Al Jazeera Reporter Killed by Israel During Raid in West Bank

Al Jazeera reporter, Shireen Abu Akleh, was shot dead during an Israeli raid in the occupied West Bank, the Palestinian Health Ministry said on Wednesday. According to details by Al Jazeera, the 51-year-old Shireen Abu Akleh, a longtime TV correspondent for Al Jazeera Arabic, was killed while covering Israeli military raids in the city of Jenin in the northern occupied West Bank.

She was rushed to the hospital in Jenin in critical condition, where she was declared dead shortly after, at 7:51am, according tot he ministry and Al Jazeera journalists. The reports state that Shireen Abu Akleh was wearing a press west and standing with other journalists when she was killed.

According to the details, Abu Akleh was shot in the head and her body has been transferred for an autopsy based on the an order from the public prosecution. Meanwhile, another Al Jazeera journalist, Ali al-Samoudi, was also wounded at the scene with a bullet in the back. However, he is said to be in stable condition now.

In a statement, the Israeli military said its troops had shot back after coming under “massive fire” in Jenin and that “there is a possibility, now being looked into, that reporters were hit – possibly by shots fired by Palestinian gunmen.” However, Al-Samoudi and other journalists claim otherwise.

According to them, there were no Palestinian fighters present when the journalists were shot, directly disputing the statement made by Israeli military. “We were going to film the Israeli army operation and suddenly they shot us without asking us to leave or stop filming,” said Al-Samoudi.

“The first bullet hit me and the second bullet hit Shireen … there was no Palestinian military resistance at all at the scene.” he added, while another journalist, Shatha Hanaysha, said that there had been no confrontations between Palestinian fighters and the Israeli army and the journalists had been directly targeted.

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