Shirin Abu Akleh could not rest even on the day of her own funeral. The Israeli forces charged with full force against the funeral procession, threw stun grenades, beat those present and not even those carrying the coffin were spared, which was about to fall to the ground. The agents did not allow the body to be carried on their shoulders to the Cathedral of the Annunciation of the Virgin, in the heart of the Old City, and above all they did not want Palestinian flags to be displayed under any circumstances. The agents tried in every way to prevent the Palestinians from firing the Palestinian reporter with her national flag. They did not succeed and shortly after Jerusalem experienced one of the most important Palestinian mobilizations in memory with the Old City taken by thousands of Palestinians who came to say their last goodbye to the star journalist of Al Jazeera, the most important news network in the world. Arab.
The holy city, where Shireen lived, picked up the baton from Ramallah where on Thursday he also received a massive goodbye. After the chaos at the gates of the hospital where the body was, the Police did not intervene in the cathedral, nor in the march to the cemetery on Mount Zion where she was buried among Palestinian flags and shouting “Jerusalem is Arab.”
The Al Jazeera chain, the Palestinian National Authority (PNA) and all the journalists present in Jenin on the day of his death accuse the Israeli soldiers of shooting Shireen in the head. The Jewish state maintains that it is “incapable” of determining who killed a reporter who was perfectly identified with her vest, case and ‘Press’ logo. This position of Israel is surprising since this type of operations of its forces in the occupied territories are usually heavily monitored by drones and are normally capable of showing every detail of what happened. The Israelis ask for a joint investigation, but from the Palestinian side they bet on taking the case to the International Criminal Court.
According to data from the Palestinian Information Ministry, Shireen is the 45th journalist killed by Israel since 2000. A year ago, they killed Youssef Abu Hussein, a broadcaster for Voice of Al Aqsa, during an operation in Gaza in which they also shot down the block in which the offices of the Associated Press (AP) or Al Jazeera were located. These chains are still waiting for “evidence” of the presence of terrorists in that place.
In April 2018, two other reporters, Ahmad Abu Hussein and Yaser Murtaja, were shot dead by the Army in the same week while covering protests at the Gaza separation barrier. Both were perfectly identified.
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