Al Jazeera Media Network has submitted a formal request to the International Criminal Court (ICC) to investigate and prosecute those responsible for killing Palestinian-American journalist Shireen Abu Akleh.
Abu Akleh a television correspondent with Al Jazeera for 25 years was shot dead by the Israeli occupation forces (IOF) on May 11 as she was covering an Israeli military raid on a refugee camp in Jenin in the northern occupied West Bank.
The 51-year-old Jerusalem native and US citizen was a widely respected journalist who gave a voice to Palestinians through her coverage of the Israeli occupation and its violations.
The request includes a dossier on a comprehensive six-month investigation by Al Jazeera that contains all available eyewitness evidence and video footage as well as new material on the killing of Abu Akleh.
The new evidence submitted by Al Jazeera shows “Shireen and her colleagues were directly fired at by the IOF” Al Jazeera said in a statement on Tuesday.
The statement said the evidence overturns claims by Israeli authorities that Shireen was killed in crossfire and it “confirms without any doubt that there was no firing in the area where Shireen was other than the IOF shooting directly at her.”
“The evidence shows that this deliberate killing was part of a wider campaign to target and silence Al Jazeera” the statement added.
