The Hamas War On Journalists

In it's coverage of Operation Pillar of Defense, The Israel Project notes Hamas's War On Journalists:

Hamas's human rights violations against journalists have increasingly found the group at odds with civil liberty and human rights groups.

The tone was set when Hamas took sole control of Gaza after a bloody coup.
Here is a video from Al-Jazeera in 2007:




The blurb by Al-Jazeera to the YouTube video notes:

In Gaza, many journalists say they are being bullied and threatened by Hamas forces. Since Hamas took over the Gaza Strip in mid-June, 13 media institutions have been shut down, looted or set on fire including the official Palestinian TV and Radio stations. Several journalists have been detained for up to 24 hours, including one cameraman who was hospitalised after being beaten. Al Jazeera's Nour Odeh reports.

Here are some examples of the terrorist group's interference and intimidation of free press:

• Hamas notoriously beats journalists, including citizen journalists.
  For example, Gaza cops use ‘beatings, stun guns’ on women reporters:
  

  A number of Palestinian women journalists complained on Sunday that they had been beaten and tortured by Hamas security forces in the Gaza Strip.
  
  They said the assaults occurred in recent days when they and their colleagues tried to cover pro-unity rallies in different parts of the Gaza Strip.
  
  ...Later, Hamas security personnel raided the offices of a number of media organizations and confiscated equipment and documents. Among the offices targeted were Reuters, CNN and a Japanese TV network.

• The Iranian-backed group forces reporters to be accompanied by "sponsors."
  For example, Reporters in Gaza will need Hamas-approved 'sponsors':
  

  Hamas authorities in the Gaza Strip are requiring foreign journalists to take on regimeapproved “sponsors” while in the coastal area, the latest sign the Islamist group is determined to keep a tight lid on the flow of information from the territory.
  
  ...“For me this is reminiscent of the Soviet Union; the authorities are trying to let the fixers know that the only way to make money is not to be too difficult,” he [freelance Swedish journalist Terje Carlsson] continued.(9/26/2011)

• Just this weekend, Hamas began trapping journalists in the Gaza Strip, raising fears that the Iran-backed terror group intends to use them as human shields during Israel's anti-terror Operation Pillar of Defense.
  See Hamas detains 22 foreign nationals trying to exit Gaza Strip for Israel
  
  
• Imprisonment of the media
  For example, Hamas imprisoned British journalist Paul Martin for a month:
  

  Mr Martin "met criminals, committed crimes and took activities against our security," said Mr Zahar.
  
  "He tried to play at dangerous things threatening the lives and the interests of the Palestinian Authority here," he said.
  
  He also said Mr Martin had "been in contact with suspicious people who in the past have been proven to be agents".
  
  He has been forbidden from returning to either Gaza or the West Bank, Hamas said, although its authority does not extend to the West Bank, which is run by the rival Fatah movement.
  
  Mr Martin had gone to Gaza to give evidence in the defence of a Palestinian man he had interviewed, who had been accused of spying for Israel.

During a war, with Hamas's desperation to control the narrative -- going so far as to manufacture stories of Gazan casualties -- the safety of journalists in Gaza is that much more precarious.


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Technorati Tag: Israel and Gaza and Hamas and Operation Pillar of Defense.