Reportage

Israel: Journalists warn of government plans

Audio 01:27

Israeli actors, filmmakers, executives and celebrities attend a demonstration against the Israeli government's plans for KAN, in Tel Aviv, January 25, 2023. AFP - JACK GUEZ

Text by: RFI Follow

2 mins

The maligned reforms proposed by the far-right Israeli government led by Binyamin Netanyahu do not only concern the judiciary, but also the media, and in particular public broadcasting, the closure of KAN, the public broadcaster.

This Sunday, January 29, Israeli journalists took to the streets of Tel Aviv to support their colleagues.

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With our special correspondent in Tel-Aviv,

Michel Paul

The people want public broadcasting, exclaim the journalists.

They are a few hundred gathered in Tel-Aviv.

They represent the entire Israeli audiovisual landscape.

And they are there to support KAN, the public broadcaster created just over five years ago.

Nahum Barnea of

​​Yediot Aharonot

is one of the country's best-known journalists.

The government wants to do something brutal on public broadcasting: reduce the budget, privatize it or simply close it.

And that's what we're here for.

Yes, it was Netanyahu's government that created it and now regrets it.

This is bad news.

The objective is the outright closure of KAN, the public broadcaster.

And initially, the reduction of almost half of the budget which is now granted to it annually by the government after the abolition of the fee.

Emmanuelle Elbaz collaborates with public television.

In the past, one of his employers was forced to go out of business.

There, we really have governmental and political pressure to silence the free press.

Now in Israel, journalists know that this is a reality, and that is why today Israeli journalists are united in this campaign.

The government's intentions are already having an impact on the work of journalists.

Several TV crews covering the deadly attack near a synagogue in East Jerusalem this weekend were attacked by far-right activists.

► See also Israel: the executive takes action after the attacks in East Jerusalem

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  • Israel

  • Media

  • Binyamin Netanyahu

  • Freedom of press