The British broadcaster engaged in a "significant breach" of broadcasting rules by failing to disclose that the narrator of a programme about the Gaza situation was the child of a Hamas representative, as determined by British broadcasting authority Ofcom.
An investigation by Ofcom into the documentary titled Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has determined that the film was "significantly deceptive".
The chief executive of the broadcaster had already issued an apology, stating there had been "a significant failing in relation to factual correctness".
The authority has directed the broadcaster to broadcast a prime-time statement about its decisions.
"Since this amounts to a major infringement of our code, we are directing the BBC to transmit a announcement of our conclusions against it on the BBC's second channel at nine o'clock in the evening, with a date to be confirmed," the statement read.
'Risk to Undermine Confidence'
The authority's announcement stated: "Our probe concluded that the film's failure to disclose that the voice's father held a position in the Hamas-controlled government was materially misleading.
"This implied that the public did not have essential details which may have been extremely pertinent to their judgment of the narrator and the details he presented.
"Credibility is at the heart of the relationship between a media organization and its viewers, especially for a state-funded media outlet such as the BBC.
"This oversight had the risk to undermine the very considerable degrees of confidence that audiences would have placed in a documentary produced by the BBC about the conflict in Gaza."
The film was withdrawn from the BBC's streaming service in February after the narrator's familial connections came to light, and in July an corporation's own inquiry determined it infringed the broadcaster's journalistic standards on accuracy.
A corporation official commented: "The regulator's decision is in accordance with the findings of Peter Johnston's review, that there was a major oversight in the documentary in relation to the BBC's Editorial Guidelines on factual correctness, which reflects Rule 2.2 of the regulator's media standards.
"We expressed regret for this and we comply with the authority's determination in complete. We will follow the sanction as soon as the date and wording are confirmed."
