The South African Federation of Trade Unions (SAFTU) is appalled by Israel’s decision to ban Al Jazeera. Reportedly, this ban includes shutting Al Jazeera feeds from broadcast and preventing Al Jazeera journalists from gathering and reporting stories in Israeli-occupied territories.
Banning one media house by repressive regimes like Israel has a chilling effect on journalism as all media workers will become targets of Israeli soldiers, snipers, and settlers. Particularly racist settlers in occupied territories will be emboldened to attack media workers and journalists. Already, between 7 October 2023 and 8 May 2024, 142 Palestinian journalists have been murdered by Israel, 80 have been injured (in many cases seriously) and 12 arrested. 178 media house offices have been bombed to the ground and destroyed.
The decision to ban Al Jazeera is most certainly an indication that they want to continue with their genocide. Al Jazeera has been the main reliable media source of facts from Gaza since the 7th of October 2023, giving us visuals of children trapped in rubbles of bombed buildings, weeping brothers carrying their dead to burry them, bleeding fathers and mothers, destroyed hospitals, universities and schools.
Israeli assassinations of grassroots Palestinian land activists and worker activists are on the increase in the West Bank as is Israeli settler violence, with settlers rampaging through quiet and small, olive farming villages and setting fire to olive trees (the staple food in Palestine), houses and farming equipment. These are stories that Al Jazeera usually covers. This subsequent ban will embolden settlers to carry out the persecution and dispossession under cover of media absence.
Further, the Israeli Zionist regime is clearly disturbed by the coverage that has exposed the genocidal deeds they have carried out since the 8th of October 2024. It is the exposure of the genocidal campaign in visuals, audio, and texts, that is awakening the youth in Western countries, particularly the USA. This awakening is manifesting in mounting action and pressure against their governments, demanding accountability and calls for the US to cease funding Israel’s genocidal campaign. It is this awakening, amongst others, that the ban on Al Jazeera is directed at quelling.
Despite laughable claims that Israel is the only democratic state in the Middle East, their banning of Al Jazeera is the latest proof that they are not a democratic state. Democracies are underpinned by non-negotiable pillars such as the freedom of expression and opinion.
In the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR), which was inked in the aftermath of the Second World War and influenced heavily by liberal democratic principles, the freedom of opinion and expression is enshrined. Article 19 of the UDHR states that “everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression; this right includes freedom to hold opinions without interference and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers.”
Israel’s decision to ban Al Jazeera is a direct violation of the right to freedom of expression. It is not surprising, however, because Israel has violated and disregarded many international laws including other provisions of this universal human rights charter.