Shireen Abu Akleh was a truth teller

Palestine will not be silenced

Israeli police attacked the funeral procession – nearly forcing pallbearers to drop Abu Akleh’s coffin.

The Palestinian journalist Shireen Abu Akleh was deliberately targeted by an Israeli sniper and assassinated on May 11. She was murdered in the morning daylight while wearing a vest that was clearly marked PRESS on the front and on her back.

To the apartheid regime occupying Palestine, her camera was more dangerous than a gun.

For 25 years Abu Akleh told the world about Palestine. “I chose journalism to be close to people,” said Shireen Abu Akleh. “It might not be easy to change the reality, but at least I could bring their voice to the world.” 

The Al Jazeera broadcaster reported how racist Israeli settlers shout in Hebrew “Mavet le-Aravim.” (“Death to the Arabs.”) She showed the demolition of Palestinian homes and the shooting of Palestinian children.

For telling the truth, Shireen Abu Akleh was beloved throughout the Arab world and beyond. And for being a truth teller she was murdered.

More than 50 other Palestinian journalists have been killed. The Israeli military spokesperson Ran Kochav justified these killings by saying “They’re armed with cameras, if you’ll permit me to say so.” 

The capitalist media covers-up these murders. The first headlines about Abu Akleh’s death in The New York Times referred to her as simply being slain, not assassinated.

The actress Susan Sarandon tweeted the truth: “Shireen Abu Akleh was EXECUTED with a shot to the head.” 

Shireen Abu Akleh held U.S. citizenship. Where was the congressional resolution condemning her assassination after the U.S. has delivered over $140 billion into the Zionist state?

In contrast, the governments of South Africa and Namibia denounced this foul murder. So did the Zimbabwe Union of Journalists.

Africans remember how Israel supported the original apartheid regime in South Africa and even supplied those neo-Nazis with nuclear weapons. 

Attacking her funeral

The Zionist state couldn’t even let Palestinians bury Shireen Abu Akleh in peace. The whole world saw on May 13 how Israeli police in riot gear attacked the pallbearers with horses and batons in Al-Quds (Jerusalem), the capital of Palestine.

At one point the casket almost dropped to the ground. One of the carriers managed to hold it with one hand while warding off police clubs with the other.

Palestinians belong to different faiths. Shireen Abu Akleh was a Christian.

Some Israeli soldiers asked Palestinians in the funeral procession whether they were Muslim or Christian. If they answered “Muslim” they would be kicked out. 

Tear gas and stun grenades were used against mourners. Cops beat and kicked the mourners while seizing Palestinian flags.

That’s how every colonial regime acts. In 1948, Law No. 53 was passed in Puerto Rico that made it illegal to display or even own a Puerto Rican flag. “La Ley de la Mordaza” was repealed in 1957.

Israeli police claim Palestinians carrying their own flag is “nationalist incitement.” Real “incitement” is the Israeli Brigadier-General (Reserve) Zvika Fogel confirming that army snipers are ordered to shoot at Palestinian children.

Fogel told Ron Nesiel on the Israeli public radio network Kan in 2018 that “it is not the whim of one or the other sniper who identifies the small body of a child now and decides he’ll shoot. Someone marks the target for him very well and tells him exactly why one has to shoot and what the threat is from that individual.”

Someone in the Israeli military establishment also marked the target of Shireen Abu Akleh and ordered the sniper to shoot her in the head.

The truth will not be silenced

It’s not just in the U.S. client state of Israel that truth tellers are assassinated. Between 2000 and 2016, $10 billion in U.S. aid was sent to Colombia.

The upshot was that tens of thousands of people were killed. Among them were 53 Colombian journalists slain between 1992 and 2022.

Within the United States itself ― all of it stolen from Indigenous peoples ― journalists have been attacked and killed.

Los Angeles Times columnist and KMEX-TV news director Ruben Salazar was killed on Aug. 29, 1970, during the National Chicano Moratorium anti-war march in East Los Angeles. Cops had attacked the peaceful protest of over 20,000 people.

Salazar was killed by a tear gas canister fired by a Los Angeles County Sheriff’s deputy.

Many people believe that Salazar was deliberately targeted for exposing the racism and brutality of the police and sheriff departments. In the days before his death, Ruben Salazar felt that he was being followed by police.

The wealthy and powerful wanted to silence the radio journalist Mumia Abu-Jamal forever. The former Black Panther Party member was framed for killing a Philadelphia police officer and was sentenced to death.

Although the death sentence was eventually overturned, Mumia Abu-Jamal has been in prison since 1981.

Ramsey Orta, a member of Copwatch in New York City, videoed the killing of Eric Garner by police officer Daniel Pantaleo on July 17, 2014. Garner was choked to death while repeatedly saying “I can’t breathe.”

For revealing the truth about Eric Garner’s cruel death to the world, Ramsey Orta was railroaded to jail and spent four years in prison.

The U.S. Government is now trying to extradite Wikileaks founder Julian Assange for exposing Pentagon war crimes in Afghanistan and Iraq. Assange is in ill health and could be sentenced to many years in jail.

Hands off Julian Assange and all the truth tellers.


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