Wed 27 July 2022:
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken met with the family of Shireen Abu Akleh, a veteran journalist who was killed in May while covering the Israeli-Palestinian conflict for Al Jazeera.
“Today I met with the family of slain Palestinian-American journalist Shireen Abu Akleh, whose fearless journalism earned her the respect of audiences around the world. I expressed my deepest condolences and commitment to pursue accountability for her tragic killing,” Blinken said on Twitter.
He also shared pictures of the meeting.
Abu Akleh, a 51-year-old Palestinian-American, was shot dead on May 11 while covering an Israeli military raid near the Jenin refugee camp in the occupied West Bank.
While Palestinian officials and Al Jazeera accused Israel of killing the reporter, Tel Aviv denied any responsibility.
Earlier, the family had harshly criticized the results of an investigation where the US avoided remarks that held Israel responsible for her killing.
“We, the family of Shireen Abu Akleh, write to express our grief, outrage and sense of betrayal concerning your administration’s abject response to the extrajudicial killing of our sister and aunt by Israeli forces on May 11, 2022, while on assignment in the occupied Palestinian city of Jenin in the West Bank,” family members said in a long letter to US President Joe Biden.
It underlined that the journalist, who was also a US citizen, was killed by an Israeli-fired bullet to the head, despite wearing a protective helmet and a blue bulletproof vest that was marked “press.”
Lina Abu Akleh, the journalist’s niece, said the family stressed at the meeting on Tuesday the need for a “US investigation that leads to real accountability”.
“Although he made some commitments on Shireen’s killing, we’re still waiting to see if this administration will meaningfully answer our calls for #JusticeForShireen,” Lina Abu Akleh wrote on Twitter after the talks with Blinken.
She also reiterated the family’s request for a meeting with President Joe Biden, which she said would show “Shireen’s case is a priority for this administration.”
Lina Abu Akleh said Blinken told the family that protecting US citizens is his duty. “Nothing short of a US investigation that leads to real accountability is acceptable, and we won’t stop until no other American or Palestinian family endures the same pain we have,” she wrote.
Abu Akleh’s relatives had called for a meeting with Biden when he visited Israel and the occupied West Bank earlier this month, but the US president did not grant their request.
“Since the President didn’t come to us in Jerusalem to hear first-hand our grief, outrage and concerns regarding his administration’s lack of response to Shireen’s extrajudicial killing, we decided to come to him,” the Abu Akleh family said in a statement first reported by Politico earlier on Tuesday.
Shortly before the family’s meeting with Blinken concluded, Department of State spokesperson Ned Price said the secretary would reiterate the US call for accountability in the case while also hearing the perspective of Abu Akleh’s relatives.
Price repeatedly mentioned “accountability” but failed to provide details on what such accountability would look like. Instead, he stressed that Washington is engaging privately with its “Israeli and Palestinian partners” on this issue.
SOURCE: INDEPENDENT PRESS AND NEWS AGENCIES
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