‘Legitimization cell’: Israeli unit tasked with linking Gaza journalists to Hamas
Al Jazeera correspondent Anas al-Sharif reports in Gaza City on 10 October 2024
Yuval Abraham writes in +972 on 14 August 2025:
The Israeli military has operated a special unit called the “Legitimization Cell,” tasked with gathering intelligence from Gaza that can bolster Israel’s image in the international media, according to three intelligence sources who spoke to +972 Magazine and Local Call and confirmed the unit’s existence.
Established after October 7, the unit sought information on Hamas’ use of schools and hospitals for military purposes, and on failed rocket launches by armed Palestinian groups that harmed civilians in the enclave. It has also been assigned to identify Gaza-based journalists it could portray as undercover Hamas operatives, in an effort to blunt growing global outrage over Israel’s killing of reporters — the latest of whom was Al Jazeera journalist Anas Al-Sharif, killed in an Israeli airstrike this past week.
According to the sources, the Legitimization Cell’s motivation was not security, but public relations. Driven by anger that Gaza-based reporters were “smearing [Israel’s] name in front of the world,” its members were eager to find a journalist they could link to Hamas and mark as a target, one source said.
The source described a recurring pattern in the unit’s work: whenever criticism of Israel in the media intensified on a particular issue, the Legitimization Cell was told to find intelligence that could be declassified and employed publicly to counter the narrative.
“If the global media is talking about Israel killing innocent journalists, then immediately there’s a push to find one journalist who might not be so innocent — as if that somehow makes killing the other 20 acceptable,” the intelligence source said.
Often, it was Israel’s political echelon that dictated to the army which intelligence areas the unit should focus on, another source added. Information gathered by the Legitimization Cell was also passed regularly to the Americans through direct channels. Intelligence officers said they were told their work was vital to allowing Israel to prolong the war.