A global media watchdog has expressed concern for the safety of an Al Jazeera reporter after false claims by the Israeli military.
The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) said it was concerned for Anas al-Sharif, Al Jazeera Arabic’s correspondent in northern Gaza, after an Israel military spokesperson accused him of “presenting a lie” in his coverage of Israel’s air strike on al-Tabin School on August 10.
The Israeli military claimed al-Sharif was “‘covering up’ for Hamas and Islamic Jihad after Israel killed dozens in its strike on a Gaza City school complex,” said CPJ programme director Carlos Martinez de la Serna.
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The strike killed some 100 people in a building housing Palestinians displaced by the war on the besieged enclave.
“Al Jazeera journalists have been paying a devastating price for documenting the war. They and all journalists should be protected and allowed to work freely,” Martinez de la Serna said.
Israel claims Hamas and the Palestinian Islamic Jihad were operating from a mosque in the school complex.
Al-Sharif has been threatened previously over his work and his father was killed on December 11, 2023, in an Israeli air strike on the family home in Jabalia.
CPJ has documented the killing of at least seven journalists and media workers affiliated with Al Jazeera — which Israel has banned from operating inside Israel — since October 7.
‘Blatant intimidation’
In an earlier statement made by the Al Jazeera Media Network, it described the Israeli military views as a “blatant act of intimidation and incitement against our colleague Anas Al-Sharif”.
“Such remarks are not only an attack on Anas’s character and integrity but also a clear attempt to stifle the truth and silence those who are courageously reporting from Gaza.”
Meanwhile, Jordan’s Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs, Ayman Safadi, has also accused the Israeli government of lying.
“No amount of disinformation by radical Israeli officials spreading lies, including about Jordan, will change the fact that Israel’s continued aggression on Gaza . . . [is] the biggest threat to regional security,” he said.
In a post on X, Safadi added: “The facts about the horrors this most radical of Israeli governments is bringing upon innocent Palestinian[s] . . . and the threat of its illegal actions and radical policies to the security and stability of [the] region are so clear and documented.
“No propaganda campaigns, no lies, no fabrications can cover that.”
