RAMALLAH, (PIC)
The Israeli occupation forces (IOF) stormed Al Jazeera satellite channel’s bureau in Ramallah City in the occupied West Bank and ordered its administration to shut down operations, amid a growing Israeli crackdown on media freedom.
Heavily armed and masked Israeli soldiers forcefully entered the building housing Al Jazeera’s bureau and handed a 45-day closure order to the network’s West Bank bureau chief, Walid al-Omari, early on Sunday, according to the Doha-based news network.
Omari said the Israeli military’s closure order accused the network of “incitement to and support of terrorism.”
Al Jazeera’s Jivara al-Budeiri said Israeli forces used tear gas in the vicinity of Al Jazeera’s bureau and al-Manara Square in the heart of Ramallah City. She added that Israeli soldiers confiscated their cameras.
Israeli military vehicles left Ramallah after the raid.
Sunday’s IOF raid in Ramallah, which is under full Palestinian security and civil control, comes just months after the Israeli government banned Al Jazeera from operating inside Israel last May in the wake of its devastating war on Gaza.
After the raid, Omari raised concerns about what Israeli forces might do to the office.
“Targeting journalists this way always aims to erase the truth and prevent people from hearing the truth,” he said.
For his part, Mustafa al-Barghouthi, secretary-general of the Palestinian National Initiative, said Israel has no legal right to close any office in Ramallah, which falls in Area A under the security and civil administration of the Palestinian Authority (PA). He added that Al Jazeera’s operating license was issued by the PA.
“This is the real face of Israel, a country that claims to be a democracy and claims to be supporting freedom of press,” he said.
Member of Hamas’s political bureau Ezzat al-Resheq also condemned the Israeli closure order as “a retaliatory measure against Al Jazeera’s professional role in exposing the occupation’s crimes against our people.”
“The closure of Al Jazeera’s office is the culmination of the declared war against journalists who are subjected to systematic Zionist terrorism aimed at hiding the truth.”
