Israel launches 'image management' campaign

"The question is whether these Palestinian employees of the foreign press are providing nonbiased objective coverage of events, or deliberately distorting the truth to serve the Palestinian cause," Seaman says. "We have no doubt that all of those employed by the foreign press receive their instructions from the Palestinian Authority."

Israel was reinforced in its decision to bar foreign journalists from Ramallah by interviews that CNN broadcast on Sunday with Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat in his besieged offices.

Journalists had followed pro-Palestinian peace activists into Mr. Arafat's room.

"If a journalist wants to come here and be accredited by Israel, we expect them not to cross us and be a part of a Palestinian propaganda show," Mr. Mekel says.

Mekel says that "we have always gone out of our way to provide full freedom all of these years, but this time it is really safety. We don't want people to be hurt and then we are blamed.

"If you compare access by the foreign press here with Arab countries, the difference is striking," he adds.

Grievances of journalists toward Israeli authorities have been mounting for months.

Journalists have also faced problems with the Palestinian Authority, including interference and intimidation.

Mr. Shadid, of The Boston Globe, was shot from behind, in the right shoulder, in Ramallah. A colleague at the Globe, Alon Tuval, said it was not clear if the shot was fired by Israelis or Palestinians. Not so in most of the cases where journalists have been hit, say watchdog groups.

"Gunfire from the Israel Defense Forces was the most dangerous and immediate threat to journalists in Gaza and the West Bank," the New York-based Committee to Protect Journalists said, referring to the year 2001.

Mr. Handal, of Egypt's Nile Television, was shot in the neck by Israeli soldiers, according to colleague Ra'ed Hilu, who was with him. Mr. Hilu said the car was clearly marked on all four sides with large stickers that said TV. The Israeli army did not respond to queries about the incident.

Ciriello's colleagues say the Italian photographer was tracking Palestinian gunmen at the time he was shot by Israeli forces, after pointing his camera toward a tank.

"I don't think they are deliberately trying to hit journalists. I think a lot of people lose patience and vent their anger at the media," says Tami Allen-Frost, deputy chair of the Foreign Press Association in Israel. "Lackadaisical and slow army investigations are giving the soldiers in the field an unofficial green light to do what they are doing."

Ms. Allen-Frost says that in 19 months, only one soldier has been punished for shooting a journalist. The soldier shot and seriously wounded photographer Yola Monakhov in the abdomen with two live bullets while there was no exchange of fire during an incident in Bethlehem. He was demoted and given a suspended 28-day prison sentence.

Seaman says the army does not deliberately shoot journalists.

In some of the cases of journalists being shot, there was not enough evidence to conclude whether disciplinary action was appropriate. In other instances, journalists were "caught in the crossfire," he said.

"I am more afraid that an Israeli soldier will not shoot in such a situation and get killed than I am that the journalist will get killed," Seaman says, referring to the incident in which Ciriello was killed.

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