Ma'an News Agency

Ma'an News Agency describes itself as part of the Ma'an Network, a cooperative body of independent journalists across Palestine.[2] The network is a nonprofit media organization founded in 2002 with stated aims of promoting independent media, building relationships among local, regional, and international media, and supporting freedom of expression and pluralism.[3] A 2007 NGO Monitor report described the Ma'an Network as composed of ten independent television stations based in major cities across the West Bank — known by its original, indigenous Jewish name of Judea and Samaria — and the Gaza Strip.[8]

The network includes nine local television stations and nine radio stations, and its activities extend beyond the news agency to television production, video filming, radio programming, and training courses for Palestinian journalists and media workers.[2] The Meir Amit Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center identifies the agency's head as Nasr al-Laham, who was also identified as editor-in-chief in the agency's own 2008 internal profile.[9][4]

The agency maintains main offices in Bethlehem and Gaza, with branch offices in Hebron and Nablus.[2] It works with correspondents and photographers in major Palestinian cities, coordinating with editors, translators, and other staff.[2] An SMS breaking-news service in Arabic and English serves subscribers on Palestinian and Israeli cellular networks, and headlines are distributed on Ma'an satellite television and the screens of nine partner local television stations.[2]

The agency's current About page gives 2005 as the year it began operations, while a profile published on the agency's own site in December 2008 states it was established in 2004 and quotes Arabic-section head Karim Asakra as having worked there since its founding.[2][4] NGO Monitor's profile similarly lists 2005 as the founding year.[3]

The agency was launched with funding from the Danish and Netherlands Representative Offices to the Palestinian Authority.[3] Additional early donors listed by NGO Monitor include the Netherlands, United Kingdom, United States, UNESCO, UNDP, and the Arab Human Rights Fund.[3] By 2014, Ma'an's financial statements listed Denmark, Sweden, the United States, Catholic Relief Services, and Save the Children among its funders.[3] Specific grants documented by NGO Monitor include a 2012–2013 U.S. Middle East Partnership Initiative grant of $71,970 for a project titled "Combating Gender Based Violence in the Palestinian Territories" and a 2016–2019 European Union grant of €427,200 for a Ma'an Television Network project called "Leveraging Media Initiatives to Promote Participatory Engagement in the Peace Process."[3]

The broader Ma'an Network's early programming included live broadcasts of Palestinian Legislative Council meetings, journalist training, and children's television.[8] A May 2003 joint project with Badil broadcast films during a two-week campaign marking the 55th anniversary of the Palestinian Nakba, and talk shows produced with MIFTAH in early 2003 addressed women's rights and education.[8]

Ma'an publishes reports, investigations, news analysis, and articles by a range of writers in Arabic and English, and also translates Hebrew-language news into both languages.[2] Ma'an says its editorial approach seeks a high degree of neutrality and describes the English-language service as a means to present international readers with different aspects of life in Palestine while giving Palestinians a platform to address the international community.[2]

Coverage spans political, economic, cultural, and sports news from the governorates of the West Bank and Gaza Strip, as well as Israeli affairs and developments inside the Green Line.[2] The agency also publishes literary pieces and investigations on subjects including prisoners' affairs and economic development projects.[2]

The 2008 internal profile described a newsroom with Arabic, Hebrew, and English sections; the Hebrew section, aimed at Israeli audiences, had been paused for four months at the time of the profile with a planned return.[4] Staff were described as monitoring Israeli television, radio, newspapers, and news websites.[4] Arabic-section head Asakra noted in the same profile that both Hamas and Fatah had at times pressured the agency over its reports, and described the agency's practice as offering each side a right of reply, including spokespeople for the Israeli military and Civil Administration.[4]

Multiple U.S. Department of State reports characterized Ma'an alongside Al Quds and Al Ayyam as a mainstream independent Palestinian news outlet that generally avoided material inciting hatred and limited criticism to governmental policies and actions of individuals rather than ethnic or religious groups.[5][6]

The agency has been at the center of several notable press-freedom episodes. On January 12, 2010, Israeli authorities detained and subsequently deported Jared Malsin, editor in chief of Ma'an's English-language section.[1] Citing the Committee to Protect Journalists, a U.S. Department of State report stated that interrogation transcripts indicated Israeli authorities deemed Malsin a security risk because of his political beliefs and reporting.[1]

Ynet reported that Malsin had worked for Ma'an for approximately two and a half years before returning from a trip to Prague, after which he was detained for eight days and denied entry to Israel.[10] Malsin said the reasons given for his detention changed during that period and that no Israeli official clearly explained the decision; Israel's Interior Ministry stated he was deported after refusing to answer investigators' questions.[10] Ma'an publicly linked his detention to his criticism of Israel and his Jewish identity, while Malsin himself said he concluded the decision was political.[10] He also said the Government Press Office had refused to issue him a press card and, according to him, had declined to grant Ma'an official status as a news agency.[10]

