gag orders

President Shimon Peres visits an Israeli police counter-terrorism unit in 2011. (Amos Ben Gershom/GPO)

+972 Magazine’s 20 most-read posts of 2016

From Shimon Peres’ dark side to Donald Trump at AIPAC to Airbnb in settlements, here are the most popular articles we published this past year. By +972 Magazine Staff 20. Why I had to leave Israel’s Foreign Ministry As a former Israeli ambassador, Ilan Baruch never expected just how badly the country’s situation would deteriorate, with the…

By +972 Magazine December 23, 2016

A full panel of the Israeli Supreme Court. (Illustrative photo, Flash90)

Israel’s surefire way of keeping its citizens in the dark

The Israeli establishment used to rely on the IDF Censor to make sure the media didn’t ask questions. Nowadays it uses court-sanctioned gag orders. By Shuki Tausig Did you hear about…and about…or what about…how could you have missed that? After all, we are talking about newsworthy events, the kind that open the 8 o’clock news. So how…

By The Seventh Eye October 10, 2016

Illustrative photo by Jennifer Moo (CC BY-ND 2.0)

IDF Censor redacts 1 in 5 articles it reviews for publication

The Israeli military censor has redacted, in full or in part, over 17,000 articles since 2011. While fewer articles have been censored in 2015 and 2016, the new IDF Censor is attempting to redact already-published information with alarming frequency. The Israeli Military Censor has outright banned the publication of 1,936 articles and redacted some information from 14,196…

By Haggai Matar September 26, 2016

Latest

Palestinian women cross Qalandiya checkpoint, a main crossing point between Jerusalem and the West Bank city of Ramallah, as they head to Al-Aqsa Mosque for the first Friday prayer of the holy Muslim month of Ramadan. (photo: Ahmad al-Bazz/Activestills.org)

Gag order extended as police refuse to release CCTV footage of Qalandiya killing

A Palestinian mother of two and her 16-year-old brother were shot and killed by Israeli security guards at Qalandiya checkpoint in April, even though eyewitnesses say they posed no risk. The police refuse to release the CCTV footage – maybe they know something we don’t? By John Brown* More than four months after a shooting…

By +972 Magazine August 30, 2016

A redacted document (Illustrative photo by Shutterstock.com)

How Israel is trying to enforce gag orders beyond its borders

At Israel’s request, Twitter is blocking Israelis from viewing certain tweets published overseas. Similar take-down notices have been sent to other international online platforms, the Justice Ministry confirms. Israeli authorities are taking steps to block their own citizens from reading materials published online in other countries, including the United States. The Israeli State Attorney’s Office Cyber Division…

By Michael Schaeffer Omer-Man August 9, 2016

Israel soldiers and private security guards at the Qalandiya checkpoint shortly after the two siblings were shot, April 27, 2016. (Yonatan Sindel/Flash90)

Police extend gag order on deadly Qalandiya shooting — again

Despite the fact that eye witnesses have provided versions of events that contradict the police narrative, the latter has refused to release CCTV footage of the shooting that killed two Palestinian siblings. John Brown* Nearly 70 days after Israeli security contractors shot two Palestinian siblings to death at the Qalandiya military checkpoint outside Jerusalem, a Jerusalem…

By +972 Magazine July 5, 2016

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and German Chancellor Merkel at a joint press conference in Berlin, February 16, 2016. (Amos Ben Gershom/GPO)

Fact-checking Netanyahu: A week full of truthiness

From surreal exaggerations to outright lies, Netanyahu dished up another batch of nonsense utterings to a foreign audience in Berlin this week. We picked three of the best and broke them down for you. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has something of a track record of saving his most nonsensical and demonstrably false statements for foreign…

By Natasha Roth-Rowland February 17, 2016

Illustrative photo by Shutterstock.com

A letter to our readers: On censorship

From military censorship to the government deciding who is and isn’t a journalist, Israeli authorities use various tools to interfere with the press. An important disclosure to our readers. When +972 Magazine was formed by a group of journalists and bloggers over five years ago, its founders decided that the site would not have an…

By Michael Schaeffer Omer-Man February 15, 2016

Avraham 'Avera' Mengistu (Facebook)

Archaic gag order lifted: Two Israeli civilians being held in Gaza

This is the third time in five years — that we can discuss — in which Israeli authorities have tried to use comprehensive gag orders to stop the publication of stories of public interest. This also is the third time that the Internet has made a mockery of such efforts to control information. A 28-year-old…

By Michael Schaeffer Omer-Man July 9, 2015

Netanyahu (Yotam Ronen / Activestills)

A premier failure: Where is Israel’s leadership?

With Netanyahu’s hints at revenge, his imperviousness toward the rage surrounding the murder of Muhammad Abu Khdeir and his complete absence in the Israeli media, the prime minister is a party to the growing Jewish-Arab animosity. Instances of violence between Jews and Arabs are piling up: the video from the bus in Tel Aviv, reports of…

By Noam Sheizaf July 5, 2014

Israeli settlers near the site where the bodies of the three abducted teens where found (photo: Activestills.com)

How the public was manipulated into believing the teens were alive

Details under gag order could have suggested early on that the abducted teens were murdered. The government-led campaign calling for their release helped the legitimacy of Israel’s military operation in the West Bank. Local and even international media played along. The following issue is not the heart of the kidnapping affair, the Israeli military operation…

By Noam Sheizaf July 2, 2014