Israel Bombs Al-Mayadeen News Office, Murders Journalists, and Falsely Accuses Others of Terrorism

October 26, 2024

Israel has increased its attack on journalists in both Lebanon and Gaza. (Photo: via Committee to Protect Journalists TW Page)

By Robert Inlakesh

In recent days, this aggression has directly targeted media outlets critical of their invasions of both Gaza and Lebanon. 

Israel’s regional war has been the deadliest for journalists in recorded history, as reporters have been direct targets of their aggression and even falsely labeled as combatants. 

In recent days, this aggression has directly targeted media outlets critical of their invasions of both Gaza and Lebanon. 

On Wednesday the Israeli regime bombed an office used by Al-Mayadeen News in the Jnah neighborhood of the Lebanese Capital, Beirut. 

Although the media network evacuated this office in advance, the strike resulted in one death and the injuring of five others, including a child, the Lebanese Health Ministry said.

In November 2023, Israeli airstrikes targeted and killed two Al-Mayadeen journalists, correspondent Farah Omar and cameraman Rabih Me’mari, as they reported on developments in southern Lebanon.

The news outlet was started in 2012, primarily with the help of former Al-Jazeera Arabic journalists who were dissatisfied with the media outlet’s coverage of the Syrian War. 

Since then, the platform has been repeatedly targeted due to its consistently favorable coverage towards the Palestinian cause, more specifically the regional Axis of Resistance that opposes US and Israeli imperialism. 

Like Al-Jazeera, Al-Mayadeen has been banned from reporting by Israel and accused of being affiliated with “terrorism”. However, Al-Mayadeen’s ban has been in place longer than that of Al-Jazeera, beginning in November of last year.

On the same day that Al-Mayadeen’s office was bombed in Beirut, six Gaza-based Al-Jazeera journalists were accused by Israel of being affiliated with Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ), putting a target on their heads. 

The two most prominent journalists accused of being “terrorists” by Israel were Anas Al-Sharif and Hussam Shabat, both based in northern Gaza. The Israelis offered no proof for their outlandish claims.

While current members of the Israeli government shared the claims against the Al-Jazeera journalists, so too did members of the Israeli opposition. 

Notably, former Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennet accused the six journalists of being “terrorists”, the same man who had used a random video to claim that PIJ fighters had killed veteran Al-Jazeera journalist, Shireen Abu Akleh, back in 2022.

An Israeli soldier had killed Shireen Abu Akleh in the Jenin Refugee Camp with a precise headshot, which was clear from the beginning, yet the Bennet held to the claim that it was actually Palestinians who had shot her. 

The video he was referring to was debunked by Israel’s top human rights group B’Tselem later that day. Despite this, as Prime Minister, Naftali Bennet never apologized for lying publicly and refused to prosecute Shireen Abu Akleh’s killer.

On Thursday morning, Israel also bombed a press station in the southern Lebanese town of Hasbaiyya, murdering two Al-Mayadeen journalists; cameraman Ghassan Najjar and broadcast engineer Mohammad Rida; in addition to killing Al-Manar’s camera operator Wissam Qassim. 

Western corporate media, even including The Guardian newspaper, described the attack as killing journalists from “Hezbollah-affiliated TV stations”. 

This was despite the fact that journalists from Sky News, TRT, Al-Jazeera, Al-Jadeed, Al-Qahera and other outlets, were all based in the same facility at which vehicles with the word “PRESS” written on them were parked out the front.

During the past year, Israel has murdered at least 177 journalists in Gaza, 11 in Lebanon, and one in Syria. This is unprecedented in the documented history of war.

(The Palestine Chronicle)

– Robert Inlakesh is a journalist, writer, and documentary filmmaker. He focuses on the Middle East, specializing in Palestine. He contributed this article to The Palestine Chronicle.