They Shoot Reporters, Don’t They?
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By
Yusuf Agha
Historian - USA
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24/06/2002
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Cameraman
in Ramallah |
This article is dedicated to Anthony
Shadid, a Boston Globe reporter, who had both shoulders shot
out by Israeli forces during the Israeli siege of Palestine, but
lacked the moral courage to place the blame squarely where it
belonged.
Anthony
Shadid reported on the onslaught of the Israeli forces on Palestine
in April this year. In a leading feature entitled “Blood on the
boundaries” for the Sunday section, he was eyewitness to three
onslaughts by Israeli forces on civilian areas in a single day - two
of them on Palestinian hospitals.
Shadid
writes how soldiers, springing out of armored personnel carriers and
crouching behind cars and along walls, trained their rifles on
bewildered doctors and staff. “In the Mideast,” muses Shadid,
“the red lines that shielded civilians, medical workers, and
journalists have been ignored.”
In
one of these onslaughts, Shadid experienced first hand the pain and
suffering of the Palestinian people: simply stated, he was shot.
“I began to fall, even before I heard the shot… I crumbled to
the ground… Then I felt a sharp sting on my spine.”
His
Palestinian stringer took Shadid to the Arabcare Hospital where he
was treated by medics. A bullet entered his left shoulder and exited
though his right.
“The
Israeli military was in complete control of the area and had been
for days. There was no crossfire,” admits Shadid. Even during his
internment in the hospital, Israeli soldiers raided the premises:
“Two soldiers with guns drawn entered my room,” the narration
continues, “shouting at me in Hebrew… they lined up suspects
along the wall of the hallway, young Palestinian men whose wrists
were bound by plastic handcuffs.”
And yet Shadid - himself brutalized by the Israeli army, witness to
the havoc and humiliation being rained down on Palestinian doctors
and patients, rescued by a Palestinian stringer, and nursed to
health by Arab medics - has not one word of disdain for the
inhumanity of his Israeli tormentors, not one word of kindness for
his Palestinian saviors.
If
Shadid failed to figure out the strategy behind his shooting, Julie
Hyland of WSWS.org
did not. She believes that “the Israeli Defense Force (IDF) is
employing intimidation and violence against international
journalists in an effort to prevent them reporting on its brutal
occupation of Palestinian towns.”
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Anthony
Shadid |
The
assault on Shadid is not an isolated case. The Committee for the
Protection of Journalists (CPJ) reports a near identical case: “On
May 15, Bertrand Aguirre, a correspondent for the French television
channel TF1, was hit in the chest by a bullet fired by an Israeli
border policeman while he was covering clashes between Palestinian
demonstrators and Israeli troops near the West Bank city of Ramallah…
Aguirre might have been killed had he not been wearing a bulletproof
vest.”
The
shooting of journalists by the Israeli Forces, states the CPJ, “is
the most dangerous and immediate threat to media professionals
covering the current unrest. The large number who have been wounded
- many under circumstances that clearly distinguished them from the
parties to the conflict - raises questions about the IDF’s
willingness to ensure the safety of journalists.”
The
Guardian of London reports an incident where Israeli troops
threw stun grenades at a convoy of 25 foreign journalists who were
on their way to cover a meeting between Yasser Arafat and a U.S.
diplomat: “The [Israeli] soldiers inside the jeeps then threw stun
grenades at the journalists. The grenades are used to disorient and
frighten their targets by creating a loud noise and giving off a
bright flash.
“As
the convoy turned back, some of the journalists left their vehicles
and fled on foot but the Israeli border police gave chase and
confiscated the identification cards of some of the journalists. A
bullet hole was later discovered in the car used by the CNN crew.”
Reporters
without Borders (RSF) has documented at least 45 cases of
journalists injured by bullets since the start of the second
Intifada, many of whom were seriously wounded. Of these, states an
RSF release, “more than 30 journalists have been wounded in
shooting by the Israeli army in the Occupied Territories. Most were
photographers or cameramen, clearly identifiable as such and shot
some distance away from clashes.”
