Israel Bans Israeli Newspaper Haaretz For Hurting "Right To Self Defence" (X image @HertfordshireI)
Tel Aviv, Israel: Israel government has decided to put sanction against Israeli news outlet Haaretz. Israel also approved government funding bodies from communicating or placing advertisements with the newspaper. In a statement released, Israel’s communication minister, Shlomo Karhi, said that his proposal against Haaretz had been unanimously approved by other ministers.
“We will not allow a reality in which the publisher of an official newspaper in the state of Israel will call for the imposition of sanctions against it and will support the enemies of the state in the midst of a war and will be financed by it”, read the statement.
“We advocate a free press and freedom of expression, but also the freedom of the government to decide not to fund incitement against the state of Israel”, he further added.
Haaretz reported that the government said its decision was due to “many articles that have hurt the legitimacy of the state of Israel and its right to self-defence, and particularly the remarks made in London by Haaretz publisher Amos Schocken that support terrorism and call for imposing sanctions on the government”.
It also added that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu approved the decision to ban the paper.
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As a respond to the move, Haaretz said it was an “opportunist resolution to boycott Haaretz, which passed in today’s government meeting without any legal review … [and] another step in Netanyahu’s journey to dismantle Israeli democracy”.
“Like his friends [Russian President Vladimir] Putin, [Turkish President Recep Tayyip] Erdogan, and [Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor] Orban, Netanyahu is trying to silence a critical, independent newspaper. Haaretz will not balk and will not morph into a government pamphlet that publishes messages approved by the government and its leader”, he added.
Haaretz is Israel’s oldest newspaper. It has been internationally respected for its reporting and analysis. the paper has been a fierce critic of Netanyahu, and his current coalition government.
Haaretz never shied away from publishing on the wrongdoings of the government. It has published a series of investigations of wrongdoing or abuses by senior officials and the armed forces, and has long been in the crosshairs of the current government.
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Recently, the outlet’s editorial accused new Defence Minister Israel Katz of instituting apartheid in the occupied West Bank by stopping the use of detention without trial for Jewish settlers, but not Palestinians. It published an editorial accusing Netanyahu and the military of “conducting an ethnic cleansing operation in the northern Gaza Strip”, earlier this month.
Haaretz also accused Netanyahu of “torpedoing” ceasefire negotiations because he ultimately wants a “prolonged occupation of the Gaza Strip”. In October this year, the outlet reported on a letter from 130 Israeli soldiers who said they would refuse to serve in the military unless the government reached a ceasefire and captive release deal.
Last November, Haaretz shed light on some of the deaths of Israelis during the Supernova festival on October 7th, when Hamas launched a surprise attack on Tel Aviv. It reported that an Israeli military helicopter which opened fire on Hamas assailants also hit some people attending the Supernova festival on October 7.
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Speaking to Al Jazeera, Haaretz columnist Gideon Levy said that the government sanctions on the outlet “send a very bad message, both politically and morally”.
“Many view it [Haaretz] as the only newspaper in Israel because, especially [in] this war, almost all the media outlets totally recruited themselves to the narrative of the government and the army,” and did not show Israelis what was happening in Gaza.
