Corporate DispatchPro Cover Story
Shooting the messenger One night in a turbulent week, news outlets reporting from Gaza City were tipped off about an imminent air assault. The target was their offices. The Al-Jalaa tower housed eight media outlets including the Associated Press and Al Jazeera as well as tens of residential apartments and other offices. An hour after the advance warning, Israeli fighter jets hit the 11-storey building pulverising it into a column of black smoke. A spokesperson for the army maintained that members of Hamas, a Palestinian militant group, were hiding in the tower, a claim disputed by the president and CEO of Associated Press, Gary Pruitt. The news publishing veteran complained that the destruction of the building will hide the ongoing fighting in the Gaza strip from the world’s eyes. The strike on the Al-Jalaa came three days after a similar bombing of the Shorouq tower, a stone’s throw away. The 14-floor structure was also home to media offices. International observers raised concerns about attacks targeting news outlets, prompting White House press secretary Jen Psaki to call for the safety and security of journalists and independent media. This round of Israel-Palestine conflicts escalated quickly from the convergence of, relatively, minor incidents. Tensions were already high when the first day of the Ramadan and Memorial Day in Israel coincided, on April 13. Confrontations between Muslim Palestinians and Israeli police officers in and around the Al-Aqsa Mosque started to snowball. Meanwhile, six Palestinian families in the West Bank were facing eviction from the Israeli government, stirring a wave of protests
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