Manama: The Foreign Press Association in Israel is threatening to boycott briefings held by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu if security procedures are not changed immediately, an Israeli daily reported.

"Security services are not permitted to do as they please," the association said in a statement. "For a government trying to usher in a new era of relations with the foreign media, this is a peculiar way to begin," Haaretz reported.

The statement followed a complaint filed by Al Jazeera with the Israeli press office and the Foreign Press Association over "a humiliating and lengthy security check at the invitation-only foreign press briefing with Netanyahu in Jerusalem."

At the entrance to the briefing on Tuesday night, a number of journalists, including Al Jazeera representatives, were stopped.

According to the complaint, filed by Walid Al Umari, Al Jazeera's bureau chief for Israel and the Palestinian Authority, the technical and news team had presented themselves for the security check long before the start of the event and had provided the names, identity numbers and GPO cards of their team to the Government Press Office three days beforehand.

However, he said, his channel's technical team and journalists were delayed by a humiliating and meticulous security check, while other groups only underwent ordinary checks.

Najwan Simri Diab, a producer and reporter, and another reporter, Shirin Abu Aqla, were part of the Al Jazeera team to the event. Abu Aqla was reportedly made to wait over an hour and not permitted to enter in the end, while Simri Diab was asked by security to remove her clothing, including her bra.

"I am not against a search and a security check, but I am against invasive humiliation," Najwan told Haaretz, adding that she believed she and her colleagues had been singled out because they were Arabs and worked for Al Jazeera.

It was not the first time that she and her colleagues have undergone such a check.
"A few months ago, we had an interview with Minister Dan Meridor and we came to the Prime Minister's Office and encountered a similar attitude," Al Umari said. "The minister had to personally intervene to stop the check and let us in."

According to the Foreign Press Association, photographers and reporters were also asked to strip, among them Charles Levinson, the Wall Street Journal's correspondent in Israel.