(June 9, 2024 / JNS)
A journalist and a doctor were among the family members holding Israeli hostages in their home in Nuseirat in the central Gaza Strip, the Israel Defense Forces confirmed on Sunday night.
“Following checks by the IDF and the Shin Bet, it can be confirmed that [journalist] Abdullah al-Jamal was an operative of the Hamas terrorist organization, who kept the hostages Almog Meir, Andrey Kozlov and Shlomi Ziv in his family home in Nuseirat,” the military said in a statement posted to X.
“Abdullah’s family home held hostages alongside family members. This is further proof that the Hamas terrorist organization uses the civilian population as a human shield,” the statement added.
Meir, Kozlov and Ziv, along with hostage Noa Argamani, were rescued by Israeli forces in a daring daylight raid on Saturday.
Al-Jamal was killed during the raid, according to EuroMed, a Geneva-based NGO led by Gaza-born Palestinian financial expert Ramy Abdu and Richard Falk, a harsh critic of the Jewish state and the former United Nations special rapporteur on human rights in the Palestinian territories.
“In an initial testimony documenting the killings committed by the Israeli army in the Nuseirat camp today, the @EuroMedHR reported that the Israeli army used a ladder to enter the home of Dr. Ahmed Al-Jamal,” Abdu tweeted.
“The army immediately executed 36-year-old Fatima Al-Jamal upon encountering her on the staircase. The forces then stormed the house and executed her husband, journalist Abdullah Al-Jamal, 36, and his father, Dr. Ahmed, 74, in front of his grandchildren. The army also shot their daughter, Zainab, 27, who sustained serious injuries.”
Al-Jamal is a contributor to The Palestine Chronicle, where his latest article was published on June 7. He also has a profile page on the Al Jazeera website, where he was described as reporting often from the 2018–2019 Gaza border riots, called the “Great March of Return” by Palestinians. (The only Al Jazeera article attributed to him, as a co-author, is an opinion piece titled “Tales of torture from Israeli prisons” published in 2019.)
The Palestine Chronicle and Al Jazeera spell his name as “Abdallah Aljamal.”
He was also the spokesman for the Hamas-run Labor Ministry in Gaza.
Imran Khan, a senior correspondent at Al Jazeera English, attempted to distance the Qatari network from al-Jamal.
“Also, the news that an Al Jazeera journalist was harboring one of the captives is completely false. The individual in question who was killed in the raid along with his family was, at one point, a freelance journalist. He has never worked for Al Jazeera Arabic or English. He is certainly not in any way, shape, or form an Al Jazeera Journalist,” wrote Khan, according to i24NEWS.
Hamas is paying Palestinian civilians in the Gaza Strip up to 70 shekels ($19) a day to watch over Israeli hostages taken on Oct. 7, a freed captive reported last week.
Ada Sagi, 75, was kidnapped from her home in Kibbutz Nir Oz during the Hamas-led invasion and was held in a family home in Gaza until she was released as part of the hostage-for-ceasefire deal on Nov. 28.
Asked on June 2 by Israel’s Channel 12 News what would motivate a Gaza family with children to imprison Jews, Sagi said: “Money.”
Israel extends temporary Al Jazeera ban
Israel’s Communications Minister Shlomo Karhi on Sunday signed a 45-day extension of a temporary ban on Al Jazeera‘s local operations, following a unanimous Cabinet decision.
https://www.jns.org/journalist-doctor-held-israelis-hostage-in-gaza/
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