Israeli Prime Minister Pledges Crackdown on Al Jazeera News Broadcast

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu vowed on Monday to use powers just given to him by lawmakers to ban the news channel called Al Jazeera from broadcasting in Israel.

The possible ban represents a new escalation in the ongoing conflict between the Israeli government and Qatari Broadcasting Corporation during Israel’s war with Hamas militants in Gaza.

In January, Israel claimed that the Al Jazeera reporter and freelancer killed in the Gaza airstrike were “terrorists.” The following month, it announced that another journalist at the station who was injured in a separate attack was a Hamas “deputy company commander.”

Al Jazeera vehemently denies Israel’s claims and accuses Israel of systematically targeting Al Jazeera staff in the Gaza Strip.

“The terrorist channel Al Jazeera will no longer broadcast from Israel. I intend to act immediately following the new law to stop the channel’s activities,” Netanyahu said on X, formerly Twitter.

The law giving Prime Minister Netanyahu that power, passed by a 70-10 vote on Monday, includes the power to ban foreign broadcasters from broadcasting their content, but also allows them to close offices in Israel.

Prime Minister Netanyahu’s Likud party said he asked “to ensure that the law to shut down Al Jazeera is passed by the Knesset, Israel’s parliament, this evening.”

Wael al-Dahdou, al-Jazeera’s Palestinian Authority bureau chief, was also injured in an Israeli attack in December that killed a photographer for the station.

Qatar is also home to Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh.The war between Israel and Hamas began with an attack by the extremist group on October 7, which killed about 1,160 people, mostly civilians, in Israel, according to official Israeli statistics from AFP.

Israeli retaliatory operations have killed at least 32,845 people, mostly women and children, according to the Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip’s health ministry.