Al Jazeera shut down in Israel, PM Benjamin Netanyahu says

Sunday’s emergency order, which included seizing broadcast equipment, preventing the channel’s reports from airing and blocking its websites, is believed to be the first time Israel has shut down a foreign media outlet.

Al Jazeera shut down Israel’s main cable provider in the hours following the order. However, its website and streaming links on multiple online platforms were still working on Sunday (early Monday AEST).

Although it includes on-the-ground reports on war casualties, its Arab branch often publishes verbatim video statements from Hamas and other armed groups in the region, drawing Netanyahu’s ire.

“Al Jazeera reporters harmed Israel’s security and incited against soldiers,” Netanyahu said in a statement.

“It is time to remove the mouthpiece of Hamas from our country.

Al Jazeera issued a statement vowing to “pursue all available legal channels through international legal institutions in an effort to protect both its rights and the rights of journalists and the public’s right to information.”

“Israel’s continued suppression of the free press, seen as an attempt to cover up its actions in the Gaza Strip, is contrary to international and humanitarian law,” the network said.

“Israel’s direct targeting and killing of journalists, arrests, intimidation and threats will not deter Al Jazeera from its commitment to cover while more than 140 Palestinian journalists have been killed since the start of the Gaza war.”

The Israeli government has cracked down on individual reporters in the decades since its founding in 1948, but it generally tolerates a fierce media scene that includes foreign bureaus from around the world, even from Arab nations.

That changed with a law passed last month that Netanyahu’s office says allows the government to take action against a foreign channel deemed “harmful to the country.”

The statement from Netanyahu’s office said that under a law passed last month, the government could take action against a foreign channel deemed “harmful to the country”.

Israeli media said the vote allows Israel to block the channel’s operation in the country for 45 days, according to the ruling.

Immediately after the announcement, Al Jazeera’s English branch began broadcasting a pre-recorded message from one of its correspondents from a hotel the channel has been using for months in East Jerusalem, which the Palestinians hope to one day own as their future state.

“They are also banning all devices – including my mobile phone,” said correspondent Imran Khan.

“If I use it to do some news gathering, then the Israelis can just confiscate it.”

The ban does not appear to affect the channel’s operations in the occupied West Bank or Gaza Strip, where Israel exercises control but which are not sovereign Israeli territory.

The decision threatens to exacerbate tensions with Qatar at a time when the government in Doha is playing a key role in mediating efforts to end the war in Gaza, along with Egypt and the United States.

Qatar has had a strained relationship with Netanyahu, particularly after he made comments suggesting that Qatar was not putting enough pressure on Hamas to get it to budge on its terms of a truce deal. Qatar hosts Hamas leaders in exile.

The two sides appear to be close to reaching a deal, but several previous rounds of talks have ended without agreement.

In a statement on Sunday, Hamas condemned the Israeli government’s order, calling on international organizations to take action against Israel.

Shortly after the government’s decision, cabinet members from the National Unity Party criticized its timing, saying it “could sabotage efforts to finalize negotiations and was politically motivated.” The party said they generally support the decision.

Those relations deteriorated further after the outbreak of Israel’s war against Hamas on October 7, when the militant group carried out a cross-border attack in southern Israel that killed 1,200 people and took 250 others hostage.

Since then, Israel’s military campaign in Gaza has killed more than 34,000 people, according to local health officials there, who do not break down the numbers into civilians and fighters.

In December, an Israeli strike killed an Al Jazeera cameraman while he was reporting on the war in southern Gaza. The channel’s Gaza bureau chief, Wael Daduh, was wounded in the same attack.

In 2017, Israel threatened to revoke the credentials of an Al Jazeera reporter after an interview surfaced in which the reporter expressed support for the Palestinian “resistance.”

Al Jazeera is one of the few international media outlets left in Gaza during the war, broadcasting bloody scenes of airstrikes and overcrowded hospitals and accusing Israel of massacres. Israel accuses Al Jazeera of collaborating with Hamas.

Israel accuses Al Jazeera, funded by the Qatari government, of collaborating with Hamas. However, criticism of the channel is not new. The U.S. government singled out the broadcaster during the U.S. occupation of Iraq after its 2003 invasion toppled dictator Saddam Hussein and for airing videos of late al-Qaeda chief Osama bin Laden.

Al Jazeera has been shut down or blocked by other governments in the Middle East. They include Saudi Arabia, Jordan, the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain during the countries’ long-running boycott of Doha amid a political dispute that ended in 2021.

In 2013, Egyptian authorities raided a luxury hotel used by Al Jazeera as a base of operations following a military takeover that followed mass protests against President Mohamed Morsi. The channel was apparently targeted for its constant coverage of Muslim Brotherhood protests against Morsi’s ouster.

Three Al Jazeera employees – Australian Peter Greste, Egyptian-Canadian Mohamed Fahmy and Egyptian producer Baher Mohamed – received 10-year prison sentences but were released in 2015 after widespread international criticism.