fbpx

Analysis

BICOM Briefing: Hamas intimidation and manipulation of the world’s media

[ssba]

Key points

  • The Foreign Press Association (FPA) has protested against the “blatant, incessant, forceful and unorthodox” Hamas intimidation of international journalists in the Gaza Strip.
  • According to the FPA coverage of the Gaza conflict has been subject to a combination of Hamas intimidation and manipulation, with journalists being subjected to threats, expulsions and a “vetting” procedure.
  • Hamas is deliberately masking militant casualties by describing them as civilians.

Recognition of Hamas intimidation

  • Following articles  in Ynet, Times of Israel, Washington Times, The Commentator and The Australian the scale of the problem of the intimidation of the media in the Gaza Strip was recognised by the FPA on 11 August with the following statement: “The FPA protests in the strongest terms the blatant, incessant, forceful and unorthodox methods employed by the Hamas authorities and their representatives against visiting international journalists in Gaza over the past month. The international media are not advocacy organisations and cannot be prevented from reporting by means of threats or pressure, thereby denying their readers and viewers an objective picture from the ground.  In several cases, foreign reporters working in Gaza have been harassed, threatened or questioned over stories or information they have reported through their news media or by means of social media.  We are also aware that Hamas is trying to put in place a ‘vetting’ procedure that would, in effect, allow for the blacklisting of specific journalists. Such a procedure is vehemently opposed by the FPA.”

How has Hamas been intimidating the media?

  • As documented by the Committee to Protect Journalists, Hamas has a track record of shutting down news bureaus, arresting reporters and cameramen, confiscating equipment and beating journalists.
  • During the current conflict, Hamas has applied a combination of threats and abuse to censor media coverage. This censorship includes preventing journalists from reporting on various aspects of the conflict, such as Hamas’s firing of rockets from civilian areas or showing Hamas militants in action.

Threats against the media

  • Israeli filmmaker Michael Grynszpan described on Facebook an exchange with a Spanish journalist on 30 July: “I asked him how come we never see on television channels reporting from Gaza any Hamas people, no gunmen, no rocket launcher, no policemen. We only see civilians on these reports, mostly women and children. He answered me frankly: ‘It’s very simple, we did see Hamas people there launching rockets, they were close to our hotel, but if ever we dare pointing our camera on them they would simply shoot at us and kill us.’”
  • As documented in The Australianand in the Jerusalem Post:the Wall Street Journal‘s Nick Casey tweeted a photo of a Hamas spokesman being interviewed from a room in Shifa Hospital, adding: “You have to wonder (with) the shelling how patients at Shifa hospital feel as Hamas uses it as a safe place to see media.”  After “a flood of online threats,” the tweet was deleted. In addition, John Reed of the Financial Times was threatened after he tweeted about rockets being fired near the Al-Shifa hospital.

Vetting and expelling journalists

  • On 23 July, in an article for Libération, French-Palestinian journalist Radjaa Abou detailed how he was “detained and interrogated by members of Hamas’s al-Qassam Brigade at a room in Shifa hospital next to the emergency room” and was forced to leave Gaza immediately without his papers.  The day after publication, Mr. Dagga asked Libération to remove his article from their website.
  • RT correspondent Harry Fear was told to leave Gaza after he tweeted that Hamas fired rockets into Israel from near his hotel.
  • The Jerusalem Postreports that Hamas issued new directives requiring foreign journalists who work in the Gaza Strip to hold press cards issued by its press office. Journalists who fail to comply would not be permitted to work in the Gaza Strip. The journalists are also required to provide Hamas’s press office with information about their Palestinian translators and guarantors, as well as the address of where they intend to stay.

