When Israel ordered Al Jazeera on Sunday to cease operations there, the network had one reporter covering a government meeting in West Jerusalem, another in a hotel room in East Jerusalem, another A third reporter in northern Israel covers clashes on the border with Lebanon and a fourth reporter in northern Israel. in Tel Aviv.
But the cameras stopped rolling when Walid al-Omari, the network’s bureau chief in Ramallah, West Bank, ordered them all to go home. Israeli authorities stormed the room used by Al Jazeera in the Ambassador Hotel in East Jerusalem, confiscating broadcasting equipment. Israel’s television and internet service providers have cut channels and blocked their websites, although people can still find it online.
Al Jazeera, the influential Arab news network, said it would continue to report and broadcast from the Gaza Strip and the West Bank. But Israel’s departure marks a new low in its long history of tensions with a country that much of Al Jazeera’s audience in the Arab world and beyond sees as an invader and occupier.
The shutdown command, which lasts 45 days and can be extended, is a long time in the making. Mr. al-Omari said that shortly after the Israel-Hamas war began in October, the network stopped using its West Jerusalem office, saying far-right Israelis used intimidation tactics against employees there.
The network has played a key role in amplifying stories of the killing and suffering of Palestinians in Gaza, increasing worldwide outrage at Israel’s behavior. Many defenders of Al Jazeera argue that its activities are so powerful that Israel wants to intimidate and censor it.
However, its focus on the bloodshed in Gaza has also sparked controversy, with some Arab analysts saying it promotes what it portrays as legitimate armed resistance against Israel and brought comments from Hamas officials and fighters without much critical reaction. This network is partly funded and controlled by the Qatari government, allowing Hamas political leaders to live and operate in their country.
That makes it an attractive target for critics in Israel and beyond, who say that, at best, it represents 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 of the closure in an interview Tuesday. The Israeli government, he said, has long pursued what he called “a war against Al Jazeera.”
Emotional report
Since the October 7 Hamas-led attack on Israel and Israel’s devastating military campaign in Gaza that followed, Al Jazeera has relied on its network of journalists in the territory – the most powerful of its kind. any news outlet – to generate a steady stream of distressing information. and emotional reporting.
Broadcasts about Gaza’s growing famine crisis filled the screens of many Arab households. Videos of parents in pain clutching their dead children and the body being pulled from the rubble were posted on social media.
With other foreign news agencies blocked by Israel and Egypt’s access to Gaza, no other channel with Al Jazeera’s global audience can match its coverage there.
According to its executive editor, Mohamed Moawad, Al Jazeera has seven reporters spread across north and south Gaza, along with a large team of cameramen, producers and others. He said in an interview that Israel is “trying to delegitimize our reporting because we are the only organization reporting from the inside.”
“They want to hide what is happening in Gaza,” he added.
Shuruq Asad, spokesman for the Palestinian Journalists Association, said that without Al Jazeera’s journalists in Gaza, “we would not have known anything and they would have paid for this with their lives.” mine”.
“Unfortunately, our badges, jackets and helmets in Gaza do not give us any protection,” Hisham Zaqout, Al Jazeera’s Gaza correspondent, wrote in a WhatsApp message.
Israeli authorities did not specify a reason for banning Al Jazeera except to say it harmed Israel’s security. But since the network can continue to broadcast from Gaza and its predominantly Arab audience can still watch the channel using a virtual private network or YouTube, many Israeli commentators see the move as symbolic at best.
The Association for Civil Rights in Israel, which appealed the order to Israel’s Supreme Court, said its limited practical effect “suggests that it was implemented to suppress critical and disparaging voices.” Arab media and their viewers are the fifth column.”
Condemnation by human rights activists
Experts who monitor the network say the combination of harrowing footage from Gaza and online commentary echoing many of Hamas’s statements has fueled support for the group’s actions, not just sympathy for the Palestinians. That especially applies to the Arabic channel; it also has channels in English and other languages.
“The fact that it just provides the main platform for Hamas, Hamas officials, Hamas spokesmen, etc., the fact that it cuts off all voices critical of Hamas — it essentially makes it what it is. So on Al Jazeera, Hamas is really the spokesperson for the Palestinian people,” said Ghaith al-Omari, a Palestinian affairs analyst at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy and a former adviser to Mahmoud Abbas, president of the Palestinian Authority. Palestinian rights, said.
Al Jazeera rejected accusations that it was a mouthpiece for Hamas, saying in a statement that the Israeli ban was a “criminal act” that violated the “basic right to information.”
The shutdown of Al Jazeera’s operations has added fuel to accusations, which Israel denies, that Israel is trying to hide the devastation in Gaza.
“Israel is trying to control the narrative and is trying to shut out the Israeli audience,” said Jamil Dakwar, a law professor at New York University and founding attorney of Adalah, the Arab Legal Center. witnessed atrocities in Gaza”. Minority rights in Israel.
Sunday’s decision has been drawn condemn from human rights advocates. U.S. State Department spokesman Matthew Miller said Monday, “We think Al Jazeera should be able to operate in Israel, just as they operate in other countries.”
Analysts who follow Al Jazeera’s news say the network differentiates itself from other Arabic channels by broadcasting press conferences by Israeli officials and inviting Israeli analysts and officials to appear on wave.
But overall, Al Jazeera tends to support the views of many Arabs, presenting an analysis that “glorifies the act of resistance” against what it describes as “the aggression of the occupying settler army.” “, that is, Israel, said Mahmoud Khalil, a media outlet. research professor at Cairo University.
He added that Al Jazeera’s military analysts often exaggerate Palestinian battlefield successes and downplay Israeli achievements.
Mr. al-Omari, of the Washington Institute, said the network also overlooked the worst October 7 attack on Israel, which helped give rise to persistent denials by some Arabs about a some of the bloodiest acts Palestinian attackers have committed there. .
Early in the war, Al Jazeera posted on social media one videotapes released by Hamas for the purpose of showing it to the attackers take care of the children at an Israeli kibbutz they attacked on October 7, leaving out the context: They killed the children’s mother. It attracted 1.4 million views on Facebook.
When asked about the video, Mr. Moawad said that the network also broadcast live an Israeli military spokesman saying that Hamas attackers had captured women and children from the kibbutz.
“We are airing footage from both sides without editing to ensure viewers are up to date with developments and have heard both sides,” he said in a statement.
Al Jazeera has been banned in other countries, including Arab states, which accuse the network of reporting bias and supporting Islamist political movements – some of which are violent – which those countries have suppressed.
Mr. Khalil, of Cairo University, said that for many Arabs wary of Islamist groups, Al Jazeera’s amplification of the voice of Hamas was a turning point.
Ms. Asad, of the Palestinian Journalists Association, said that imbalance or shortcomings in reporting were not grounds for a ban, which critics of the decision said put Israel in the same boat. similar to other authoritarian governments that have suppressed unfriendly media. .
“No one has the right to shut down Israeli television, CNN, or anyone has the right to silence them,” she said.
Report contributed by Adam Rasgon And Johnatan Reiss from Jerusalem, Emad Mekay from Cairo and Iyad Abuheweila from Istanbul.
