Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu pledged on Monday to “take immediate action” to prevent the broadcast of the Qatari Al Jazeera channel in Israel, shortly after the Knesset voted on a law allowing him to ban foreign media outlets that harm security in Israel.
Shortly after Parliament approved the text, Netanyahu said in a post on the X platform, “The terrorist Al Jazeera channel will no longer broadcast from Israel. I intend to move in accordance with the new law to stop the activities of this channel.”
This law, which was approved by a majority of 70 votes to 10, gives the Prime Minister the ability to ban the broadcast of the targeted channel, up to and including closing its offices in Israel.
Netanyahu had previously pledged to take “immediate action” to close Al Jazeera in Israel as soon as the text was approved.
Netanyahu accused Al Jazeera of being a “Hamas propaganda apparatus” and of having “actively participated in the October 7 massacre.”
The channel strongly denies the truth of what Israel accuses it of, and in turn accuses the Hebrew state of systematically targeting its employees in the Gaza Strip.
The White House considered on Monday that the possibility of Israel banning the channel’s broadcasts is “worrying.”
US presidential spokeswoman Karine Jean-Pierre said, “I will blame Israel regarding what they intend to do, but (…) if that is true, a similar decision would be disturbing,” adding, “We believe in freedom of the press.”
In January, Israel accused an Al Jazeera journalist and a freelance contractor who were killed in a strike in Gaza of being “terrorist elements.”
The following month, she said that another journalist working for the channel, who was wounded in a separate strike, was a “deputy company commander” in Hamas.
Israeli forces have been at war with Hamas in Gaza since October.
The text allowing the authorities to ban foreign media outlets that pose a threat to national security passed its first parliamentary hurdles last month.
The Likud Party, led by Netanyahu, said that the latter had called for “care to approve the law that allows the closure of the island this evening” in the Knesset.
Wael Al-Dahdouh, director of Al-Hazira’s office in the Gaza Strip, was wounded in an Israeli strike in December, in which a cameraman for the network was killed.
