Israeli forces have raided the Ramallah office of Al Jazeera in the occupied West Bank on Sunday, ordering its closure for an initial 45-day period.
Armed and masked soldiers stormed the building during a live broadcast, confronting the network’s West Bank bureau chief, Walid al-Omari, who read the closure order live on air.
The raid is part of a broader crackdown on the Qatar-based news broadcaster, which Israel has accused of being a threat to national security.
Earlier this year, Israeli forces also raided Al Jazeera’s offices in Nazareth and occupied East Jerusalem.
Commenting on the raid, Omari stated, “Targeting journalists this way always aims to erase the truth and prevent people from hearing the truth.”
The troops confiscated equipment, including microphones and cameras, and removed a poster of Shireen Abu Aqla, an Al Jazeera reporter killed in the West Bank during an Israeli raid in 2022.
While Israel initially claimed Palestinian forces shot her, later investigations suggested a “high probability” she was killed by an Israeli soldier.
The tension between the Israeli government and Al Jazeera has worsened since the outbreak of war in Gaza, with Israel repeatedly branding the network a “terrorist mouthpiece,” a claim Al Jazeera denies.
With foreign journalists barred from entering Gaza, Al Jazeera’s local team has been one of the few reporting directly from the conflict zone.
In April, the Israeli parliament passed a law allowing the government to temporarily shut down foreign broadcasters considered a national security threat during wartime, enabling closures for 45 days at a time, as seen in Sunday’s raid.
The Israeli government has yet to comment on the latest operation.
