Gaza journalists get threats over Hamas coverage

GAZA (Reuters) - A handful of Palestinian journalists have reported receiving death threats for their critical coverage of the Islamic militant group Hamas since it began running the government in March, a press group said on Monday.

The Palestinian Journalists' Union said seven journalists in the Gaza Strip, mostly sympathetic to President Mahmoud Abbas's Fatah party, had received threats by e-mail, phone or fax -- made in Hamas's name -- to harm or kill them for their coverage.

Hamas spokesman Sami Abu Zuhri denied the group had threatened journalists, saying the calls were a fraudulent attempt to "damage Hamas's image". He urged security forces to investigate.

The threats came amid a struggle for sway over the Palestinian Authority and its security forces that pits the moderate Abbas, favored by Israel and Western powers, against Hamas, which beat Fatah in a parliamentary election in January.

"We are taking these threats seriously, although we do not think the Hamas movement has a policy to threaten journalists," said Sakher Abu Own from the Journalists' Union, which represents journalists in the West Bank and Gaza.

"These threats could have been made by individuals. We have urged factions to take a position against it," he said.

No journalists have been harmed since Hamas took office.

In recent years, some Palestinian reporters have been beaten over coverage, and a journalist who ran a government-funded magazine was killed in 2004. Victims of the violence said attackers came from various factions, including Fatah, and in one case, from Hamas. Members of the security services were also involved in some of the incidents, journalists said.   In the past year, several foreign journalists were also briefly kidnapped in Gaza.

CRITICISM

The mainstream Palestinian media have tended to favor Fatah in news coverage. The largest media outlets, especially in radio and on the government-run television station, have been highly critical of Hamas policies since the group took office.

Some pro-Fatah media have predicted the government will collapse because of financial problems after Western countries cut off aid to the Hamas-led administration. Others have slammed Hamas as unprepared to run state affairs.

Muwafaq Matar, a journalist with the pro-Fatah al-Hureya radio station in Gaza who has criticized the performance of Hamas in government, said he had received three separate threats.

"The caller told me: 'You are part of the campaign to bring down the Hamas government'," Matar told Reuters. "I will blow up your head and cut off your legs if I hear you again on al-Hureya radio."

Another journalist, working for the pro-Fatah Palestine Press news Web site, said the caller who threatened him identified himself as a member of Hamas's military wing, the Izz el-Deen al-Qassam Brigades.

"Since Hamas came to power, they want journalists all to talk the same language, the Hamas language," said the journalist, Waseem Gharib.