The Freedoms Committee of the Palestinian Journalists’ Syndicate says the Israeli occupation forces have killed 44 Palestinian journalists inside displacement tents in the Gaza Strip.

The committee said that these journalists were among 254 media workers who had been killed since the beginning of the Israeli assault on Gaza in October 2023 until the end of October 2025, reports Middle East Monitor.

According to the report, the attacks were systematic, targeting displacement tents located around hospitals and UNRWA shelters, in addition to direct sniper shootings inside displacement areas.

It added that the victims were working for local and international media outlets, and most of them were killed while covering the humanitarian situation in the displacement camps.

The syndicate affirmed that such targeting reflects a deliberate attempt to silence the Palestinian press and prevent the truth from reaching the world.

It also stressed the need to hold the Israeli occupation accountable for its crimes against journalists and to ensure international protection for media crews working in Gaza.

Israel’s audiovisual media bill ‘a nail in coffin of editorial independence’
Meanwhile, the Paris-based media freedom watchdog Reporters Without Borders (RSF) has sounded the alarm following the first reading of a bill sponsored by Israel’s Communications Minister Shlomo Karhi that would strengthen the executive branch’s control over the audiovisual media, despite opposition from the Attorney General and the Union of Journalists in Israel.

The bill includes measures that RSF condemned a year ago.

Although the rest of the legislative process is likely to be difficult, Israel’s Communications Minister Shlomo Karhi, a member of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s Likud party, has managed to get a foot in the door. On the evening of November 3, around midnight, his media broadcasting bill was adopted after its first reading, as part of a voting pact with ultra-Orthodox MPs.

The bill calls for the creation of a Broadcast Media Authority largely composed of members appointed by the Communications Minister himself. His ministry would also be entrusted with calculating television audiences, a measure approved by the Ministerial Committee for Legislation a year ago that was condemned by RSF.

Legal and legislative barriers are already being put in place in response to this attempt to strengthen the Israeli government’s control over the media landscape.

Attorney-General Gali Baharav-Miara, who is responsible for advising the government on legislative matters, is opposed to the bill, which has been deemed unconstitutional by the Knesset, Israel’s Parliament.

Two petitions against the bill have also been filed with the Supreme Court. One was submitted by the Union of Journalists in Israel, which represents around 3000 media professionals. The other was instigated by the NGO Hatzlacha (meaning “success” in Hebrew), which promotes social justice.

“This first reading vote is the first nail in the coffin of broadcast media’s editorial independence in Israel,” said RSF editorial director Anne Bocandé.

“Communications Minister Shlomo Karhi is openly attacking a pillar of democracy. Against a backdrop of war and an upcoming election campaign, Benjamin Netanyahu’s government is seeking to silence voices that are critical of the far-right coalition in power.

“RSF reiterates the warning it issued a year ago: these legislative attacks will have lasting, negative consequences on Israel’s media landscape.”

Incorporating the ‘Al Jazeera’ ban on foreign broadcasters into common law
In parallel with his legislative attack on the editorial independence of the country’s broadcast media, Communications Minister Shlomo Karhi is also continuing his battle against international broadcasters operating in Israel.

Although his so-called “Al Jazeera law” — which allowed Israeli authorities to shut down any foreign broadcasters perceived as undermining national security and was condemned by RSF in April 2024 — expired on October 27 with the end of the state of emergency, the minister informed the National Security Council — which is attached to the Ministry of National Security — that he now intended to turn the measure into common law.

After the missile exchanges between Israel and Iran in June 2024, the Prime Minister’s party had already attempted to amend the “Al Jazeera law” in an attempt to give additional powers to the Minister of Communications to stop the broadcasting of foreign channels in the country.

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About 500 people honoured Palestinian journalists in the heart of the New Zealand city of Auckland today for their brave coverage of Israel’s War on Gaza, now in its seventh month with almost 35,000 people killed, mostly women and children.

Marking the annual May 3 World Press Freedom Day “plus two”, the crowd also strongly applauded UNESCO’s Guillermo Cano Award being presented to the Palestinian journalists for their “courage and commitment”.

Several speakers gave tributes to the journalists, the more than 100 Gazan news workers killed had their names read out and put on display, and cellphones were lit up due to the breeze preventing candle flames.

Activist MC Anna Lee praised the journalists and said they set an example to the world.

Shut the Gaza war down chants in Auckland.     Video: Café Pacific

Journalist Dr David Robie, convenor of Pacific Media Watch, said 143 journalists had been killed, according to Al Jazeera and the Gaza Media Office, and it was mostly targeted “assassination by design”.

He paid tribute to several individual journalists as well as the group, including Shireen Abu Akleh, shot by an Israeli sniper more than a year before the October 7 war outbreak, and Hind Khoudary, a young journalist who had inspired people around the world.

The Guillermo Cano Prize was awarded to the Gaza journalists in Santiago, Chile, as part of World Press Freedom Day global events.

Nasser Abu Baker, president of the Palestinian Journalists’ Syndicate (PJS) and vice-president of the International Federation of Journalists (IFJ), received the UNESCO prize on behalf of his colleagues in Gaza.

