KUALA LUMPUR: The Information Ministers of the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) Member States have called out Israel's systematic misinformation campaigns on human rights violations and targeting of journalists in Palestine.
In a statement following the one-day Extraordinary Session of the Islamic Conference of Information Ministers (ICIM) in Istanbul, Turkiye, the ministers condemned the Israeli occupation's deliberate and systematic targeting of Palestinian journalists and highlighted that the act was part of a campaign to silence the voices of truthtellers.
"We also condemn the Israeli occupation forces for unwilling to take even the most basic steps to ensure the safety of journalists, according to the International Humanitarian Law (IHL) and other international instruments that guarantee and protect journalists' rights.
"The ministers are also concerned that Israel, the occupying power, is seeking to conceal the truth about the unfolding atrocities in the Gaza Strip, including murdering babies, children, women, elderly journalists, healthcare workers, academics, and humanitarian workers through, including, by systematic disinformation campaigns."
The Final Communique of the ministers also called on the international community to open an investigation to hold the Israeli occupation authorities accountable for the crimes they commit against media professionals in the occupied Palestinian territory.
"We want to emphasise that the international community has the right to know what is happening in the Palestinian territory, in particular in the Gaza Strip, and underline the need for the international community to act immediately to hold Israel, the occupying power, accountable for violating international law for targeting journalists, and to take immediate steps to protect all journalists assigned in the region," it said.
"We are also holding Israel, the occupying power, responsible for the killings, arrest and censorship of journalists as well as the murder and targeting their family members," it said.
The ministers also determined to work collectively and closely at the international level to combat disinformation, and demonstrate a common will to act in solidarity and unison to expose indiscriminate attacks targeting Palestinian civilians, including settler terrorism in the West Bank, which aims to cause forced displacement of the Palestinian people.
"We also emphasise our collective determination to counter and expose attempts by the Israeli colonial occupation to cover up the destruction in the field, by intimidating journalists to minimise the international reaction, and to ensure that their efforts to cover up the war crimes and genocide committed in the Gaza Strip fail," it said.
The ministers also mandated the OIC General Secretariat's Media Monitoring Unit to devise a media action plan, in cooperation with OIC media institutions and interested national news agencies of member states, to counter the Israeli occupation's disinformation, misinformation, false news and war crimes, at international forum.
"We call to provide support for the OIC media Monitoring Unit to organise a media workshop to accomplish its mission as stipulated by the joint Arab and Islamic Summit held in Riyadh on 11 Nov, 2023.
"This is to support the efforts of the OIC media Monitoring Unit to combat the Israeli occupation's disinformation, misinformation, false news and war crimes, through digital communications platforms such as social media and artificial intelligence tools," it said.