IDF accuses Al Jazeera of being Hamas mouthpiece

The Israeli military on Thursday accused Al Jazeera of following instructions Hamas militants gave the news outlet for how to cover certain incidents in Gaza. One day earlier, the Israeli military accused six Al Jazeera reporters of being members of either the Gaza-based terrorist group Hamas or the Palestinian terrorist group Islamic Jihad. Al Jazeera on Wednesday denied that its reporters were members of militant groups. On Thursday, WORLD reached out to Al Jazeera for a response to Israel’s accusations that the outlet received instructions from Hamas about how to frame its coverage. As of Thursday evening, WORLD had not received a response.

What did the Israeli military say about Al Jazeera’s coverage? The Israeli military shared images of correspondence it claimed showed that Al Jazeera agreed not to call a failed rocket launch a “massacre” and that it agreed to limit the number of images it would show of the damage caused by the rocket. Israel’s military said the correspondence also demonstrated that the news outlet agreed to prevent some of its guests from criticizing certain aspects of Hamas’ activities.

The Israeli military shared another image it said showed Hamas giving instructions to Al Jazeera about which individuals to quote, and what information not to include in its coverage of certain Hamas activities. It also shared an image reportedly showing that Hamas made it a priority to set up a secure line of communication between its emergency operations center and Al Jazeera.

Dig deeper: Read my report in the WORLD archives about how an Israeli soldier likely killed an embedded Al Jazeera reporter in 2022 by mistake.