The Palestinian National Authority (ANP), the Palestinian autonomous government based in Ramallah that he presides Mahmoud Abbashas ordered the suspension of Al Jazeera broadcasts and has temporarily banned the activities of its journalists in West Bank. The decision comes after a special committee made up of representatives of several ANP ministries accused the qatari chain of broadcasting “inciting material, spreading disinformation and interfering in the internal affairs of the Palestinians” in a way that fosters “division and instability,” according to the official Wafa news agency. with his gag on Al Jazeera, The Abbas regime follows in the footsteps of Israelwhich in May also banned its broadcasts, accusing the network of being “a loudspeaker of Hamas” and a “threat to national security.”
In both cases, however, a clear willingness to silence the chain international news, one of the most viewed and influential in Near Eastwith a wide deployment of reporting teams on the ground and a high level of professionalism. Also with a proven talent for making many of the governments in the region uncomfortable, a region where the press censorship is the order of the day. “We consider this decision nothing more than an attempt to dissuade the network from its coverage of the escalation of events in the occupied territories,” Al Jazeera responded in a statement this Thursday.
The trigger for the ANP veto has been the coverage of military operations that their security forces have been carried out in recent weeks against the Palestinian armed resistance groups in it Jenin refugee camp. Operations that have coincided in time with the devastating Israeli assault on Gaza, which has left more than 150,000 dead and injured to date, as well as the destruction of the bulk of the enclave’s infrastructure.
Raids against armed militias
Palestinian raids in Jenin have been taking place since the beginning of December, and are occurring almost daily, with armed clashes between security forces and militants. Hamasthe Islamic Jihad and other armed factions. Dozens of militiamen have been arrested and at least half a dozen have died killed by Palestinian security agents. Among them, a Jihad commander assigned to the Jenin Brigadea militia that encompasses militants from various factions. Five civilians have also died in the clashes, including a journalist, according to the United Nations. The journalist in question, Shatha Sabbaghwas murdered by a bullet to the head fired by the Palestinian security forces, according to several of her professional colleagues.
While ANP rules in the occupied West Bank, it has no sovereignty over the territory and faces multiple limitations imposed by the Israeli military. Among the Palestinians it is greatly discredited. Its leaders are accused of corruption and incompetencebut also having imposed a authoritarian regime that collaborates with Israel repressing the Palestinian resistance against the occupation. This has meant that in places like refugee camps, where the status quo generates the most contestation, the ANP exercises only relative control over its day-to-day life. Power there has to be shared with armed factions.
Accusations of “brutality”
Hence, Ramallah has justified the operation of recent weeks as an attempt to “regain control of the Jenin countryside from the hands of the outlaws.” One of the problems, however, is that it comes only two months after the Israeli military invaded those same alleys for 10 days, leaving 21 dead (including several children) and a trail of destruction in its wake. Like their Israeli counterparts, Palestinian paramilitaries have also been accused by several observers of act with “brutality” in Jenin.
A performance covered profusely by Al Jazeera that has not been liked within Al Fatah, Abbas’s party that monopolizes the ANP. A week ago, in fact, Al Fatah released a statement accusing the network of “sow division in our Arab homeland in general and in Palestine in particular.
The suspension of Al Jazeera broadcasts in the West Bank comes just a few months after Israel did the same in its territory, a maneuver that was followed by the forcible closure of its offices in Ramallah. In the Israeli case, there is no doubt that the gag derives from the detailed coverage that the outlet has done of its brutal military campaign in Gaza, being one of the few that keeps journalists in the enclave. Several of them have been murdered in these 14 months by the Israeli military. In its labeling Al Jazeera does not talk about war, but about “genocide in Gaza.”
Before Israel and the ANP silenced the network, other of its regional neighbors had already done so. In Egypt it has been banned since General Al Sisi took power through a coup d’état in 2013, while in Saudi Arabia it has not been seen since 2017 as a result of the political tensions that exploded that year between Riyadh and Qatar.
