CNN Crew Detained and Journalist Put in Chokehold in IDF Run-In: ‘We’re Journalists. What Are You Doing?!’
CNN Crew Detained and Journalist Put in Chokehold in IDF Run-In: ‘We’re Journalists. What Are You Doing?!’

CNN’s Jeremy Diamond and his crew were briefly detained in Israel this week and a photojournalist was put into a chokehold during the incident.

Diamond and his crew were confronted by IDF soldiers while doing a report on rising violence in the West Bank where Israelis and Palestinians have been violently clashing amid the war in Iran.

Soldiers confronted Diamond and his crew and repeatedly told them to sit down. One of the soldiers then came from behind photojournalist Cyril Theophilos and put him in a chokehold to get him off of his feet. His camera was damaged, and Diamond’s phone was slapped out of his hand as he questioned the IDF soldier.

“We’re journalists. What are you doing?!” he said.

Diamond said they were ultimately detained for two hours.

He said during the report:

Producer Abeer Salman identifies us as journalists, before translating the soldiers’ commands. So the soldiers just immediately came up and started pointing their weapons directly at us, telling everyone to sit down immediately. Obviously, we’re not posing any threat here. The commander comes straight for our camera. And within seconds, a soldier has just put photojournalist Cyril Theophilos in a chokehold, forcing him to the ground. The soldier who assaulted Theophilos continues to demand he turn off his camera before another smacks my phone. So as you can see, what we have seen happen in the last 24 hours is that settlers came to this area. They settled that hilltop. And now you have a lot of soldiers coming to this area with the Palestinians in this area.

The IDF soldiers told Diamond they are in the West Bank to bring “order,” but Diamond showed footage of the soldiers claiming ownership of the land later. They view, Diamond said, Palestinians in the area as the “threat.”

“The Palestinians here are detained and questioned. Soldiers detain us, too, and walk us back to our vehicle,” Diamond reported. “They say they’re trying to establish order between settlers and Palestinians. But as the cameras keep rolling, it becomes clear these soldiers are here in service of the settler movement.”

Watch above via CNN.

The post CNN Crew Detained and Journalist Put in Chokehold in IDF Run-In: ‘We’re Journalists. What Are You Doing?!’ first appeared on Mediaite.

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