Qatar-based news network Al Jazeera has condemned a raid by Israeli forces on its office in Ramallah in the occupied West Bank and the issuing of a 45-day closure order.
The Qatar-funded channel said in a statement it "vehemently condemns and denounces this criminal act", adding the "raid on the office and seizure of our equipment is not only an attack on Al Jazeera but an affront to press freedom and the very principles of journalism".
The Israeli military has said it closed the Al Jazeera TV office in Ramallah because it incited "terror".
The closure order was signed after a legal opinion and intelligence assessment "determined that the offices were being used to incite terror, to support terrorist activities and that the channel's broadcasts endanger the security and public order in both the area and the State of Israel as a whole," a military statement said.
Last week Israel's government announced it was revoking the press credentials of Al Jazeera journalists in the country, four months after banning the channel from operating inside Israel.
"There is a court ruling for closing down Al Jazeera for 45 days," an Israeli soldier told Al Jazeera's West Bank bureau chief Walid al-Omari, the network reported, citing the conversation which was broadcast live.
"I ask you to take all the cameras and leave the office at this moment," the soldier said, according to the footage, which showed heavily armed and masked troops entering the office.
The broadcaster said the soldiers did not provide a reason for the closure order.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's government has had a long-running feud with Al Jazeera that has worsened since the Gaza war began following the 7 October attack by Palestinian militant group Hamas.
The Israeli military has repeatedly accused journalists from the Qatari network of being "terrorist agents" in Gaza affiliated with Hamas or its ally, Islamic Jihad.
Al Jazeera denies Israel's accusations and claims that Israel systematically targets its employees in Gaza.
The media office of the Hamas-run government in Gaza condemned the raid, saying in a statement it was a "resounding scandal and a blatant violation of press freedom".
Ban extension
The Israeli parliament passed a law in early April allowing the banning of foreign media broadcasts deemed harmful to state security.
Based on this law, the Israeli government approved on 5 May the decision to ban Al Jazeera from broadcasting from Israel and close its offices for a renewable 45-day period, which was extended for a fourth time by a Tel Aviv court last week.
The shutdown had not affected broadcasts from the West Bank or Gaza, from which Al Jazeera was still covering Israel's war with Palestinian militants.
Al Jazeera correspondent Nida Ibrahim said the network's West Bank office closure "comes as no surprise" after the earlier ban on reporting from inside Israel.
"We've heard Israeli officials threatening to close down the bureau," she said on the network.
"But we (had) not been expecting it to happen today," she added.
Bureau chief Mr Omari said that "targeting journalists this way always aims to erase the truth and prevent people from hearing the truth".
In May, the network condemned as "criminal" the ban on it operating over its coverage of the Gaza war.
"We condemn and denounce this criminal act by Israel that violates the human right to access information," the channel said in a statement.
