“The Israel Police Commissioner, in coordination with the Minister of Public Security, has instructed that an investigation be carried out into the incident. The Israel Police supports its officers, but as a professional organization seeking to learn and improvement will also draw lessons from the incident,” the institution said on Saturday.
This Saturday the Israeli police assured that they will investigate the actions of their officials during the funeral of the Palestinian journalist Shireen Abu Akleh murdered in the West Bank.
The funeral was held in Jerusalem and the police brutality suffered by those carrying his coffin received a wave of criticism.
“The Israel Police Commissioner, in coordination with the Minister of Public Security, has instructed that an investigation be carried out into the incident,” a police spokesman said in a statement today, adding that “the Israel Police supports its officers, but as a professional organization that seeks to learn and improve will also draw lessons from the incident”.
The institution argued that during the funeral ceremonies “the agents were exposed to the violence of rioters,” who “tried to sabotage the ceremony and harm the police.” Given this, they added, the officers responded by using force.
The decision to investigate these events comes in response to a wave of criticism from the international community.
They include the US government, the European Union and the UN Security Council.
This after images of Israeli agents beating Palestinians carrying Abu Akleh’s coffin with batons, almost causing it to fall.
Al-Jazeera journalist Shireen Abu Akleh was shot dead in the head while reporting in the occupied West Bank. Other journalists who were at the scene say that they were deliberately shot by Israeli soldiers. pic.twitter.com/utPGrg981p
– English + Spanish (@ajplusespanol) May 11, 2022
Arguments of violence at Shireen Abu Akleh’s funeral
During the day on Friday, the Israeli police offered various arguments to justify the violence of their forces.
They first alleged nationalist chants, incitement to violence and the alleged throwing of stones.
They then emphasized that the intention to carry the reporter’s body out of the hospital on their shoulders violated an agreement with her family to do so in a vehicle.
These episodes took place in a context of high tension in Jerusalem.
Murder of the journalist
Some 10,000 Palestinians gathered to bid farewell to the veteran journalist, a native of the city and who He was shot in the head on Wednesday while covering an Israeli army raid in the West Bank city of Jenin..
Both the Palestinian National Authority (PNA) and the Qatari network Al Jazeera – for which Shireen Abu Akleh worked – and several journalists who were with her when she died accused Israeli troops of having killed her.
The Israeli government, for its part, initially blamed Palestinian militiamen.
He then pointed out that at the moment it is impossible to determine who fired the shot, emphasizing the need to carry out a joint investigation, something that the ANP refuses.
The raid in which he died Abu Akleh, 51, who had Palestinian and American nationalityoccurred within the framework of the current uptick in violence in the region, which began almost two months ago with a wave of attacks on Israeli territory and has already caused more than 50 deaths.
Yesterday, during a new arrest operation in Jenin, an exchange of fire with Palestinian militiamen caused the death of a sergeant of a special unit of the Israeli police, in addition to 13 wounded Palestinians.
This Saturday, the official Palestinian news agency, WAFA, reported the death of a 23-year-old man who had been injured on April 22 during clashes with Israeli troops on the Esplanade of the Jerusalem Mosques.