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ISRAELIS TARGET JOURNALISTS
SHARON DECLARES "ISRAEL HAS NO MASTER"
MID-EAST REALITIES - www.MiddleEast.Org - Washington - 4/21/01:
Targeting journalists by the Israeli Army is not accidental. This is one more means
by which the Israelis try to control the Palestinian areas making it both difficult
and risky for journalists to inform the world what is really going in. A few months
ago even CNN's Cairo Bureau Chief Ben Wedemann was targeted, shot, and hospitalized;
but CNN pretty much covered it up. This time the Israelis targeted Laila Odeh of Abu
Dhabi TV. And though the intimidation does have a significant impact nevertheless
many courageous journalists continue to cover, write about, and film, what the
Israelis are doing to the Palestinians in order to enforce their Apartheid-style
policies and attempt to beat the Palestinians into submission.
MUSLIM HOLY DAY DISRUPTED
JOURNALIST SHOT IN GAZA
[The Palestine Monitor - April 21, 2001]
Yesterday afternoon, Israeli riot police armed with assault rifles and
protective gear entered the esplanade at the Haram Al Sharif compound in
Jerusalem after Palestinians demonstrated against the massive police
presence during the Friday prayers. In Gaza, Israeli forces shot and wounded
a Palestinian television correspondent.
The mere presence of armed Israeli police during Muslim prayer times,
coupled with the restrictions placed on Palestinians right to worship only
serves to fuel Palestinian anger. Yesterday�s action, reminiscent of Ariel
Sharon�s provocative visit to the Haram- al Sharif in September, can only be
construed as an attempt by the Israeli government to enforce their
illegitimate rule over the Muslim site, in complete disregard for
Palestinian rights and in violation of the religious sanctity of the Haram
Al-Sharif.
In Rafa, Gaza, Israeli forces opened fire on Abu Dhabi television
correspondent Laila Odeh. According to Odeh and her cameraman Ayman
al-Ruzzi, they were filming their segment near the Salah El-Din gate when
Israeli forces yelled at them to leave the area. Odeh tried to signal to the
soldiers that they were journalists, but the soldiers ignored them and
opened fire with live ammunition. Two bullets were aimed at Odeh; one hit
her in the thigh. She was rushed to Najja hospital and immediately operated
on. There were not clashes at that time and according to al- Ruzzi, he
filmed the entire incident. At least 75 journalists have been shot or beaten
by Israeli forces since the beginning of this Intifada.
PALESTINIAN JOURNALIST WOUNDED BY ISRAELI FIRE
JERUSALEM, AP, April 20 - A Palestinian journalist was wounded in the
Gaza Strip on Friday in what she said was an unprovoked shooting by
Israeli troops. The army said it was investigating the incident in the
Rafah refugee camp.
Laila Odeh, 33, a reporter for Abu Dhabi Television, said she
was shot in
the back of her right thigh as she tried to evade fire from Israeli
soldiers
manning a tower about 40 yards away on the Israeli-Egyptian border.
''There were no clashes while I was there. The Israelis fired
without any
warning,'' Odeh said in a telephone interview.
She said gunfire erupted as her cameraman was preparing to put a
camera on a tripod he had just set up. After two gunshots were fired,
Odeh
said she turned to leave and was then struck by a third bullet.
Odeh was first taken to a hospital in Rafah and then
transferred to Shifa
Hospital in Gaza City.
''We strongly condemn and object to this attack,'' said Ismail
Abdullah,
director of Abu Dhabi Television. ''We will not back away from our
work in
these areas or from providing a true picture of what is happening.''
Army spokesman Lt. Col. Olivier Rafowicz said the Israeli
military was
investigating the shooting and was sorry Odeh was hurt.
In a letter to Israeli Defense Minister Binyamin Ben-Eliezer,
the
Paris-based journalist advocacy group Reporters Without Borders
protested
the shooting and demanded an inquiry.
Reporters Without Borders says 20 journalists have been wounded
while
working in the region since violence broke out on Sept. 28. Some
Palestinian
journalists have said they were being targeted by troops while covering
clashes, a claim the army has denied.
"ISRAEL HAS NO MASTER" SAYS SHARON
[PARIS, Associated Press, April 20]: Israel ''obeys no one,'' Prime
Minister Ariel Sharon says in an interview, rejecting suggestions that
he bowed to U.S. pressure when he withdrew Israeli troops from
the Gaza Strip.
''The Americans never pressured Israel to withdraw,'' Sharon
told Le
Figaro newspaper in an interview to be published Saturday. ''We had
planned
that the operation would last less than 24 hours.''
Sharon was roundly criticized for the operation earlier this
week, when
troops reoccupied a part of the Gaza Strip in response to a
Palestinian mortar
attack and then quickly pulled out the next day, following comments by
U.S.
Secretary of State Colin Powell that the operation had been
''excessive and
disproportionate.''
''The Americans are our allies,'' Sharon told Le Figaro.
''Israel has no
master. Our country is independent and the only democracy in the Middle
East. Israel obeys no one.''
Sharon also said that despite the criticism, Tuesday's
operation in Gaza
was ''an excellent message.''
''In the future, the Palestinians will be very careful before
they get involved
in other terrorist acts,'' he said. ''I know the Arabs and they know
me. They
know that I keep my word.''
Also Friday, French Foreign Minister Hubert Vedrine expressed
satisfaction that Israel and the Palestinians were taking steps toward
re-establishing calm in the region.
''The fact that the Israeli army is ending or easing the
blockades on the
Gaza Strip and that Yasser Arafat has personally committed to ask for
the
mortar attacks to stop ... is good,'' Vedrine told Europe-1 radio,
adding that
he welcomed these ''first small steps.''
''It is indeed a lull, a relative improvement,'' he said.
But the minister also reiterated French criticism of Israeli
policies in the
Palestinian territories.
''The fundamental problems are still there; blockades of other
occupied
territories, total suffocation of the Palestinian society and economy,
the policy
of settlements, which is at the heart of all this, and on the other
side, violence,''
Vedrine said.
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