MIDDLE EAST: Israel issues formal complaint to Qatar based Al Jazeera satellite channel

Record ID: 644606

  • Title: MIDDLE EAST: Israel issues formal complaint to Qatar based Al Jazeera satellite channel
  • Date: 16th March 2008
  • Summary: WIDE OF HANIYEH SPEAKING AT UNIVERSITY
  • Embargoed: 31st March 2008 13:00
  • Keywords:
  • Topics: Communications,International Relations
  • Reuters ID: LVAE7MX52SUDAC8WLV8HIITEFTUK
  • Story Text: Israel has formally issued instructions to its spokespeople to refuse requests by the Qatar-based Arabic and English television network, Al-Jazeera Network, on Wednesday (March 12) over what it called 'biased coverage of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict'.

    "Today official spokespersons are not giving interviews to Al-Jazeera, all the issue of the visas and the services they are receiving from us, we will know how to behave with them. They have to be objective or to leave us alone, why do I have to give them services?" Israeli Deputy Foreign Minister Magali Whabe told Reuters television in parliament.
    Israeli Foreign Ministry officials have been refusing requests to appear on the international news network based in Jerusalem, after what it called biased coverage of a deadly Israeli offensive on the Gaza Strip, where over 125 Palestinians were killed, more than half of them civilians.
    Israel blast Al-Jazeera for one-sided coverage that primarily serves the ruling Islamic group Hamas in the Gaza Strip.

    "When we send a letter to the authorities in Qatar and also to Al-Jazeera regarding this matter. We do not want to deal with a channel that is not realistic and does not give a real picture to its viewers. If there is no change in the way they deal with us there will be a reaction for us and we can take action," said Whabe.
    Whabe stated several examples to what he said was not a "real picture", including al-Jazeera's coverage of the electricity crisis in Gaza and an explosion in a Gaza house that killed 8 people in mid February 2008, which the Israeli army denied any connection to but al-Jazeera reported was caused by an Israeli attack.
    Dismissed Prime Minister, a prominent Hamas leader in the Gaza Strip, Ismail Haniyeh, said Israel's policy to deny reactions to its aggressions in the Gaza enclave is because the Jewish state wants to shrug off responsibility for its crimes.

    "Today the Israeli ministry of foreign affairs renews its boycott of al-Jazeera. You want a media that speaks in your tongue, saying what you say, telling your (Israel's) story to the world? Even the media is now changing," said Haniyeh during an address at the Islamic University in Gaza city.
    Al-Jazeera headquarters in Qatar refrained from comment until they received an official complaint from the Israeli Foreign Ministry.
  • Copyright Holder: REUTERS
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