José Ramírez hits grand slam, AL-leading Guardians beat Red Sox 6-4

CLEVELAND (AP) — José Ramírez belted his sixth career grand slam and had three hits, Will Brennan added a solo homer and the Cleveland Guardians beat the Boston Red Sox 6-4 on Thursday.

Cleveland has the best record in the American League at 18-7 and matched the second-best mark in franchise history through 25 games. The Guardians won their season series against Boston 5-2 -- all in an 11-day span.

“Once the guys arrive in the clubhouse before the game, you feel that good energy,” Ramírez said through interpreter Agustin Rivero. “With that energy we can compete with anybody, so I think that’s a good energy to have.”

Rafael Devers had three hits and Rob Refsnyder tripled in a run for the Red Sox. Jarren Duran added an RBI single in the sixth for Boston, which went 4-2 on a six-game trip through Pittsburgh and Cleveland.

Ramírez’s slam off Chase Anderson (0-1) came one pitch after he appeared to strike out to end the second, but Red Sox catcher Reese McGuire couldn’t hold onto the foul tip. Brennan also homered in the inning as Cleveland went ahead 5-0.

“The biggest thing is I put myself in that jam, I didn’t do my part,” said Anderson, who loaded the bases by hitting Gabriel Arias with a pitch and walking two. “I just lost feel for my pitches and the zone in the second.”

After Boston scored two runs in the third and twice in the sixth to pull within 5-4, Ramírez added an insurance run in the seventh by singling, stealing second, advancing on an error by McGuire, and scoring on a passed ball.

“It’s just what José does, he makes stuff happen,” Guardians manager Stephen Vogt said. “Running the bases, hitting the ball, I like them both. He’s aggressive, he’s smart, he’s everything you could want in a ballplayer.”

Hunter Gaddis (1-0) was awarded the win with 2/3 scoreless innings of relief, while Emmanuel Clase pitched a perfect ninth for his eighth save.

All-Star third baseman Devers served as the designated hitter for the second straight day. He missed the previous five games with a bone bruise in his left knee and is unlikely to play the field until Saturday in Boston.

Guardians starter Triston McKenzie struck out a season-high seven in four innings, allowing two runs. Anderson gave up five runs and two homers in 1 2/3 innings.

“We put up good at-bats against McKenzie, but we didn’t cash in,” Red Sox manager Alex Cora said. “And at the end, (Clase) is really good.”

TRAINER’S ROOM

Red Sox: SS Romy González (left wrist sprain) is still experiencing stiffness in his wrist and “not progressing the way he wanted,” according to Cora. González has been sidelined since April 11.

Guardians: RHP James Karinchak (right shoulder inflammation), who isn’t eligible to come off the 60-day injured list until May 27, will travel with the team on its six-game trip to Atlanta and Houston.

UP NEXT

Red Sox: RHP Kutter Crawford (1-0, 0.66 ERA) takes on Cubs LHP Shota Imanaga (3-0, 0.84 ERA) in the first game of a three-game set at Fenway Park.

Guardians: LHP Logan Allen (3-0, 5.06 ERA) faces Braves LHP Chris Sale (2-1, 4.38 ERA) in the opener of a three-game interleague series in Atlanta.

AP MLB: https://apnews.com/hub/mlb

Boston Red Sox's Masataka Yoshida warms up before a baseball game against the Cleveland Guardians, Thursday, April 25, 2024, in Cleveland. (AP Photo/David Dermer)

Boston Red Sox's Masataka Yoshida runs to first base on a ground out during the sixth inning of a baseball game against the Cleveland Guardians, Thursday, April 25, 2024, in Cleveland. (AP Photo/David Dermer)

Cleveland Guardians starting pitcher Triston McKenzie delivers during the first inning of a baseball game against the Boston Red Sox, Thursday, April 25, 2024, in Cleveland. (AP Photo/David Dermer)

Boston Red Sox starting pitcher Chase Anderson delivers during the first inning of a baseball game against the Cleveland Guardians, Thursday, April 25, 2024, in Cleveland. (AP Photo/David Dermer)

Cleveland Guardians' Jose Ramirez runs the bases after hitting a grand slam off Boston Red Sox starting pitcher Chase Anderson during the second inning of a baseball game, Thursday, April 25, 2024, in Cleveland. (AP Photo/David Dermer)

Cleveland Guardians' Jose Ramirez, right, is congratulated by Gabriel Arias (13), Tyler Freeman (2), Steven Kwan (38) after hitting a grand slam off Boston Red Sox starting pitcher Chase Anderson during the second inning of a baseball game, Thursday, April 25, 2024, in Cleveland. (AP Photo/David Dermer)

Boston Red Sox's Reese McGuire scores a run on an RBI-single by Jarren Duran during the sixth inning of a baseball game against the Cleveland Guardians, Thursday, April 25, 2024, in Cleveland. (AP Photo/David Dermer)

