Democratic senator calls for Biden to release report on Israeli shooting death of American journalist

A Democratic senator is calling on the Biden administration to publicly release its findings into the shooting death of Shireen Abu Akleh, a Palestinian-American journalist who was killed by Israeli forces while covering a security raid in the West Bank in May 2022.

Sen. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.), a member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, said that a report compiled by the U.S. security coordinator for Israel and the Palestinian Authority provides relevant information about the “the conduct of the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) unit involved in that operation as well as other IDF units operating in the West Bank.”

“I strongly believe that its public release is vital to ensuring transparency and accountability in the shooting death of American citizen and journalist Shireen Abu Akleh and to avoiding future preventable and wrongful deaths – goals we should all support,” the senator said in a statement.

Van Hollen has been pushing the State Department for nearly a year to see the classified report that was compiled by U.S. Security Coordinator for Israel and the Palestinian Authority Gen. Michael Fenzel and his team in the aftermath of Abu Akleh’s death.

The Maryland senator last week secured a commitment from the State Department’s top Middle East official, Barbara Leaf, that he would finally be able to view the report.

“I want to see the report. That’s pretty much it,” Van Hollen told The Hill last week when asked what he expected to find in the security coordinator’s review.

“It’s not an independent investigation, but it is a review of different reports, and I’m interested in what his findings are. My overall interest is to accomplish what the president has said he wants to accomplish. Which is two things, one is to reduce risks to journalists in conflict zones but also, what the administration says they’re seeking as well, which is accountability in the shooting death of an American citizen and a journalist.”

Abu Akleh, a reporter for Al Jazeera and a veteran journalist in the region, was shot and killed in the Palestinian city of Jenin, in the West Bank while covering an Israeli security operation on May 11, 2022.

The State Department said on July 4, 2022, that the security coordinator’s assessment concluded that “gunfire from IDF positions was likely responsible for the death of Shireen Abu Akleh,” but cautioned that there was no evidence to suggest that the shooting was intentional.

Van Hollen, who has repeated calls for an independent investigation into Abu Akleh’s death, criticized the security coordinator’s lack of access to key witnesses that would provide more details on the circumstances surrounding the shooting.

“This summation report does not and cannot shed new light on the state of mind of the individual responsible for firing the fatal shot,” he wrote in the statement.

Van Hollen further called for the Israeli government and IDF to review the military’s rules of engagement in the West Bank, echoing the recommendation by the State Department in the aftermath of the review’s conclusions, which was criticized and rebuffed by Israeli leadership at the time.

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