Israel says Al Jazeera journalist it killed in Gaza was Hamas 'sniper'

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00:00Israel has reacted to condemnation of its killing of two journalists in the Gaza Strip

00:04by accusing one of them of being a Hamas sniper.

00:08Now Israel on a regular basis accuses al-Jazeera media of working with militant groups.

00:13The militant group, the media group al-Jazeera denies any involvement.

00:18Hussam Shabbat was one of the best-known journalists in Gaza.

00:22Gaza's civil defence agency said that Shabbat was killed when an Israeli drone struck his car

00:28on Monday afternoon near a petrol station in the northern town of Beit Lahiya.

00:32The other journalist who was killed was Mohamed Mansour,

00:36who worked for a media which is described as pro-Islamic jihad called Palestine Today.

00:41Now Israel says, without providing proof, that Shabbat was a sniper terrorist from

00:46the Beit Hanoun battalion of the Hamas terrorist organisation,

00:50who was also employed as journalist by al-Jazeera.

00:54That's how it's stated on paper.

00:58Let's bring in Jodie Ginsberg who's on the committee to protect journalists.

01:01Jodie, a very good evening to you.

01:03Two colleagues killed covering a war.

01:08This is not a good sign for freedom of speech

01:12and certainly not a good sign that the truth will be coming out about what's happening.

01:16No it's not and these two killings bring to 173 the number of journalists and media workers

01:23that we have documented at the committee to protect journalists as having been killed

01:28since the start of the Gaza war.

01:30Last year was the deadliest year for journalists worldwide that CPJ has ever documented

01:36and two-thirds of those killings were carried out by Israel.

01:40And the thing is that freedom of speech also suffers in times of war because

01:46if journalists can't go into places and bring back the story,

01:49the public won't find out what's going on.

01:52Is there though an interest here to target journalists to prevent the story getting out?

01:57Well it's the old adage isn't it that truth is the first casualty in war and certainly

02:03what we have seen over the past year and a half is a systematic attempt to control

02:08the information coming out of Gaza.

02:09Remember no foreign journalists have been allowed into Gaza to report on what's happening

02:14except on very strictly controlled trips controlled by the Israeli army.

02:18So we are entirely reliant on Palestinian journalists for information about what's

02:22happening inside of Gaza.

02:25So in addition to the killings that we've seen, we've seen a pattern where we think

02:29there are at least 14 targeted deliberate killings of journalists but we've seen the

02:36killings of journalists, we've seen the arrests of journalists at record levels for Israel,

02:41we've seen the targeting of infrastructure, media infrastructure and of course the censoring

02:48of news outlets including Al Jazeera in Israel but also the Israeli news outlet Haaretz where

02:54the government said that it would remove government advertising for its stance on the war.

02:59So that's all part of a pattern that we see in which Israel deliberately tries to control

03:04information coming out about the war.

03:06Indeed I can back up completely what you're saying Julie about trying to get into Gaza.

03:09I was there end of January, beginning of February on a two-week assignment and getting into

03:13the Gaza Strip was just an impossible task to try to attempt because of the fact you

03:19pointed out that Israel has closed all access.

03:21That's being controlled very, very, very strictly by Israel in that sense and of course then

03:26trying to tell the story becomes more and more difficult.

03:29All the while with this sense that you are under threat, what would you call for from

03:34the authorities, from the people who can change things to protect journalists?

03:39Clearly this is a situation where you have one side perhaps trying to stop the truth

03:44getting out and those who are trying to expose that will automatically be at risk.

03:48So first and foremost we would call on Israel to stop targeting of journalists.

03:54The deliberate targeting of any civilian and journalists are considered civilians in a war

04:00is considered a war crime so immediately to prevent that we would strongly urge and continue

04:06to urge Israel to allow foreign media into Gaza to be able to report on what's happening

04:13inside Gaza and to cease the censorship of news outlets from Israel and writing about

04:21Gaza.

04:21Those are the things that can be done immediately to improve the situation and of course to

04:26stop smearing without credible evidence those journalists who continue to report.

04:31One of the things that we've seen repeatedly during this war but in the preceding two decades

04:38is Israel frequently smearing journalists as terrorists most frequently after those

04:44journalists have been killed but in the case for example of Hossam Shabbat in advance of

04:48his killing and yet producing no credible evidence to suggest that those individuals

04:53were terrorists and of course that sows doubt in the mind of the public about whether or

04:57not those individuals are trustworthy.

05:00It's worth repeating just in case people didn't catch that no proof that Shabbat, Mr

05:05Shabbat was a Hamas sniper as Israel's claiming.

05:10We've seen no credible evidence that Mr Shabbat is a terrorist was a terrorist and this is

05:16not an isolated case we've seen this repeatedly in the cases of journalists who have been

05:20killed and subsequently Israel alleging that they were considered terrorists but providing

05:26absolutely no credible evidence and Israel has never been held accountable for the killing

05:31of any journalist for the past 24 years.

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