The British broadcaster committed a "serious breach" of broadcasting rules by failing to disclose that the presenter of a programme about Gaza was the offspring of a Hamas administrator, according to British broadcasting authority Ofcom.
An investigation by the media regulator into the programme Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has concluded that the documentary was "significantly deceptive".
The BBC's director general had earlier expressed regret, saying there had been "a significant failing in relation to accuracy".
The regulator has instructed the BBC to transmit a prime-time announcement about its decisions.
"As this represents a serious breach of our rules, we are ordering the corporation to transmit a announcement of our findings against it on BBC Two at 9pm, with a date to be confirmed," it said.
'Potential to Damage Confidence'
The watchdog's statement declared: "The inquiry we conducted found that the film's omission to reveal that the voice's parent served in a post in the Hamas-controlled administration was materially misleading.
"This implied that the audience did not have vital facts which may have been very significant to their assessment of the voice and the content he shared.
"Credibility is at the center of the relationship between a media organization and its viewers, especially for a state-funded media outlet such as the public broadcaster.
"This oversight had the risk to erode the very considerable levels of credibility that viewers would have placed in a documentary produced by the BBC about the Gaza conflict."
The documentary was pulled from the BBC's streaming service in February after the presenter's family links emerged, and in the month of July an broadcaster's internal assessment concluded it breached the broadcaster's journalistic standards on factual correctness.
A representative for the broadcaster said: "The Ofcom ruling is in agreement with the results of Peter Johnston's review, that there was a serious error in the documentary in relation to the corporation's content standards on truthfulness, which corresponds to clause 2.2 of the regulator's media standards.
"We expressed regret for this and we agree with Ofcom's decision in full. We will comply with the sanction as soon as the timing and wording are determined."