Boston Red Sox's Masataka Yoshida swings during the fifth inning of a baseball game against the Cleveland Guardians, Thursday, April 25, 2024, in Cleveland. (AP Photo/David Dermer)

Cleveland Guardians' Jose Ramirez watches the ball after hitting a grand slam off Boston Red Sox starting pitcher Chase Anderson during the second inning of a baseball game, Thursday, April 25, 2024, in Cleveland. (AP Photo/David Dermer)

TEL AVIV, Israel (AP) — Israel ordered the local offices of Qatar's Al Jazeera satellite news network to close Sunday, escalating a long-running feud between the broadcaster and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's hard-line government as Doha-mediated cease-fire negotiations with Hamas hang in the balance.

The extraordinary order, which includes confiscating broadcast equipment, preventing the broadcast of the channel’s reports and blocking its websites, is believed to be the first time Israel has ever shuttered a foreign news outlet.

Al Jazeera went off Israel’s main cable and satellite providers in the hours after the order. However, its website and multiple online streaming links still operated Sunday.

The network has reported the Israeli-Hamas war nonstop since the militants' initial cross-border attack Oct. 7 and has maintained 24-hour coverage in the Gaza Strip amid Israel's grinding ground offensive that has killed and wounded members of its own staff. While including on-the-ground reporting of the war's casualties, its Arabic arm often publishes verbatim video statements from Hamas and other militant groups in the region.

“Al Jazeera reporters harmed Israel’s security and incited against soldiers,” Netanyahu said in a statement. “It’s time to remove the Hamas mouthpiece from our country.”

Al Jazeera issued a statement vowing it will “pursue all available legal channels through international legal institutions in its quest to protect both its rights and journalists, as well as the public’s right to information.”

“Israel’s ongoing suppression of the free press, seen as an effort to conceal its actions in the Gaza Strip, stands in contravention of international and humanitarian law,” the network said. “Israel’s direct targeting and killing of journalists, arrests, intimidation and threats will not deter Al Jazeera."

The Israeli government has taken action against individual reporters over the decades since its founding in 1948, but broadly allows for a rambunctious media scene that includes foreign bureaus from around the world, even from Arab nations.

That changed with a law passed last month, which Netanyahu's office says allows the government to take action against a foreign channel seen as “harming the country.”

Israeli Communication Minister Shlomo Karhi later published footage online of authorities raiding a hotel room Al Jazeera had been broadcasting from in east Jerusalem, which the Palestinians hope to one day have for their future state. He said officials seized some of the channel's equipment there.

“We finally are able to stop Al Jazeera’s well-oiled incitement machine that harms the security of the country,” Karhi said. His office said it would bar Al Jazeera from operating in Israel for at least 45 days, a measure that can be renewed.

The ban did not appear to affect the channel’s operations in the occupied West Bank or Gaza Strip, where Israel wields control but which are not sovereign Israeli territory.

The decision threatens to heighten tensions with Qatar at a time when the Doha government is playing a key role in mediation efforts to halt the war in Gaza, along with Egypt and the United States.

Qatar has had strained ties with Netanyahu in particular since he made comments suggesting that Qatar is not exerting enough pressure on Hamas to prompt it to relent in its terms for a truce deal. Qatar hosts Hamas leaders in exile at a political office in Doha.

The sides appear to be close to striking a deal, but multiple previous rounds of talks have ended with no agreement.

In a statement Sunday, Hamas condemned the Israeli government order, calling on international organizations to take measures against Israel.

The Foreign Press Association in Israel criticized the order.

“With this decision, Israel joins a dubious club of authoritarian governments to ban the station,” it said. “This is a dark day for the media.” The New York-based Committee to Project Journalists similarly warned the move represented an “extremely alarming precedent for restricting international media outlets working in Israel.”

Omar Shakir, Human Rights Watch’s Israel and Palestine director, criticized the Israeli order as “an assault on freedom of the press.”

“Rather than trying to silence reporting on its atrocities in Gaza, the Israeli government should stop committing them,” he added.

Israel has long had a rocky relationship with Al Jazeera, accusing it of bias. Relations took a major downturn nearly two years ago when Al Jazeera correspondent Shireen Abu Akleh was killed during an Israeli military raid in the occupied West Bank.

Those relations further deteriorated following the outbreak of Israel’s war against Hamas on Oct. 7, when the militant group carried out a cross-border attack in southern Israel that killed 1,200 people and took 250 others hostage. Since then, the Israeli military campaign in Gaza has killed over 34,000 people, according to local health officials there, who don't break figures down into civilians and combatants.

Israeli media largely has avoided the plight of those in the Gaza Strip, instead focusing on the Oct. 7 attack, the hostages held there and tales of Israeli military heroism.

