Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu announced Sunday that his cabinet had unanimously voted to shut down operations of Al Jazeera in Israel. Authorities started raiding the news organization’s offices soon after.

Israel has long had a strained relationship with Al Jazeera, accusing it of anti-Israel bias and collaborating with Hamas. The decision was enabled by a law granting the government the authority to close down foreign news outlets operating in Israel if deemed a threat to national security.

Israel’s Communications Minister, Shlomo Karhi, announced on X (formerly Twitter) that he had issued orders against Al Jazeera which would take effect right away. Karhi described Al Jazeera’s operations as well-orchestrated incitement efforts that jeopardize the nation’s security. He vowed to do everything in his power over the coming months to ensure Al Jazeera could no longer operate within Israel’s borders.

In a separate post, Karhi shared video footage depicting Communications Ministry inspectors, backed by Israeli police forces, conducting a raid on Al Jazeera’s Jerusalem offices. The video showed them confiscating various equipment belonging to the channel, such as editing systems, cameras, microphones, servers, laptops, wireless transmission gear and some mobile phones.

Al Jazeera released a pre-recorded final report from their correspondent Imran Khan in Israel. Khan recorded his last report from occupied East Jerusalem, ahead of the Netanyahu government’s unanimous decision to shut down Al Jazeera’s operations in Israel. In the report, Khan explained that according to the recently passed law, the ban on Al Jazeera encompasses blocking their website and prohibiting the use of any device to provide their content. Additionally, internet service providers risk being fined if they host Al Jazeera’s website. The law’s provisions also impose a complete ban on broadcasting the Al Jazeera channel itself, prohibiting any transmission of their content by providers. Furthermore, the channel is barred from maintaining offices or conducting any operations within Israeli territory. Khan stated that this wide-ranging ban leaves uncertainty over how long these restrictions will remain in place.

Jonathan Dagher, who heads the Middle East desk at Reporters Without Borders (RSF), condemned Israel’s actions and stated:

Israel is using every possible method to try to silence Al Jazeera for its coverage of the reality of the fate of Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza since October 7th. The Israeli parliament’s vote to censor Al Jazeera, and Benjamin Netanyahu’s defamatory remarks about its journalists are unacceptable. RSF demands that the Israeli authorities end their aggressive harassment of Al Jazeera. Such censorship legislation, under the guise of democratic regulation, implicitly targeting a specific media outlet, creates a precedent fraught with dangers for journalism in Israel.

Last month, after the Israeli parliament approved a law granting senior ministers the power to shut down foreign news networks, Netanyahu said that he would take immediate action to stop operations of Al Jazeera in Israel. Calling it a terrorist channel, he also accused the network of harming Israel’s security and actively participating in the October 7th attacks. The new legislation, passed on April 1, 2024, authorized the prime minister and communications minister to temporarily close foreign media outlets operating in Israel and confiscate their equipment if they are found to be “doing actual harm to state security.” Closure orders issued under this law are valid for an initial 45-day period, with the option to renew for additional 45-day extensions. However, the law itself is a temporary measure set to expire on July 31, 2024, or earlier if the government lifts the declared state of emergency situation that prompted its passage.

Shutting down Al Jazeera is not the first attack on press freedom in Israel in recent years. RSF says that more than 100 journalists have been killed in Gaza by the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) and that pressure on journalists within Israel has escalated since the country invaded Gaza after Hamas’s October 7 attacks. Last December, Al Jazeera announced plans to file a war crimes complaint against Israel with the International Criminal Court (ICC) after the death of their photojournalist Samer Abu Daqqa in Gaza, who was killed by an alleged IDF drone strike.

Israel’s actions threaten to heighten tensions with Qatar, which partially funds the operations of Al Jazeera, at a time when Qatar is playing a key mediating role in efforts to halt the war in Gaza.