Israel has said that one of Al Jazeera journalists injured in an Israeli airstrike in Gaza last week is a Hamas terrorist.
Al Jazeera correspondent Ismail Abu Omar and cameraman Ahmed Matar were struck on Feb. 13 by a missile fired by an Israeli drone while they were reporting on Israel’s bombardment of displaced people in the Miraage area, north of Rafah.
Following the news, posts spread on social media platforms in an orchestrated campaign calling Abu Omar, whose leg was amputated, a “terrorist” affiliated with Hamas. A campaign by the Israeli military and foreign ministry and military has alleged the same.
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Social media accounts that are used to exaggerate and promote Israel’s narrative for the war and disinformation campaigns have joined the campaign against the journalist. These campaigns also put pressure on media outlets over their coverage of the Gaza war.
Abu Omar and Matar were the latest journalists to be hit by Israeli airstrikes in the war. As of mid-February, 77 journalists had been killed in Gaza, according to the Committee to Protect Journalists.
An Israeli counter-narrative
Once Al Jazeera, the Qatar-based television network, began airing footage on its channels and social media accounts about the journalists professional careers and giving details of the attack, Israeli social media accounts rushed to circulate a counter-narrative. This counter-narrative sought to justify the direct bombing of the journalists in an area designated by the Israeli military as a safe zone.
The area was hit by Israel’s warplanes and drones the same day the attack against Al Jazeera journalists took place. Video footage aired by Al Jazeera shows that, just before he was hit and injured, Abu Omar spotted a drone flying over the area.
Since the attack, Abu Omar has undergone three surgeries and is in “very critical” condition, according to Dr. Mohammed al-Far, head of an American medical delegation treating injured in Rafah hospitals. Al-Far called for the journalist’s evacuation out of Gaza.
Social media videos
A video has circulated of Abu Omar on October 7, coinciding with Hamas fighters crossing the Gaza border. At the time, Abu Omar was covering the Hamas attack through his social media accounts. Israeli social media accounts reused the video and repeatedly published it, claiming that he was a “terrorist’ participating in the Hamas attack.
Most of these accounts are newly established and just have a few dozens of followers.
Accounts promoting this type of posts included those of former Israeli soldiers and others whose activity showed that they were likely working in a machine to promote and amplify the Israeli narrative about the war in Gaza. These accounts circulated and prompted Israeli propaganda, including many posts that had been widely disseminated since the outbreak of the war, and were ultimately found to be misleading.
Most of these accounts are newly established and just have a few dozens of followers. Their activities centered on reposting and engaging defamation and online harassment campaigns that have targeted Palestinian journalists, the United Nations, UNRWA, UK legislators supporting the Palestinian cause.
State-sponsored campaign
As condemnation and criticism grew after the attack, an official campaign by the Israeli army and the Foreign Ministry appeared on social media platforms. This campaign promoted the same allegations. Israeli military spokesman Avichay Adraee said Abu Omar is a deputy company commander in Hamas’s East Khan Younis Battalion and “even filmed himself participating in the bloody massacre and published it on social media networks.”
Such allegations are not supported by evidence.
Some Israeli diplomats have pressured international media that have reported on the attack that injured Abu Omar. A foreign ministry spokeswoman notably criticised the coverage by the Sydney Morning Herald and described Abu Omar as a “military target.”
This was accompanied by an article on Honest Reporting, a non-profit media watchdog that exposes anti-Israel bias, that criticised Al Jazeera. The organization described the network as spokesperson for Hamas, and said of its correspondents “You can’t put lipstick on a pig, and you can’t put a press vest on a terrorist.”