Meanwhile in December, an Israeli strike killed an Al Jazeera cameraman as he reported on the war in southern Gaza. The channel’s bureau chief in Gaza, Wael Dahdouh, was wounded in the same attack. Dahdouh, a correspondent well-known to Palestinians during many wars, later evacuated Gaza but only after Israeli strikes killed his wife, three of his children and a grandson.

Al Jazeera is one of the few international media outlets to remain in Gaza throughout the war, broadcasting bloody scenes of airstrikes and overcrowded hospitals and accusing Israel of massacres.

Criticism of the channel is not new, however. The U.S. government singled out the broadcaster during America’s occupation of Iraq after its 2003 invasion toppled dictator Saddam Hussein and for airing videos of the late al-Qaida chief Osama bin Laden.

Al Jazeera has been closed or blocked by other Mideast governments.

Most notably in 2013, Egyptian authorities raided a luxury hotel used by Al Jazeera as an operating base after the military takeover that followed mass protests against President Mohammed Morsi. Three Al Jazeera staff members received 10-year prison sentences, but were released in 2015 following widespread international criticism.

Gambrell reported from Jerusalem. Associated Press writer Jack Jeffrey in Jerusalem contributed.

The office of late Al Jazeera network journalist Shireen Abu Akleh is decorated with memorial items, inside the network's office, in the West Bank city of Ramallah Sunday, May 5, 2024. Israel ordered the local offices of Qatar's Al Jazeera satellite news network to close Sunday, escalating a long-running feud between the broadcaster and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's hard-line government as Doha-mediated cease-fire negotiations with Hamas hang in the balance. (AP Photo/Nasser Nasser)

Palestinian politics analyst Nehad Abu Ghoush is live at Al Jazeera broadcast inside the network's office in the West Bank city of Ramallah Sunday, May 5, 2024. Israel ordered the local offices of Qatar's Al Jazeera satellite news network to close Sunday, escalating a long-running feud between the broadcaster and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's hard-line government as Doha-mediated cease-fire negotiations with Hamas hang in the balance. (AP Photo/Nasser Nasser)

The office of late Al Jazeera network journalist Shireen Abu Akleh is decorated with memorial items, inside the network's office, in the West Bank city of Ramallah Sunday, May 5, 2024. Israel ordered the local offices of Qatar's Al Jazeera satellite news network to close Sunday, escalating a long-running feud between the broadcaster and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's hard-line government as Doha-mediated cease-fire negotiations with Hamas hang in the balance. (AP Photo/Nasser Nasser)

A corner is dedicated for late Al Jazeera network journalist Shireen Abu Akleh inside the network's office, in the West Bank city of Ramallah Sunday, May 5, 2024. Israel ordered the local offices of Qatar's Al Jazeera satellite news network to close Sunday, escalating a long-running feud between the broadcaster and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's hard-line government as Doha-mediated cease-fire negotiations with Hamas hang in the balance. (AP Photo/Nasser Nasser)

International correspondent of Al Jazeera English Zein Basravi reports live from the network's office in the West Bank city of Ramallah Sunday, May 5, 2024. Israel ordered the local offices of Qatar's Al Jazeera satellite news network to close Sunday, escalating a long-running feud between the broadcaster and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's hard-line government as Doha-mediated cease-fire negotiations with Hamas hang in the balance. (AP Photo/Nasser Nasser)

Al Jazeera network office in the West Bank city of Ramallah Sunday, May 5, 2024. Israel ordered the local offices of Qatar's Al Jazeera satellite news network to close Sunday, escalating a long-running feud between the broadcaster and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's hard-line government as Doha-mediated cease-fire negotiations with Hamas hang in the balance. (AP Photo/Nasser Nasser)

Al Jazeera cameraman Zaid Aqrat works at his network's office in the West Bank city of Ramallah Sunday, May 5, 2024. Israel ordered the local offices of Qatar's Al Jazeera satellite news network to close Sunday, escalating a long-running feud between the broadcaster and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's hard-line government as Doha-mediated cease-fire negotiations with Hamas hang in the balance. (AP Photo/Nasser Nasser)

Al Jazeera broadcast engineer Mohammad Salameh works at the Master Control Room unit inside the network's office in the West Bank city of Ramallah Sunday, May 5, 2024. Israel ordered the local offices of Qatar's Al Jazeera satellite news network to close Sunday, escalating a long-running feud between the broadcaster and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's hard-line government as Doha-mediated cease-fire negotiations with Hamas hang in the balance. (AP Photo/Nasser Nasser)

FILE - Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu attends a press conference in the Kirya military base in Tel Aviv, Israel on Oct. 28, 2023. Netanyahu pledged Tuesday, April 30 to launch an incursion into the southern Gaza city of Rafah, where hundreds of thousands of Palestinians are sheltering from the almost 7-month-long war, just as cease-fire negotiations between Israel and Hamas appear to be gaining steam. (Abir Sultan/Pool Photo via AP, File)