An American news agency fired its reporter for tweeting in support of Palestine.
Emily Wilder, a newly hired Associated Press reporter, was fired for spreading messages in support of Palestine.
“This is really destructive,” Wilder said in a telephone interview with the Washington Post, protesting his dismissal.
Associated Press spokeswoman Lauren Easton, speaking on condition of anonymity because she was not authorized to speak to the media, said:
“We have a policy that the statements of one person should not create dangerous conditions for our reporters who are covering the story.”
A spokeswoman for the news agency added: “Every Associated Press reporter is responsible for protecting our ability to report conflict or any other news that must be fair and credible, and these individuals cannot take sides in public.”
However, Wilder told the Washington Post that he had received and taken seriously the training on how to work with social media at the Associated Press.
To this end, the 22-year-old Jewish journalist even deleted one of his posts about the anti-racist movement “Black Lives Matter” from his Twitter account.
He continued: “Just because I have a deeply political and personal opinion on issues does not mean that I am not able to do fair and fact-based journalism.”
Wilder added: “There is no doubt that all this was accompanied by an onslaught of persecution against me.”
Two days before Wilder was fired, Stanford Republicans attacked Wilder in a Twitter message, describing him as an “anti-Israel insurgent.”
A day later, the far-right Washington Free Bacon claimed in an article against Wilder: “The Associated Press is hiring anti-Israel activists as its new correspondent. The Associated Press is already being questioned for sharing its office space with Hamas.”
“He wonders why the Associated Press fired him instead of sharing his concerns about the tweets,” said Stanford University Wilder Professor Jenny Zakaria.
The Israeli army bombed and completely destroyed the building, which also housed the Associated Press, on Saturday, claiming the presence of Hamas forces in the Al-Jalaa Tower, with a warning to the owner.
Sally Razby, executive editor of the Associated Press, said in an interview with CNN on Sunday, that during the 15 years that the news agency’s office has been located in the Al-Jala building, there has been no sign of the presence of Hamas forces, and the Zionist regime has no evidence to support this claim.
“Javad Mehdi”, the owner of this building, denied this claim and said: “Apart from the tenants, several law and engineering offices and some media outlets, including Al Jazeera and the Associated Press, were not present.”
Prior to the destruction of the Associated Press office, the agency had accused the Israeli army of playing tricks and deceiving the Western media in order to advance its goals.
According to some media reports, the Israeli army in a statement deliberately described the firing of Israeli ground tanks “on” the Gaza Strip as a ground attack “on” the Gaza Strip in order to mislead them.