The Scoop
Some of Al Jazeera’s correspondents covering the war in Gaza are protesting what they believe is months of mistreatment and missed paychecks from the organization.
In an email obtained by Semafor titled “Suspending Operations,” and sent to hundreds of network staff on Tuesday, one of Al Jazeera English TV’s Gaza-based correspondents Hani Mahmoud said that the team based in Gaza would no longer be broadcasting on air until the network paid its bills.
Mahmoud wrote that due to the delay of fuel payments by the Qatar-backed satellite television organization, Al Jazeera’s employees can no longer drive vehicles between their homes and broadcast locations — and don’t want to risk traveling by public transportation.
“There is not much that I can do at this point about this other than wait for the bills to be settled!” he wrote. “I have submitted every single receipt/bill for September, October, and November on time. I have requested multiple times to expedite the payment process so we can pay our bills on time and not have to run the risk of ceasing operations. All requests for payment have been made clear throughout the past two months in all emails that have been sent to the office.”
One person familiar with the situation told Semafor that in addition to missed expense repayments, staff in Gaza had also struggled to receive payment in recent months.
In an email to Semafor, a spokesperson for the network blamed the lack of recent funds for its Gaza team on logistical issues getting money into the area.
“Due to the ongoing war on Gaza and the Israeli siege, we are facing challenges with fund transfers,” the spokesperson said. “Our team is working diligently to resolve this.”
Mahmoud is one of several journalists the Doha-based Al Jazeera has kept on the ground in Gaza despite the deaths of correspondents killed in Israeli airstrikes.
Know More
Al Jazeera, which has long covered the conflict from a point of view sympathetic to Palestinians, has been the primary media voice for Gazans amid an Israeli invasion aimed at destroying Hamas. Its Arabic service is widely viewed across the region and has an audience riveted by the conflict, while its English service offers a regional point of view to a global audience.
The embattled media organization had hoped to spend this week celebrating its Gaza coverage. Earlier this week, the National Press Club in Washington awarded Al Jazeera’s Gaza Bureau Chief Wael Al-Dahdouh with its highest distinction after his continued broadcasts from Gaza despite the deaths of family members in the war.
Al Jazeera has been the primary target of Israel’s criticism of foreign press coverage of the war in Gaza, which the Israeli government has escalated significantly in recent months. Earlier this year, Israeli troops raided Al Jazeera offices in the Israeli-occupied West Bank and ordered the bureau to shutter, and in May, Israel seized Al Jazeera equipment in East Jerusalem and blocked the network’s websites and broadcasts in Israel.
Israel criticized the Qatar-backed network for publishing Hamas statements verbatim, and said that it was “being used to incite terror.” Israel also accused some of the network’s journalists of having ties to armed militant groups. Al Jazeera vehemently disputed the allegations, saying that Israel has presented no evidence to support its claims, and the office closures represented an attack on press freedom.
Notable
- Al Jazeera is “half-closed” in the West Bank, Le Monde reported. “The Israelis want to control all information about what’s going on here. I’m not optimistic,” the network’s director on the ground said.
- Al Jazeera’s sponsor, Qatar, has paused its role in mediating the conflict “as it triangulates between its relationships with the West and its ties in the region,” the Wall Street Journal wrote.
- The network “denies and ‘vehemently condemns’ a claim by the Israel Defense Forces that six of its journalists were affiliated with militant groups.”