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The Israeli authorities have banned journalists from entering the Gaza Strip since 6 November 2008. This blockade on the foreign media was reinforced by Operation Cast Lead, launched on 27 December 2008.
In general, the Israeli security forces behave arbitrarily towards Palestinian journalists and media assistants in the West Bank and Gaza Strip. A Palestinian cameraman working for Reuters, Fadel Shanaa, was killed in the Gaza Strip on 16 April 2008 by a shell fired from an Israeli tank. The army’s investigation did not lead to legal proceedings against the soldiers implicated nor did it shed light on the circumstances of his death. A missile or shell hit the Al-Shurouq Tower, a building in Gaza City that houses several news organisations, on 15 January, injuring an Abu Dhabi TV journalist and a Reuters cameraman. Afag TV, a station based in the West Bank city of Nablus, had to cease operations on 10 July 2008 after Israeli soldiers closed its studios and put them under seal.
The Israeli army regularly arrests Palestinian journalists as they move about within the Palestinian Territories or on their return from visits abroad. For example, Ibrahim Hamad, a sound engineer working for the Palestinian news agency Ramattan was arrested on 15 July 2008 and placed in detention for six months. Four Ramattan journalists and technicians were arrested on at a checkpoint at Zaatara, near the West Bank city of Nablus, while headed for Nablus on 22 June 2008 in a vehicle with TV markings. Israeli army abuses rarely result in legal proceedings against the soldiers involved.
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