When Israel ordered Al Jazeera to shut down its operations on Sunday, the channel sent a journalist to cover a government meeting in West Jerusalem, another to a hotel room in East Jerusalem, a third to the north of Jerusalem. Israel to cover clashes on the border with Lebanon and a fourth. in Tel Aviv.
But the cameras stopped rolling when Walid al-Omari, the network’s bureau chief in Ramallah, West Bank, ordered everyone to return home. Israeli authorities descended on a room used by Al Jazeera at the Ambassador Hotel in East Jerusalem, confiscating broadcast equipment. Israeli television and internet providers cut his channels and blocked his websites, although people could still find him online.
Al Jazeera, the influential Arab news network, says it will continue reporting and broadcasting from the Gaza Strip and the West Bank. But his departure from Israel marks a new low in its long, tense history with a country that much of Al Jazeera’s audience in the Arab world and beyond views as an aggressor and occupier.
The shutdown order, which lasts 45 days and can be renewed, was a break long in the making. Mr. al-Omari said that shortly after the start of the war between Israel and Hamas in October, the network stopped using an office in West Jerusalem, claiming that far-right Israelis had used tactics of intimidation against staff.
The network played a major role in amplifying stories of killings and suffering of Palestinians in Gaza, thereby increasing global outrage over Israel’s conduct. Many of Al Jazeera’s defenders say its work is so powerful that Israel wants to intimidate and censor it.
But the focus on bloodshed in Gaza has also generated controversy, with some Arab analysts saying it encourages what it describes as legitimate armed resistance to Israel and features comments from Hamas officials and fighters without any critical reaction. The network is supported by the government of Qatar, which allows Hamas political leaders to live and operate in its country.
That makes him a compelling target for critics in Israel and beyond, who say he presents, at best, a one-sided view of the war. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu accused Al Jazeera of inciting violence against Israel and harming Israel’s security.
“We knew it was a matter of time,” Mr. al-Omari said Tuesday of closing the facilities. The Israeli government, he said, has long waged what he calls “a war against Al Jazeera.”
An emotional report
Since Hamas’s attack on Israel on October 7 and the devastating Israeli military campaign in Gaza that followed, Al Jazeera has relied on its network of journalists in the territory – the strongest of any media outlet – to produce a constant stream of harrowing information. and emotionally charged reports.
Its broadcasts on the growing food crisis in Gaza fill the screens of many Arab homes. His videos of anguished parents clutching their dead children and bodies pulled from the rubble flood social media.
While other foreign media outlets are blocked by Israel and Egypt from accessing Gaza, no outlet with a global audience of Al Jazeera can match the breadth of its coverage there.
Al Jazeera has seven correspondents stretching from the north to the south of Gaza, according to its editor-in-chief, Mohamed Moawad, as well as a large team of cameramen, producers and others. He said in an interview that Israel was “trying to delegitimize our media coverage because we are the only organization covering it from the inside.”
“They want to hide what is happening in Gaza,” he added.
Shuruq Asad, spokesperson for the Palestinian Journalists Union, said that without Al Jazeera journalists in Gaza, “we would not have been able to know anything, and they paid for it with their lives.”
“Unfortunately, our badges, vests and helmets in Gaza did not provide us with any protection,” Hisham Zaqout, Al Jazeera correspondent in Gaza, wrote in a WhatsApp message.
Israeli authorities have not specified their reasons for banning Al Jazeera, except to say that it harmed Israel’s security. But given that the channel can continue broadcasting from Gaza and its predominantly Arab audience can still watch the channel through virtual private networks or YouTube, many Israeli commentators have called the move symbolic at best.
The Association for Civil Rights in Israel, which appealed the decision to the Israeli High Court, said its limited practical effect “suggests that it was designed to silence critical voices and to brand the media.” Arabs and their viewers as a fifth column.
Condemnation by rights defenders
Experts who follow the channel say its mix of vivid images from Gaza and on-air commentary echoing many of Hamas’ claims builds support for the group’s actions, not just sympathy for the Palestinians. This particularly applies to its Arabic-language channel; it also offers channels in English and other languages.
“The fact that he’s just giving the main platform to Hamas, to Hamas officials, to Hamas spokespeople, et cetera, the fact that he’s cutting off all voices critical of Hamas – that has “Basically, on Al Jazeera, Hamas is really the spokesperson for the Palestinian people,” said Ghaith al-Omari, an analyst of Palestinian affairs at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy and a former adviser to Mahmoud Abbas. , the president of the Palestinian Authority.
Al Jazeera rejects accusations that it is a spokesperson for Hamas, saying in a statement that Israel’s ban is a “criminal act” that violates “the fundamental right to access information.”
The shutdown of Al Jazeera’s operations fueled allegations, denied by Israel, that Israel was trying to hide the devastation in Gaza.
“Israel is trying to control the narrative, and it is trying to deprive even the Israeli public of seeing the atrocities being committed in Gaza,” said Jamil Dakwar, a law professor at New York University and founding attorney of Adalah, the Center legal for Arab countries. Minority rights in Israel.
Sunday’s decision sparked condemnation from rights advocates. A US State Department spokesperson, Matthew Miller, said on Monday: “We believe Al Jazeera should be able to operate in Israel, as it operates in other countries. »
Analysts who follow Al Jazeera’s media coverage say the channel differentiates itself from other Arabic-language channels by broadcasting press conferences by Israeli officials and inviting Israeli analysts and officials to appear on air.
But in general, Al Jazeera tends to adopt the opinions of many Arabs, broadcasting analyzes “that glorify the act of resistance” against what it describes as “an aggression by the occupying settler army.” ‘meaning Israel,’ said media outlet Mahmoud Khalil. professor of studies at Cairo University.
He added that Al Jazeera’s military analysts often exaggerated Palestinian battlefield successes and downplayed Israeli gains.
Mr. al-Omari of the Washington Institute said the network also averted the worst Oct. 7 attacks on Israel, helping to give rise to lingering denials among some Arabs about some of the attackers’ bloodiest acts. Palestinians there. .
At the start of the war, Al Jazeera posted on social media a video released by Hamas that purported to show its attackers caring for children on an Israeli kibbutz they had attacked on October 7, leaving out the context: they had killed the children’s mother. It attracted 1.4 million views on Facebook.
Asked about the video, Mr. Moawad said the channel also broadcast live footage of an Israeli army spokesperson saying Hamas attackers had taken women and children from the kibbutz.
“We air and broadcast footage from both sides without editing to ensure our viewers are aware of developments and have heard both sides,” he said in a statement.
Al Jazeera has been banned in other countries, including Arab states that have accused the network of biased reporting and support for Islamist political movements — some of them violent — that those countries have repressed.
For many Arabs who distrust Islamist groups, Al Jazeera’s amplification of Hamas voices is a turn-off, said Mr. Khalil of Cairo University.
Ms. Asad, of the Palestinian Journalists’ Union, said imbalances or omissions in media coverage should not justify a ban, which critics of the decision say would put Israel in the same category as other authoritarian governments who cracked down on hostile news media. .
“No one has the right to shut down Israeli television, to silence CNN or anyone,” she said.
The report was provided by Adam Rasgon And John Reiss from Jerusalem, Emad Mekay from Cairo, and Iyad Abuheweila from Istanbul.
News Source : www.nytimes.com
Gn world
