Reporters Without Borders urges police investigation after Reuters photographer beaten

Reporters Without Borders has urged Israeli police chief Shlomo Aharonishki to hold an investigation after a photographer for the British press agency Reuters, Ammar Awad, was brutally beaten and kicked by around a dozen Israeli police officers, according to witnesses at the scene. Awad was covering clashes between young Palestinians and Israeli Police on the esplanade of the mosques in Jerusalem old town after Friday prayers at the Al-Aqsa Mosque on 2 April when he was attacked. Police fired tear gas grenades leaving around 20 people injured. "Journalists covering the conflict between Israelis and Palestinians are exposed on a daily basis to brutality from the military, the police or other groups, such as Israeli settlers and some Palestinian militants," said the international press freedom organisation. "Israel is democracy which should not tolerate such behaviour from its police force. We ask that the perpetrators of these abuses be punished and that an official apology be made to Reuters and to its journalist, who was prevented from doing his job for no legitimate reason." Awad was treated for his injuries by a doctor and is expected to be unable to work for one week. In addition his camera and lenses were destroyed and his identity papers seized. The clashes took place on the second Friday following the death of the Hamas spiritual leader, Sheik Ahmed Yassin, killed by the Israeli Army in Gaza on 22 March.