Indeed,
the hero of our story, Anthony Shadid writes that he was clad in a
flak jacket, with “ ‘TV’ written prominently with red tape on
our backs, the best-known symbol for the international press.”
In
most cases, continues the RSF release, “RSF imputed responsibility
to the Israeli army and asked it to expedite its inquiries. In
mid-December 2001, 15 months after the first clashes, the Israeli
defense ministry made the results of its inquiries public. Only nine
cases of journalists were mentioned in the document which exonerated
Tsahal [Israeli forces] in all cases but one.”
Reporters
without Borders has established a list of “Predators” - persons
who order violations of press freedom and have others do the deed.
These lists of “luminaries” include Robert Mugabe, Saddam
Hussain - and Shaul Moffaz, army chief of staff of the Israeli
Defense Forces.
The
Israeli assault on journalists has taken an added dimension when it
comes to Palestinian reporters, even those working for major
international networks. “Since January 2002,” reports Reporters
without Borders, “most of them have not been able to renew their
press cards, without which they cannot travel between Israel and the
different territories. On 19 January 2002, the Israeli Army
destroyed the building in Ramallah housing the Palestinian radio and
television headquarters.”
In
a separate incident, Israeli soldiers captured a six-story building
housing the offices of Reuters and other foreign media.
The
list of reporters shot by Israeli forces continues: Carlos Handal of
Nile Television; the Italian photographer Raffaelli Ciriello, killed
by Israeli troops in Amari refugee camp; Jussry al-Jamal, a
23-year-old Reuters television cameraman, detained in the West Bank
city of Hebron, to name a few.
“When
a city is occupied, horrible things happen,” states the Israeli
newspaper Ha’aretz. “The Israeli and world media need to
be there in order to document what is going on.”
Yet
during the rape of Palestine, the media was prevented by the Israeli
forces from entering or reporting from the cities under siege.
“The city of Ramallah,” states The Christian Science Monitor,
“continued to be off limits to reporters yesterday after two
journalists were shot.” The report continues: “During this
decisive period, strictures on the media, as well as mounting danger
faced by journalists, promise to significantly curtail the flow of
information for shaping opinion and making policy decisions.”
“The
Israeli army is waging an appalling campaign that has targeted media
and journalists,” says Aidan White, General Secretary of the
International Federation of Journalists. “Reporters continue to be
detained, shot at and victimized. It is an unprecedented campaign
against press freedom and a reckless war on media that should not go
unpunished.”
If
there was not a squeak of protest out of the mainstream press - CNN,
Reuters, or the Boston Globe, the latter recently bought out
by the New York Times - they were not alone.
“No
Western government has protested against the attacks on journalists,
even those from national state TV stations,” writes Julie Hyland.
Quite to the contrary, it was during this very period that both
houses of the U.S. Congress came up with a resolution endorsing
whole-heartedly all actions by Israel.
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Robert
Fisk |
Shadid
is one of the few reporters who have reported incidents of
Israel’s battle against journalists, most probably because he
“became” the story. But while reporters, through their unions
and societies, clamor and yell bloody murder, their voices in the
mainstream media are stifled and silent.
Writing for The Independent, Robert Fisk tells of “When
Journalists Refuse To Tell the Truth About Israel”: “Our
gutlessness, our refusal to tell the truth, our fear of being
slandered as “anti-Semites” - the most loathsome of libels
against any journalist – means that we are aiding and abetting
terrible deeds in the Middle East. Maybe we should look up those
cuttings of the apartheid era and remember when men were not without
honor.”
It
is a supreme irony that when the journalists themselves are
embattled, the printer’s ink has run dry of honor. Is the pen of
the reporter - muzzled by the control of the Zionist lobby - no
longer mightier than the blood-drenched sword of Israel?
The
author encourages your comments. Please e-mail him at yagha@YellowTimes.org
This
article was originally published in YellowTimes.org. For a complete
version please view source www.yellowtimes.org
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