Person who gave the testimony: Shireen Abu-‘Akleh, al-Jazeera correspondent in Palestine.
“On Monday 19th March 2001 at about 14:30 hours, three armed men came to the office, they didn’t say who they were or to which security service they belonged. They told the staff in the office to evacuate the place within 10 minutes. The staff tried to contact some officials regarding the decision to close the office.
The following day, at about 13:00 hours, Walid al-Omari, correspondent of al-Jazeera received a phone call from Abu-Sa’oud Kheir from the President’s Office who told him to evacuate the offices, Walid asked him for a written order, but he was told there wasn’t any written order. After half an hour three men from the President’s Office arrived at the offices and demanded that all the staff must leave. They informed the staff that the reasond for the order to close the office was that the station showed a photo of President Arafat with a shoe hanged on it, in a series program that the station transmitted on war in Lebanon.
The following day the employees tried in the morning to enter the office, but there were two armed guards at the door who prevented them.”
Date of Testimony: 22/3/2001
On Friday 23/3/2001 al-Jazeera office in Ramallah was reopened at about 18:00 hours, following some contacts at the highest level with officials in the PA, in which Bassam Abu-Sharif and Hanan Ashrawi, and other Palestinian personalities were involved. President Arafat met with the staff of the office for half an hour and gave his instructions to reopen the office immediately.
24/3/2001
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*Al-Jazeera is an Arab private TV station that transmits from Qatar. It gives a good coverage to events that take part in the Occupied Territories.