3/18/2024-|Last update: 3/18/202409:31 PM (Mecca time)
Al Jazeera Media Network called for the immediate release of its correspondent in Gaza, Ismail al-Ghoul, and the journalists detained with him, and held the Israeli occupation army responsible for their safety.
The network said, in a statement, that on Monday, the occupation forces attacked its correspondent, Ismail al-Ghoul, while he was carrying out his journalistic work, then arrested him and destroyed broadcast vehicles and photography equipment.
Our colleague Al-Ghoul was arrested from inside Al-Shifa Medical Complex in Gaza City, while he was covering developments in the occupation’s storming of the complex this morning.
Eyewitnesses reported that the occupation army severely beat Al-Ghoul and a number of colleagues in the press staff working with him before arresting them.
The occupation forces also destroyed broadcast vehicles belonging to press crews at Al-Shifa Medical Complex.
Journalist Mahmoud Aliwa, who is in the Al-Shifa Complex, said that the occupation soldiers beat Al-Ghoul and the crew working with him, forced them to take off their clothes, and then took them to an unknown destination.
Al Jazeera Network said, in its statement, that this targeting is “another attempt by the occupation army to intimidate journalists to prevent them from reporting the horrific crimes it is committing against innocent civilians in Gaza.”
The network confirmed that what colleague Ismail Al-Ghoul was subjected to came within a series of systematic targeting of Al-Jazeera by the occupation authorities, which included the assassination of colleagues Sherine Abu Aqla, Samer Abu Daqqa, and Hamza Al-Dahdouh, the bombing of its office in Gaza, the deliberate targeting of a number of its journalists and their family members, and the arrest and intimidation of its crews in the field. .
Al Jazeera condemned the ongoing crimes committed by the Israeli occupation forces against journalists and media professionals in Gaza, and renewed its demand for the need to immediately stop these attacks.
For its part, the US State Department said that it is communicating with the Israeli side regarding the circumstances of the arrest of Al Jazeera correspondent Ismail al-Ghoul.
Widespread condemnation
This new targeting of journalists sparked condemnation from many international human rights and journalistic bodies.
Reporters Without Borders called on Israel to immediately release Al Jazeera correspondent Ismail al-Ghoul, “who was beaten and whose equipment was destroyed.”
Irene Khan, the United Nations Special Rapporteur concerned with the promotion and protection of the right to freedom of opinion and expression, also stressed the need to hold Israel accountable for its killing and targeting of journalists despite the international protection they are supposed to enjoy.
In an interview with Al Jazeera, Khan expressed her shock at the treatment received by journalists in the Gaza Strip, and said that the number of journalists killed in Gaza exceeds the number of those killed in all previous conflicts.
For her part, Chair of the Board of Directors of the International Press Institute, Khadija Patel, said that she was shocked by the arrest of Al Jazeera correspondent Ismail Al-Ghoul by the Israeli occupation army, and called on the Israeli authorities to release all journalists.
In an intervention to Al Jazeera, Patel expressed the Institute’s concern about the prevailing “culture of impunity” and the impact of the ongoing arrests on the possibility of access to information about what is happening in Gaza.
In turn, the Committee to Protect Journalists expressed its alarm at the attack and arrest of Al Jazeera correspondent Ismail al-Ghoul by Israeli soldiers.
The committee called on the Israeli army to release Al-Ghoul and the rest of the detained Palestinian journalists immediately.
As for the Islamic Resistance Movement (Hamas), it considered Israel’s arrest of journalists while they were doing their work at the Shifa Medical Complex in Gaza City, “barbaric behavior and systematic terrorism.”
The movement said – in a statement – that the occupation aims to prevent journalists from transmitting a picture of the crimes of genocide and ethnic cleansing that our people are being subjected to.
