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US should be ‘backing Israel to the hilt’: Cotton
Sen. Tom Cotton, R-Ark., discusses the Israeli hostage rescue, Benjamin Netanyahu’s handling of the war, Biden’s apology to Volodymyr Zelenskyy for the Ukraine aid bill delay, and speculation over Trump’s VP selection.
The Israel Defense Forces on Sunday accused the Qatari regime-owned Al Jazeera news organization of employing a Hamas terrorist whose family held three of the hostages freed in Saturday’s IDF raid.
The IDF killed the alleged Al Jazeera reporter Abdallah Aljamal during its dramatic rescue mission in Nuseirat in the Gaza Strip.
The IDF wrote on X, formerly known as Twitter, “‘Journalist’ Abdallah Aljamal was a Hamas terrorist holding Almog, Andrey and Shlomi hostage in his family’s home in Nuseirat. No press vest can make him innocent of the crimes he has committed. @AlJazeera what’s this terrorist doing on your website?”
Al Jazeera listed Aljamal as an author on its website, and he reportedly wrote at least one article for the Doha-based network.
But the Jerusalem bureau chief of the now-closed Al Jazeera office, Omar al-Walid, denied that Aljamal worked for Al Jazeera, according to the Times of Israel.
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“This man is not from Al Jazeera, and he did not work for Al Jazeera at all, and he is not listed as working for Al Jazeera neither now nor in the past,” al-Walid said, adding, “We do not know him, and all the rumors that have been spread are empty of content and not true at all.”
Al-Walid said Al Jazeera plans to sue anyone disseminating claims that Abdallah Aljamal is connected to the outlet.
The IDF has accused the Al Jazeera news organization of employing a Hamas terrorist. (Ramsey Cardy/Sportsfile for Web Summit Qatar via Getty Images/File)
Imran Khan, a senior correspondent on Al Jazeera’s English channel, wrote on Instagram that Aljamal was a freelancer in the past.
“The individual in question who was killed in the raid along with his family was, at one point, a freelance journalist,” Khan wrote. “He has never worked for Al Jazeera Arabic or English.”
Aljamal did report for the Palestine Chronicle, which on Sunday wrote that it “is saddened to learn that Abdallah Aljamal, one of its contributors in the Gaza Strip, has been killed in the latest Israeli massacre in the Nuseirat refugee camp.”
In response to a Fox News Digital query, the Palestinian Chronicle replied with the statement and an article about Aljamal’s death.
“Particularly tragic is that Aljamal’s last contribution to the Palestine Chronicle covered a previous massacre, which killed over 40 Palestinian civilians in an UNRWA school in the refugee camp,” the article reads. “Israeli media is linking Aljamal’s family to the Israeli captives, claiming that Abdallah’s father, Dr. Ahmed, and other members of the family, were executed in the process of the bloody rescue mission.”
“Those claims have been refuted by respected commentators and journalists online, who pointed [out] the inconsistencies in the official Israeli narrative.”
The Palestine Chronicle is a registered U.S. nonprofit organization with a post office box listed in Mountlake Terrace, Washington.
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Al Jazeera reporters have been embroiled in supporting terrorism over the years, according to a detailed May updated report published by the Washington, D.C.-based Middle East Media Research Institute (MEMRI) titled “Al-Jazeera Arabic: The Qatari-owned TV channel that promotes Islamist terrorism worldwide.”
Yigal Carmon, the president and founder of MEMRI, listed examples of Al Jazeera reporters who allegedly aided Hamas in the Oct. 7 massacre in Israel: “Some Al-Jazeera journalists have recently been ‘outed’ as Hamas and PIJ fighters. A Palestinian journalist working for Al-Jazeera, Muhammad Wishah, appears to have also been a commander in the military wing of Hamas, according to documents on a laptop found by the Israeli army in a Hamas base in northern Gaza.”
IDF forces are seen operating in Rafah, a city in the Gaza Strip. (IDF Spokesman’s Office)
Carmon noted that “Another Al-Jazeera correspondent, Ismail Abu Omar, who participated in the October 7 attack, documenting it from within the Gaza Envelope, was airlifted to Doha for medical treatment on February 19 after having been wounded in an Israeli airstrike in Rafah a week earlier. He has been identified as a Hamas platoon deputy commander.”
According to the MEMRI report, “Al-Jazeera employed a correspondent, Tayseer Allouni, who was sentenced in Spain to seven years in prison for transferring funds to Al-Qaeda – and Al-Qaeda even issued a public statement in his support. Al-Jazeera broadcast live the killing of a U.S. soldier by an Iraqi sniper – which could only have happened if the media network had coordinated with the perpetrators of the killing.”
Fox News Digital approached Qatar’s ambassador to the U.S., Sheikh Meshal bin Hamad Al Thani, Al Jazeera and the Qatari embassy in London for a comment about the MEMRI report.
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Hamas massacred nearly 1,200 people on Oct. 7 in southern Israel, including more than 30 Americans. The Sunni terrorist organization Hamas is currently holding more than 121 hostages in Gaza.
Aljamal’s wife was killed during the IDF rescue operation.
A Palestinian fighter from the armed wing of Hamas takes part in a military parade to mark the anniversary of the 2014 war with Israel, near the border in the central Gaza Strip, on July 19, 2023. (Reuters/Ibraheem Abu Mustafa/File)
Last week, a Tel Aviv-Jaffa District Court determined that there is a “close connection” between Al Jazeera and Hamas. The court’s deputy president, Shai Yaniv, said that based on a review of classified documents, “The picture that emerges from the documents demonstrates categorically [and] with convincing, clear and unambiguous evidence the close, long-term connection between the Hamas terror organization and the Al Jazeera media network, with the Hamas terror organization advancing its goals through the channel.”
Israeli military experts told Fox News Digital that Al Jazeera uses its reporters to track Israeli military movements and then delivers the information to Hamas. Yaniv said the evidence shows that Al Jazeera had harmed Israel’s national security.
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Israel’s former prime minister, Naftali Bennett, wrote on X, “Abdallah Aljamal is an Al-Jazeera reporter and a Hamas terrorist who held three Israeli civilians hostage in his home. This has now been confirmed. Unfortunately, many Gaza civilians have been taking an active role in terror. Thousands that participated in the October 7th massacres and rapes, and hundreds of thousands that provide their homes to Hamas as terror bases, ammunition storage and as a jail for Israeli hostages.”
He added, “This isn’t a bug; it’s a feature. Hamas’ core strategy is this use of civilians as weapons, and it’s what grows the number of casualties in Gaza. If Hamas is determined to kill Gazans, nobody can stop them. Only Hamas’ defeat.”
Benjamin Weinthal reports on Israel, Iran, Syria, Turkey and Europe. You can follow Benjamin on Twitter @BenWeinthal, and email him at [email protected]