On August 31, 2024, Israeli security forces arrested Palestinian freelance journalist Ashwaq Muhammad Ayad, a reporter and photographer for the Jenin-based Al-dafa TV, at a checkpoint in the old city of the southern West Bank city of Hebron, according to the Palestinian Authority’s official news agency WAFA, the Beirut-based regional press freedom group SKeyes, and Palestinian freelance photographer Amer al-Shaloudi, who was with her at the time and spoke to CPJ via messaging app.
Al-Shaloudi, who was detained with Ayad near Ibrahimi Mosque for two hours and subsequently released, told CPJ that Ayad was initially held at Jerusalem’s Moscovia Detention Center for writing critically about Israel on social media. She has since been transferred to Damon prison, in northern Israel, according to her father, Mohammed Ayad.
Ayad’s father told CPJ via messaging app that Ayad had been charged with incitement on social media for posts published between October 7, 2023, and May 2024 and for “supporting a hostile organization.” He said that hearings in her case have been postponed multiple times. CPJ was unable to determine the status of her health in prison.
Ayad was arrested in the course of Israel’s recent military operations in the region, which began after the October 7, 2023, Hamas attack on Israel. Israel has killed scores of journalists in Gaza as well as six in Lebanon, jailed dozens of Palestinian journalists from the West Bank and Gaza, and destroyed much of the press infrastructure in Gaza, all while preventing the foreign press from entering Gaza.
CPJ emailed the Israel Defense Forces, Israel’s Security Agency, also known as Shin Bet, and the Israeli Prison Service in late 2024 for comment on the cases of imprisoned Palestinian journalists but received no response.