Palestinian Authority security forces arrested Ma'an journalist Salim Sweidan after he reported that the PA had provided Israel with information leading to the capture of suspects in the terrorist murders of Eitam and Na'ama Henkin.[11] A 2007 Jerusalem Post report on attacks against Palestinian journalists quoted Ma'an describing hazardous working conditions in which journalists were being beaten, their equipment destroyed, and some kidnapped or subjected to death threats.[12]

In July 2013, Ma'an's Gaza operations were shut down by order of the Hamas administration. The Hamas administration's attorney general ordered the closure of Ma'an's offices alongside those of Al-Arabiya, accusing both outlets of fabricating news, spreading false rumors, and publishing reports divorced from reality.[13] The dispute arose chiefly in the context of reports about senior Muslim Brotherhood figures allegedly fleeing Egypt for the Gaza Strip.[13] Following the closure order, Ma'an lodged an official complaint with Hamas administration head Ismail Haniyeh.[13]

The U.S. Department of State's 2013 human-rights report confirmed that Hamas closed Ma'an's Gaza offices on July 25, 2013, accusing it and Al-Arabiya of spreading "fabrications" aimed at harming the Palestinian national interest and resistance.[7] The State Department described Ma'an as a non-Hamas-affiliated outlet in the context of Hamas restrictions on independent media in Gaza.[7] Accounts of how the closure ended differ slightly across sources: the 2013 State Department report said Hamas allowed the outlets to reopen on November 19, while the 2014 report stated that authorities permitted reopening but that only Ma'an chose to do so.[7][14]

Ma'an served as a notable source during the August 2014 Cairo cease-fire talks between Israel and Hamas. Hamas negotiator Izzat Abdul Risheq told Ma'an that Hamas was prepared to transfer control of the Rafah crossing to Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas, representing a shift from Hamas's earlier demand for direct control.[15] Palestinian unity delegation head Azzam al-Ahmad's statement that the Palestinian unity government would accept agreed cease-fire terms and arrangements for Gaza's reconstruction was also attributed to Ma'an coverage.[15]

During the same period, an Islamic Jihad spokesperson told Ma'an that a cease-fire would be confirmed within hours based on understandings reached in Cairo — a report that stood in contrast to Al-Jazeera's account that Palestinian factions had rejected the Egyptian proposal and to a senior Hamas official's statement that no new cease-fire development had occurred.[16]

The Meir Amit Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center cited Ma'an reports from July 2013 covering Gaza's economic conditions, including remarks from Hamas economy minister Alaa al-Rafati on the impact of Egypt's tunnel closures and the limited capacity of the Kerem Shalom crossing, as well as Ma'an's coverage of a protest march in Ramallah opposing renewed negotiations with Israel.[9] In November 2016, Ma'an's satellite television station interviewed editor-in-chief Nasser al-Laham on the implications of the U.S. presidential election for Palestinians, Arab states, and the two-state solution.[9]

Ma'an has attracted criticism from several Israeli and pro-Israel research organizations regarding its editorial content and political orientation. A 2007 NGO Monitor report assessed that Ma'an News' content did not match its stated standards of reliability and objectivity, noting that the agency republished material from Palestinian NGOs and other sources, and that its archive included references to Israeli actions using terms such as "apartheid" and "ethnic cleansing" and to terrorism as "resistance."[8] These are NGO Monitor's characterizations and attributed criticisms of the agency's editorial choices, not independently established findings.

NGO Monitor separately alleged that Ma'an published an article denying the Holocaust on January 31, 2013, and that the article was removed after public exposure and scrutiny.[17] A Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs article cited reports by NGO Monitor and Palestinian Media Watch in making similar allegations about Holocaust-denial content and hostile statements about Jews in Ma'an's coverage around 2012–2013.[18] These claims originate with advocacy organizations and have not been independently verified in the available sources.

The Times of Israel reported that editor-in-chief Nasser Laham made a statement in December 2017 asserting that negotiations with Israel and the United States made no difference to Palestinians because, as characterized in the headline, both were controlled by Jews.[19] The topic page provides no further context for the remark. During the 2023 Israel-Hamas war, the Meir Amit Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center asserted that Ma'an published photographs it presented as showing damage to Shifa Hospital that were in fact from damage near al-Ahli Hospital caused by a failed Palestinian Islamic Jihad rocket launch on October 17; this is the Center's account of a contested wartime media report.[20]