“Israel said it carried out Saturday’s raid on Al Jazeera’s bureau in the West Bank after concluding that the news network’s offices there were ‘being used to incite terror,’” reported Bloomberg. “An ‘up-to-date intelligence assessment’ determined that ‘the channel’s broadcasts endanger the security and public order,’ the Israel Defense Forces said in a statement.”
Staffers at the Ramallah bureau broadcast the initial moments live of the tense confrontation with heavily armed Israeli forces, who ejected workers, confiscated cameras and other equipment and declared the office closed for 45 days. Security officials also reportedly tore down a banner celebrating the journalist Shireen Abu Akleh, a prominent Palestinian-American reporter who was shot and killed by the IDF in 2022.
The move comes after the Israeli Knesset voted to close Al Jazeera’s offices in Israel proper four months ago, raiding the news outlet’s bureaus in Nazareth and East Jerusalem. Legislation passed in May provided Israeli authorities with significant latitude to shut down news outlets accused of threatening Israeli national security.
Al Jazeera has devoted significant resources to documenting Israel’s military operation in the besieged Gaza Strip, which has killed over 41,400 according to the latest official figures, as well as escalating settler violence in the West Bank.
Al Jazeera denounced the closure of the Ramallah bureau in a statement online, noting that it lies within territory under the sovereign control of Palestinian authorities under international law. Israel has illegally occupied Gaza and the West Bank since 1967, also seizing control of Syria’s Golan Heights and annexing Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula and portions of southern Lebanon until forced to surrender the territory after international pressure. Israel’s control of the Syrian and Palestinian territories represents the longest military occupation in modern world history.
“Al Jazeera rejects the draconian actions and the unfounded allegations presented by Israeli authorities to justify these illegal raids,” said Al Jazeera in a statement posted to the X platform. “Al Jazeera reaffirms its unwavering commitment to continue reporting on the war on Gaza and the ongoing occupation of the Palestinian territories and the regional escalation.”
“The raid on the office and seizure of our equipment is not only an attack on Al Jazeera but an affront to press freedom and the very principles of journalism. These oppressive measures are clearly intended to prevent the world from witnessing the reality of the situation in the occupied territories and the ongoing war on Gaza and the devastating impact on innocent civilians… Al Jazeera will not be intimidated or deterred by efforts to silence its coverage.
The US-based Committee to Protect Journalists also slammed the move, saying it was “deeply alarmed” by the forced closure of the Ramallah office.
“Israel’s efforts to censor Al Jazeera severely undermine the public’s right to information on a war that has upended so many lives in the region,” read a statement by the organization’s program director Carlos Martínez de la Serna.
Violence by Israeli settlers and security forces has been on the increase in the West Bank, although the situation there often fails to make headlines as the country’s aggression in Gaza and Lebanon stokes fears of a regional war. In October video emerged of controversial Israeli Minister of National Security Itamar Ben-Gvir distributing rifles to so-called “civilian security teams” in the occupied territory.
In March, Ben-Gvir celebrated distributing his 100,000th gun license since October 7.
According to analysis recently released by the group Defense for Children International Palestine (DCIP), one child has been killed every two days in the West Bank over the last 11 months. UNICEF noted that the figure represents “a spike of nearly 250 per cent compared to the preceding nine months.”
An average of five children are killed or injured daily in the West Bank, according to the organization Save the Children.
“More than 440 Palestinian children have been injured with live ammunition,” UNICEF has reported. “The increasing tensions in the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, are also impacting the physical and mental well-being of thousands of children and families, who are now living in daily fear for their lives. Children report being scared to walk around their neighbourhoods, or to travel to school.”
“We are seeing frequent allegations of Palestinian children being detained on their way home from school, or shot while walking on the streets,” said UNICEF Executive Director Catherine Russell. “The violence needs to stop now.”
Some 116 journalists and media workers have been killed since the beginning of Israel’s latest military operation against Hamas said the Committee to Protect Journalists, calling it “the deadliest period for journalists since CPJ began gathering data.” Casualties in the ongoing Russia-Ukraine conflict have received disproportionate coverage in Western media, but the group noted that more than twice as many journalists had been killed by Israel in just one month of fighting as had died in 18 months of conflict in the Donbass.