Reporters Without Borders condemns sniper who targets the media
Reporters Without Borders has condemned a Palestinian sniper who took shots at the media as they tried to report on the murder of Carlos Andres Muscara Chavez, a 21 year old volunteer from Ecuador. We reported on B’tselems condemnation of Carlos’ murder previously and we are still waiting to see more of a response from the NGO community. Some blogs at least are starting to comment.
In condemning the attack on the reporters Reporters Without Borders said, “Whatever their nationality, reporters are neutral observers and must not be regarded as a party to any conflict… Targeting journalists is unacceptable and must be firmly condemned.”
The reporter and his cameraman were from a major Israeli TV station and arrived at the kibbutz a few hours after Carlos was killed by members of Hamas. The reporter told Reports Without Borders “We wanted to accompany the farm workers who went back to the apple orchard where the young man was killed to recover their tractor. We thought the danger was over and that the Palestinian snipers had withdrawn. But when we started filming, shots began raining down on us. But there were no soldiers with us. We were just civilians.”
The cameraman filmed the first few minute of the 20 minute attack. The video (shown below) has been uploaded to YouTube.
Without a free press, public accountability is impossible. Human rights NGOs should be responding to this attack on freedom of the press. Human rights organizations need to apply pressure on Hamas to stop their attempts to manipulate and intimidate the media.
On the topic of manipulation, Pajamasmedia and Commentary have exposed a further instance of Hamas media manipulation regarding the Gaza electricity incident last week. The most comical (or perhaps simply saddest) image is the one at Time Magazine which was captioned “The Palestinian Parliament was forced to meet by candlelight on Tuesday night.” Yes, there are members of Hamas meeting by candle light… but there is also a large amount of sun light behind the closed curtains, and shinning through the gap in the door. Perhaps the sun stood still for Hamas… or perhaps not. Time Magazine later edited the caption once it began to attract attention in the blogosphere.
