US TO OPEN INVESTIGATION INTO SHIREEN ABU AKLEH KILLING: REPORTS

Fein said while Israel may be quick to refuse to cooperate with the probe, the US has many tools, including military aid and regional geopolitics, to pressure its Middle East ally. “Those kinds of levers can change the minds of the Israelis,” he said.

Biden administration’s position

A US probe into the killing would mark an about-face from the initial stance of President Joe Biden’s administration.

Despite numerous calls by US legislators for a Washington-led investigation, the US State Department previously ruled out opening an inquiry into the incident. Instead, US officials have stressed that Israel can investigate its own troops.

Abu Akleh’s killing sparked international outrage and calls for justice by press freedom advocates.

Dozens of US legislators, including some staunch Israel supporters, signed on to letters urging Biden and his top aides to seek accountability in the case. One of the letters called for an FBI probe.

In September, the Israeli government said it will not conduct a criminal investigation into the incident after releasing a public assessment stating that there is a “high possibility” that one of its soldiers shot Abu Akleh but that it was accidental.

Video footage, several witnesses and multiple investigations by independent media outlets showed that there were no armed Palestinians in the area where Abu Akleh and other journalists were standing before Israeli soldiers started firing at them.

After calling for “accountability” for months and saying the journalist’s killers should be prosecuted, the Biden administration changed its tone after the Israeli statement in September, and the public US push for accountability became muted.

Instead, the State Department urged Israel to review its rules of engagement to prevent similar incidents from happening in the future — a demand later publicly rejected by Israeli leaders.

“This is an important and overdue step toward accountability for relentless Israeli abuses,” Democracy for the Arab World Now, a Washington, DC-based human rights group, said on Twitter.

Robert Mahoney at the Committee to Protect Journalists said while “Israel has powerful allies and political influence in the United States … Washington equally has influence over a state that it props up with nearly $4 billion a year in aid”.

“It can do more than give Israel a slap on the wrist from press-briefing podiums. It can pressure Israel to accept an FBI or other independent investigation,” Mahoney wrote in an op-ed in The Hill.

“The Abu Akleh family says Shireen Abu Akleh was murdered. Israel denies it. Without a thorough, independent investigation by a credible agency like the FBI, we will never know and reporters, even those wearing ‘PRESS’ vests, will continue to be potential targets.”