The British broadcaster was found to have committed a "significant breach" of media regulations by failing to disclose that the narrator of a film about Gaza was the offspring of a Hamas official, according to UK media regulator Ofcom.
An probe by the broadcasting watchdog into the programme Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has concluded that the programme was "materially misleading".
The chief executive of the broadcaster had earlier expressed regret, stating there had been "a serious error in relation to factual correctness".
Ofcom has ordered the corporation to air a evening declaration about its conclusions.
"As this represents a major infringement of our regulations, we are instructing the BBC to transmit a announcement of our conclusions against it on BBC2 at 21:00, with a timing to be confirmed," the statement read.
'Risk to Erode Trust'
The regulator's announcement stated: "Our probe concluded that the programme's lack of disclosure that the voice's parent occupied a role in the Hamas-run authority was significantly deceptive.
"This implied that the audience did not have vital facts which may have been highly relevant to their judgment of the presenter and the information he provided.
"Confidence is at the center of the bond between a media organization and its viewers, particularly for a state-funded media outlet such as the British Broadcasting Corporation.
"This error had the potential to erode the very considerable degrees of trust that audiences would have put in a documentary produced by the BBC about the Israel-Gaza war."
The programme was removed from the online platform in last February after the boy's familial connections emerged, and in July an broadcaster's internal assessment concluded it breached the broadcaster's editorial guidelines on accuracy.
A corporation official stated: "The regulator's decision is in line with the results of the internal assessment, that there was a serious error in the programme in relation to the BBC's Editorial Guidelines on factual correctness, which corresponds to Rule 2.2 of Ofcom's Broadcasting Code.
"We have apologised for this and we accept the authority's determination in full. We will adhere to the sanction as soon as the timing and language are finalised."
