Int'l watchdog condemns Israeli violence against press

By Busra Nur Cakmak

ANKARA (AA) - International media watchdog Reporters Without Borders (RSF) on Thursday condemned Israel's "disproportionate use of force against journalists" amid escalated violence towards Palestinians.

The group "condemns Israel's disproportionate use of force against journalists, who should under no circumstances be treated as parties to the armed conflict," it said in a statement.

"Palestinian journalists, who were already struggling to work in the conditions imposed by the Israeli authorities, are once again on the front line when tension erupts," said Sabrina Bennoui, the head of RSF’s Middle East desk, was quoted as saying in a statement by the group.

Bennoui urged Israeli authorities to "desist from this disproportionate use of forces against Palestinian reporters," according to the statement which noted the "continuing violent clashes in Jerusalem with Palestinian reporters among the victims and Israeli air force attacks on media outlets in Gaza City."

It listed several journalists injured, arrested or attacked in Jerusalem -- including from Anadolu Agency -- while some 21 media outlets were destroyed in the Gaza Strip.

Several people were injured early on Thursday when the Gaza office of TRT Arabi, the Arabic service of Turkey's public broadcaster, was targeted by Israeli airstrikes while a reporter was on the air.

Meanwhile, Turgut Alp Boyraz, Anadolu Agency's Middle East news editor, was shot twice by Israeli police in two separate incidents while covering recent events in Palestine.

Boyraz, a veteran journalist with eight years of experience with the agency, was shot in the foot with a plastic bullet on May 7 while covering a raid on Al-Aqsa Mosque's surrounding Haram al-Sharif area in occupied East Jerusalem. This Monday, he was shot again in the leg with two rubber bullets in another Israeli police raid on the flashpoint mosque.

He was one of four Anadolu Agency journalists attacked by Israeli police.

Correspondent Esat Firat, who has worked for the agency since 2016, and two photographers were targeted on Monday while covering Israeli security forces' attacks on worshipers at Al-Aqsa.

Fayez Abu Rumaila, a photojournalist with Anadolu Agency based in occupied East Jerusalem since 2018, was attacked by Israeli occupation forces, also while covering the clashes at the Al-Aqsa Mosque complex.

Another of the agency's photojournalists Mustafa AlKharouf, who has covered Jerusalem since 2017, said he was hit by a rubber bullet in the chest while aiding to an injured medic.

AlKharouf said Israeli forces pushed them out of the Al-Aqsa Mosque, adding that when he left Jerusalem's Old City and headed towards his vehicle near the wall of the Al-Rahma Cemetery, he found a medic injured by shrapnel from a stun grenade.

Ongoing Israeli attacks on Gaza have killed 15 more Palestinians, taking the death toll to 87, according to the Palestinian Health Ministry.

Fatalities include 18 children and eight women, while a total of 530 people have been injured to date, it said in a statement.

Tensions have been running high in the Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood of East Jerusalem since last week when an Israeli court ordered the eviction of Palestinian families. The decision was later postponed.

Palestinians protesting in solidarity with residents of the neighborhood have been targeted by Israeli forces.

Israel occupied East Jerusalem during the 1967 Arab-Israeli war and annexed the entire city in 1980, in a move that has never been recognized by the international community.