IDF spokesman says Al Jazeera covering up Hamas activity in targeted Gaza school
Military’s Arabic spokesman Avichay Adraee says he’s ‘convinced’ reporter Anas al-Sharif knew slain terrorists by name; Qatari network calls comments attempt to ‘stifle the truth’
The Israeli military’s Arabic-language spokesman Avichay Adraee traded barbs online Sunday with the Qatar-based Al Jazeera network, accusing the outlet of covering up activities by the Hamas and Islamic Jihad terror groups from within a former school in Gaza City that was targeted by the Israeli military over the weekend.
“I can’t describe what’s happening,” said al-Jazeera reporter Anas al-Sharif while touring the aftermath of the strike on Saturday.
“We’re talking about almost 100 martyrs in the Taba’een school in Gaza City, a big massacre. They were holding dawn prayers inside and the Israeli warplanes hit them,” he said in his report.
Tamer Almisshal, another Al Jazeera reporter, shared the video of al-Sharif’s report on X, writing: “May God protect you. Proud of Anas al-Sharif and all our colleagues, knights of audio and video.”
“Of course you’re proud of them,” Adraee responded on the social network. “He’s covering up the crimes of Hamas and [Islamic] Jihad taking shelter inside schools. I am convinced that he knows the names of a great number of the Hamas terrorists among those killed in the school. But he presents a lie, the motivation for which has nothing to do with the residents of Gaza.”
The Gaza Strip’s Hamas-run civil defense agency claimed over 90 people were killed in the airstrike, describing the incident as a “horrific massacre,” drawing denunciations from several Western diplomats, as well as Egyptian and Qatari mediators in the ongoing hostage-ceasefire talks between Israel and Hamas.
According to the Israel Defense Forces, however, the strike was carried out using three precision munitions against the two terror groups’ command room embedded within a mosque at the Taba’een school complex.
صوت وصورة الكذب. واضح ان تكون فخرًا بهم. يغطي على جرائم حماس والجهاد في الاحتماء داخل المدارس…أنا مقتنع انه يعرف عدد كبير ممن قتل داخل مدرسة التابعين من مخربي حماس بأسمائهم لكنه يتحرك في مسرحية إعلامية كاذبة بدوافع لا تمت لسكان غزة بصلة.
— افيخاي ادرعي (@AvichayAdraee) August 10, 2024
The IDF said that footage from after the strike showed that there was no major damage to the surrounding school complex. It also said that the missiles “could not have caused the damage that corresponds to the casualty reports of the government media office in Gaza.”
The IDF also published an infographic on Saturday with the names and faces of nineteen terror operatives it said were killed in the strike.
In a statement posted on its website Sunday, Al Jazeera responded to Adraee’s comments, calling them “not only an attack on Anas’s character and integrity but also a clear attempt to stifle the truth and silence those who are courageously reporting from Gaza.
“Anas has seen the aftermath of horrific events, including the killing of over 100 civilians today, and yet, he continues to report with integrity and courage,” the network claimed.
Al Jazeera, which broadcasts in English and Arabic, has been the focus of months of criticism from Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his government.
In early May, the government banned Al Jazeera in Israel, shuttering and raiding its offices, alleging it was actively harming national security. Last month, the Tel Aviv District Court extended the ban on the network.
In January, Israel said an Al Jazeera staff journalist and a freelancer killed in an airstrike in Gaza were terror operatives.
The following month, it accused another journalist with the channel, who was wounded in a separate strike, of being a deputy company commander with Hamas.
Al Jazeera has denied Israel’s allegations and accused it of systematically targeting Al Jazeera employees in the Gaza Strip.
Emanuel Fabian contributed to this report.
