Israeli Army Says It's Highly Possible Al Jazeera Journalist Shireen Abu Akleh Was Killed By A Soldier
The Israeli army said Monday there was a “high possibility” that a soldier killed Shireen Abu Akleh a well-known Al Jazeera journalist in May.
The army was announcing the results of its investigation into the killing.
AP News cites an Israeli army official as saying that the shooting was accidental and no one would be punished.
Shireen Abu Akleh was killed in May while covering Israeli military raids in the occupied West Bank. The Palestinians blamed Israel for the killing. Israel initially said she may have been killed by militant fire, but later said a soldier may have hit her by mistake during an exchange of fire.
Abu Akleh, a Palestinian-American journalist, had covered the West Bank for the satellite channel for two decades and was known across the Arab world.
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In a briefing to reporters, a senior military official said the military could not conclusively determine where the fire emanated from, saying there may have been Palestinian gunmen in the same area as the Israeli soldier.
But he said the soldier shot the journalist “with very high likelihood” and did so by mistake. The official did not explain why witness accounts and videos showed limited militant activity in the area, as well as no gunfire in the vicinity until the barrage that struck Abu Akleh and wounded another reporter.
The official said, speaking on condition of anonymity under military briefing guidelines:
He misidentified her. His reports in real-time…absolutely point to a misidentification.
The results of the probe, announced nearly four months after the killing, largely align with those of several independent investigations completed much earlier.
Abu Akleh’s family criticized the investigation, saying the army “tried to obscure the truth and avoid responsibility” for the killing.
The family has over the months maintained that the Israeli army was responsible for the reporter’s death. It says it’s obvious to anyone that Israeli war criminals cannot investigate their own crimes.
The family also reiterated its call for an independent U.S. investigation and a probe by the International Criminal Court.
