Israel enforces Al Jazeera ban with military raid against West Bank bureau News
 / IDF Spokesperson's Unit
Israel enforces Al Jazeera ban with military raid against West Bank bureau

Israeli troops raided Al Jazeera’s offices in the West Bank on Sunday and ordered the bureau to shut down for 45 days amid a widening crackdown on Al Jazeera that began in May.

According to Al Jazeera, heavily armed and masked Israeli soldiers forcefully entered the network’s building in Ramallah and handed a 45-day closure order to the West Bank bureau chief, Walid al-Omari. According to Al-Omari, the order accused the network of supporting terrorism.

The raid appears to violate the Oslo Accords, which state that internal security and public order in this area of the West Bank is under the jurisdiction of the Palestinian Authority. The Israeli military’s actions, including the confiscation of equipment and the enforced closure of the office, appear to undermine the autonomy established under these agreements, effectively disregarding the Palestinian Authority’s jurisdiction in that area.

The raid also undermines press freedoms that are enshrined in the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, which Israel ratified in 1991. Israel has received extensive international criticism for killing, torturing, injuring and arresting journalists reporting on the war in Gaza. Al Jazeera states that 173 journalists have been killed since the beginning of the war.

Journalist Jivara Budeiri reported that the soldiers “used tear gas in the vicinity” of the bureau and confiscated their cameras. Budeiri added that there is a fear that the Israeli military will destroy Al Jazeera’s archives, which are stored within the office.

In May, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu announced a ban on Al Jazeera broadcasts, accusing them of instigating and inciting violence in the ongoing war in Gaza. A month following the announcement of the ban, the Israeli Minister of Communications announced that it would be extended. Minister Shlomo Karhi labelled Al Jazeera a “terrorist channel”, and stated that there is optimism for the “extension of the time limit established in the law authorizing the Minister…to act against foreign broadcasters that harm the security of the state”.

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