Palestinian photographer killed in northern West Bank

By MOHAMMED DARAGHMEH, Associated Press Writer

Transcribed from the clipping

NABLUS, West Bank (AP) — Palestinian free-lance photographer Imad Abu Zahra died of a gunshot wound today in the northern West Bank, and a fellow photographer said the shot came from a machine gun on an Israeli tank.

Israel's military said the tank gunner was responding to rifle fire from Palestinians who were also lobbing firebombs and rocks when the tank was disabled after hitting an electricity pole in the town of Jenin on Thursday. The military spokesman said it was not clear if army fire hit anyone, and said it was possible that Palestinian shooting killed the photographer.

Said Dahlah, a colleague working with Abu Zahra on Thursday, said the tank fired randomly as it moved up a street around midday, and people ran, barricading themselves in shops and homes.

Dahlah, a photographer for the Palestinian news agency Wafa, said that he and Abu Zahra were the only people left on the street and were shot at as they photographed the tank ramming into the electricity pole. A military curfew had been lifted at the time of the shooting, the army said.

Israel took control of Jenin and six other Palestinian cities and towns after back-to-back suicide bombings in Jerusalem killed 26 Israelis last month. Dahlah, who said he was wearing body armor with a fluorescent colored sign that read “Press” in English, was hit in the leg by shrapnel. He ran as the tank fired. Abu Zahra was not wearing a protective vest.

Shot in the leg, he fell to the ground. “When I looked back I saw him bleeding,” Dahlah said. “I came back to try to drag him away but the tank fired again. Then I left him and he crawled to a nearby alley. I saw a lot of blood on the ground.”

Dahlah said that people returned to the streets to find the two photographers injured, and only then did they attack the tank with rocks. He didn't know if any shots were fired from the angry crowd, because he left quickly for the hospital with his wounded colleague. A doctor at Jenin Hospital, Ashraf Tzubah, said a bullet severed Abu Zahra's femoral artery.

His heart stopped twice, and doctors were unable to restart it the second time, Tzubah said. The photographer, who was not married, died early today. Abu Zahra, 35, was a free-lance photographer and worked with foreign journalists, helping to arrange interviews, transportation and translations.

He had his own news agency called Al-Nahil and started a weekly newspaper, called “Jenin,” in 1996. The Palestinian Authority closed the newspaper and detained Abu Zahra for a week because the paper was critical of the Palestinian leadership.

Context added by this archive

The Associated Press account. It gives Imad Abu Zahra's age as 35 and says he was not wearing a protective vest. The Washington Post account, printed the next day in Spokane, gives his age as 34 and says both injured men were wearing blue bulletproof vests identifying them as journalists. This account alone carries his detention by the Palestinian Authority.

Cite this item

"Palestinian photographer killed in northern West Bank," Kentucky New Era, 12 July 2002. Covering Palestine archive, CP-2002-032. https://coveringpalestine.org/archive/cp-2002-032