A BBC Arabic team was driving to back to a hotel when they were stopped and dragged from their car.

Muhannad Tutunji, Haitham Abudiab and their BBC Arabic team were driving to a hotel when their car was intercepted.

They were dragged from the vehicle - marked “TV” in red tape - searched and pushed against a wall.

A BBC spokesperson said journalists “must be able to report on the conflict in Israel-Gaza freely”.

Mr Tutunji and Mr Abudiab said they identified themselves as BBC journalists and showed police their press ID cards.

While attempting to film the incident, Mr Tutunji said his phone was thrown on the ground and he was struck on the neck.

“One of our BBC News Arabic teams deployed in Tel Aviv, in a vehicle clearly marked as media, was stopped and assaulted last night by Israeli police. Journalists must be able to report on the conflict in Israel-Gaza freely,” a BBC spokesperson said.

The BBC has contacted Israeli police for comment.

  • EvilCartyen
    1345·
    1 year ago

    I mean, if they were looking to do a genocide I don’t think they’d bother to use precision strikes, warming knocker bombs, and tell civilians to flee.

    Seems to me Hamas with their rhetoric of ending Israel and killing all Jews are the genocidal part. Don’t want to see what would happen if they had the military Israel has.

    Make no mistake, Israel is still an apartheid state run by awful people, but this is not genocide. This is trying to minimize casualties in an urban combat situation.

    • • milan •@feddit.nl
      304·
      1 year ago

      They do that so they can justify it afterwards. Warnings dont do anything because the people in Gaza can’t leave and Israel knows this. It’s by design after all.

      • NuPNuA@lemm.ee
        723·
        1 year ago

        They’re not being told to leave Gaza as a whole, they’re being told to leave the urban areas where Hamas are holed up to avoid civillains caught in the crossfire.

        • • milan •@feddit.nl
          251·
          1 year ago

          I know, but where are they supposed to go? The Gaza Strip is one of the most densely populated places on earth. Hamas is everywhere in Gaza. The initial deadline of 24 hours was even more impossible. These are not accidents, Israel knows this.

        • ???@lemmy.worldEnglish
          199·
          1 year ago

          Israel has killed full Palestinian families in Gaza. This isn’t people “caught in the crossfire”. This is Israel bringing the crossfire to their beds and homes. This is Israel’s continuing ethnic cleansing.

        • AngrilyEatingMuffins@kbin.social
          1·
          1 year ago

          One million people can’t move anywhere in 48 hours with no warning. And you know it. What a lying piece of shit you are, defending genocide.

    • dill@lemmy.one
      112·
      1 year ago

      The IDFs playbook seems awful bad at minimizing casualties.

    • NoneOfUrBusiness@kbin.social
      167·
      1 year ago

      While I don’t know about precision strikes, they haven’t been warning civilians before striking these past few days, and in fact many times designated an evacuation destination and bombed it. And don’t get me started on the white phosphorus. They’re definitely not avoiding civilian deaths (I mean why would you try to avoid the deaths of “human animals”). Oh, and I don’t see how holding journalists at gunpoint has anything to do with minimizing casualties.

      Israel has been genocidal for a while now, but they’ve been going full holocaust recently.

    • bunnyfc@kbin.social
      8·
      1 year ago

      That’s up to history, sadly, whether it’s genocide or not. Genocide has many characteristics, it’s not only killing a population by guns or other means.

      The definition of genocide does not care about the means, only about the goal or result.

    • ???@lemmy.world
      51·
      1 year ago

      use precision strikes

      These strikes are so precise that they now killed about 2k Gazans and around ten of the Israeli hostages. So precise.

      warming knocker bombs

      They said they would not roof knock this time although it seems international human rights orgs forced them to. Knocking does squat shit if you have around 5 minutes to leave.

      and tell civilians to flee.

      Then they bomb them while they flee. Or in the case of internationals, tell them to get to Rafah then leave them bretthless as they discover the Rafah checkpoint is still closed despite Biden’s best efforts and an Israeli promise.

      Also they told civilians to flee within 24 hours, which many have said was impossible. They created panic and chaos, killed 70 of those people fleeing, then extended the deadline and demand that the hospitals evacuate and leave which the hospitals say is impossible.

      Israel is drowning in war crimes now.

    • NuPNuA@lemm.ee
      312·
      1 year ago

      Genocide seems to have lost any kind of definition in the modern age, just like nazi and fascist have over the last decade when they’re thrown at everything people don’t like.