DOHA, (PIC)
Member of Hamas’s political bureau Ezzat al-Resheq has expressed his belief that the “Israeli occupation state fears nothing as much as it fears truth and resistance.”
“As for the resistance, led by al-Qassam Brigades, it has inflicted heavy battlefield losses upon the Nazi army,” Resheq said in a statement on Tuesday.
“However, the truth is the historical enemy of the usurping [Zionist] entity, which was established and founded on making lies and stealing land, as it exposes the ugliness of its criminal nature,” Resheq added.
The Hamas official stressed that the Israeli army’s failure to stand in the face of the Palestinian resistance prompted it to commit massacres against civilians, while the media’s role in telling the truth made it suppress news outlets and kill journalists and reporters.
“The occupation state’s commodity consists of lies, murder and abuse,” the Hamas official said.
He said that his Movement condemned the Israeli crackdown on the Associated Press, but it was not surprised to see the news agency exposed to such repression by the Israeli occupation authority.
“AP was founded in May 1846. It is 100 years older than Israel. Perhaps it is an additional factor that reflects the [Zionist] entity’s deep hatred for everything that has a history and roots,” he underlined.
In a related context, the Hamas Movement released a statement on Tuesday denouncing the Israeli authorities for confiscating the broadcast equipment of the Associated Press, calling the measure as a “repeated arbitrary and oppressive act against press freedom” and “aimed at preventing the world from knowing its crimes and violations against the Palestinian people.”
“It is a fascist behavior that reflects that the [Zionist] entity lies about respecting the values of human rights and press freedom, and this also confirms that Israel is one of the world’s worst repressive regimes,” Hamas said.
“The occupation’s restrictions on The Associated Press and previously its closure of Al Jazeera’s offices, as well as the deliberate targeting of Palestinian journalists in Gaza and the West Bank and the prevention of international journalists from entering Gaza to report the crimes that are committed by the criminal occupation army, entail widespread international condemnation and effective action by international media bodies to pressure this rogue entity to stop suppressing and targeting journalists, news offices and the journalistic work in general,” the Movement stressed.
At the behest of the Israeli government, the Israeli police seized on Tuesday cameras and broadcast equipment belonging to the Associated Press in southern Israel after accusing the news agency of violating a new media law.
The law, passed by the Israeli parliament in April, allows the Israeli authorities to shut down foreign media outlets if it deems them a security threat.
Recently, the Israeli police raided and closed Al Jazeera’s offices and banned its websites and broadcasts in the country.
On Tuesday, Israeli minister of communications Shlomo Karhi accused AP of ignoring warnings and continuing to provide services to Al Jazeera network, which has been extensively covering Israel’s genocidal war on the Gaza Strip since October 7, 2023.