Fear of reprisals

  • Fear of reprisals has prevented journalists from reporting on certain aspects of the conflict until they leave the Gaza Strip.
  • A report by Sreenivasan Jain for Indian network NDTV showed rockets being placed and subsequently fired from outside his hotel. Jain wrote that it was published “after our team left the Gaza Strip – Hamas has not taken very kindly to any reporting of its rockets being fired … just as we reported the devastating consequences of Israel’s offensive on Gaza’s civilians, it is equally important to report on how Hamas places those very civilians at risk by firing rockets deep from the heart of civilian zones.”
  • On 28 July, ten people, eight of them children, were killed at the al-Shati refugee camp (an event blamed by Palestinian sources on Israeli airstrikes, but the IDF attributed it to a failed rocket attack). After he departed the Gaza Strip, Italian journalist Gabriele Barbati tweeted on 29 July: “Out of #Gaza far from #Hamas retaliation: misfired rocket killed children yday in Shati. Witness: militants rushed and cleared debris.”
  • Some commentators have criticised the failure to acknowledge reporting restrictions. Clifford May in the Washington Times notes, “I do think they [journalists] should be honest with their readers and viewers about the conditions under which they are operating; namely, conditions of coercion, manipulation, restriction and censorship.” In this respect, it is worth noting that section 11.4.1  of the BBC Editorial Guidelines on accuracy and impartiality in times of War, Terror and Emergencies states that, “We should normally say if our reports are censored or monitored or if we withhold information, and explain, wherever possible, the rules under which we are operating.”

Additional Hamas media manipulation

  • As reported in Times of Israel on 11 July and the IDF blog, the Hamas Ministry of Interior in Gaza published a video in Arabic dealing with “cautious and effective” social media engagement on Facebook and Twitter during Operation Protective Edge. It contained such directives as, “Anyone killed or martyred is to be called a civilian from Gaza or Palestine, before we talk about his status in jihad or his military rank … Don’t forget to always add ‘innocent civilian’ or ‘innocent citizen’ in your description of those killed in Israeli attacks on Gaza.”
  • Hamas has actively interfered with the bomb-sites and casualty areas in order to gain PR advantage. The Washington Post‘s Sudarsan Raghavan detailed how the organisation staged events and scenes to evoke sympathy from the viewer.  By way of illustration, he was taken to photograph a mosque that had been bombed, and discovered that someone had “prepared” the scene and placed a prayer mat and burnt Quran pages. “The symbolism was obvious, almost too perfect. It was clear that someone had placed them there to attract sympathy for the Palestinian cause.  A television crew spotted the pile and filmed it. Mission accomplished.”
  • Hamas has physically shielded its fighters from press scrutiny throughout the conflict. New York Times photographer Tyler Hicks described in an interview on 05 August how Hamas terrorists operated from within the civilian population, “you can’t differentiate the fighters from the civilians. They are not wearing uniforms …” In addition, Canadian TV correspondent Janis Mackey Frayer tweeted on 20 July: “Inside Shejaiyya we also saw several #Hamas gunmen. One passed dressed in a woman’s headscarf… tip of a gun poked out from under cloak.”
  • Hamas have ensured that reporters are exposed to casualties by insisting that spokesmen could only be interviewed in the courtyard of the Al-Shifa hospital, as described by Ynet News in an account from a foreign reporter.
  • Furthermore, on 5 August, the Hamas-run Gaza interior ministry’s Facebook page called on the population of Gaza “to be wary of disseminating information and pictures of fatalities of the resistance, and [about] mentioning details about [the circumstances of] their deaths as martyrs and where they died … the occupation is collecting all the information and reports [about the martyrs] and uses them as evidence to justify its crimes against [Palestinian] civilians.”

Hamas manipulation of civilian casualties

  • Hamas’s deception extends to manipulation and distortion of the widely cited civilian casualty figures by the Gaza Ministry of Health, which is under Hamas control. These figures, which have been used as a focal point for worldwide condemnation of Israel, have been challenged by Israel. The need for caution has now been recognised by both the BBC in a report and the New York Times.
  • The Hamas-run Gaza Health Ministry refuses to distinguish between civilian and military casualties, referring only to “martyrs” from “Israeli aggression.”
  • The IDF disputes the statistics, claiming that around 750-1,000 of the reported fatalities are militants.