‘Unique suffering, fearless reporting’
The UN cultural agency has recognised the “unique suffering and fearless reporting” of Gaza’s journalists by awarding them the freedom prize.

Apart from those journalists and media workers have been killed by Israeli strikes in Gaza since October 7, nearly all the rest have been injured, displaced or bereaved.

From the start of the conflict, Israel closed Gaza’s borders to international journalists, and none have been allowed free access to the enclave since.

A thousand Gazan journalists were working at the start of the war, and more than a 100 of them have been killed.

“As a result,” reports the IFJ, “the profession has suffered a mortality rate in excess of 10 percent — about six times higher than the mortality rate of the general population of Gaza and around three times higher than that of health professionals.

PJS president Baker said: “Journalists in Gaza have endured a sustained attack by the Israeli army of unprecedented ferocity — but have continued to do their jobs, as witnesses to the carnage around them.

“It is justified that they should be honoured on World Press Freedom Day.

Naming the martyred Gaza journalists.   Video: Café Pacific

‘Most deadly attack on press freedom’
“What we have seen in Gaza is surely the most sustained and deadly attack on press freedom in history. This award shows that the world has not forgotten and salutes their sacrifice for information.”

IFJ general secretary Anthony Bellanger said: “This prize is a real tribute to the commitment to information of journalists in Gaza.

“Journalists in Gaza are starving, homeless and in mortal danger. UNESCO’s recognition of what they are still enduring is a huge and well-deserved boost.”

Kia Ora Gaza – doctors speak out.      Video: Café Pacific

Gaza Freedom Flotilla blocked
Also at the rally today were Kia Ora Gaza’s organiser Roger Fowler and two of the three New Zealand doctors who travelled to Turkiye to embark on the Freedom Flotilla which was sending three ships with humanitarian aid to break the Gaza siege.

Israel thwarted the mission for the time being by pressuring the African nation of Guinea-Bissau to withdraw the maritime flag the ships would have been sailing under.

However, flotilla organisers are working hard to find another flag country for the ships and the doctors vowed to rejoin the mission.

Pacific Media Watch

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More than two dozen Palestinian journalists had called for a boycott of the dinner, writing an open letter urging their American colleagues not to attend.

“You have a unique responsibility to speak truth to power and uphold journalistic integrity,” said the letter from the Palestinian Journalists Syndicate.

“It is unacceptable to stay silent out of fear or professional concern while journalists in Gaza continue to be detained, tortured, and killed for doing our jobs.”

‘It hurts our souls’
Al Jazeera’s Hind Khoudary was one of the signatories of the letter calling for the boycott.

She spoke to the network from Deir el-Balah in central Gaza, saying she did not “have the words” to describe what she had been going through.

“This isn’t something that has been ending. It has been continuous every single day for more than 200 days.

“We have been killed, displaced and homeless, and we’re not only reporting on this, but we’re also living it with every single detail.

“We’re living this war in all aspects of life. We have not seen our families as journalists. We have not been able to eat well. We have been dehydrated.

“We have been reporting in one of the harshest conditions any reporter can go through despite losing a lot of colleagues, and it hurts our souls and our hearts every single day.

“We have been constantly targeted by the Israeli air strikes and shelling.

“All of these daily things we have been living as journalists are overwhelming [and] exhausting, but we still continue because there have been at least 100 Palestinian journalists whom I personally know that have been killed since October 7.

“If they were here today with us, they would be reporting, and they would be raising the voice of the voiceless Palestinians.”

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The toll of four months of war in Gaza on journalism is “nothing short of horrifying” — Palestinian journalists killed, wounded, and prevented from working without any possibility of safe refuge, reports he Paris-based global media watchdog Reporters Without Borders (RSF).

RSF has strongly condemned the “eradication of journalism and the right to information” in Gaza by the Israeli army, and has called on states and international organisations to increase pressure on Israel to “immediately cease this carnage”.

In 124 days of conflict, at least 84 journalists have been killed in Gaza, including at least 20 in the course of their journalistic work or in connection with it, according to RSF statistics.

Journalists are being decimated as the days of this interminable war go by, through incessant Israeli strikes from the north to the south of the Gaza Strip, the watchdog said.

Journalists who had survived these four months were “living a daily hell” — in inhumane conditions, they suffered shortages of all kinds, particularly of equipment, as well as regular media blackouts, RSF said.

“In four months of conflict, Palestinian journalism has been decimated by Israeli armed forces with complete impunity, with a staggering death toll of more than 84 journalists killed — at least 20 in the line of duty,” said RSF’s Middle East desk in their statement.

“After filing two complaints with the International Criminal Court and making repeated appeals to States and international organisations, RSF is once again urging the UN Security Council to immediately enforce Resolution 2222 (2015) on the protection of journalists.

Journalists trapped in Rafah
Journalists in Gaza have no way out or any place of safe refuge. Forced to flee to the south of the enclave since October 7, the vast majority have taken refuge in Rafah, where the crossing point with Egypt is still closed and where an invasion of the city could lead to a new bloodbath.

Rafah was described by Israel as a “security zone” at the start of the conflict. Despite RSF’s calls for the Rafah gate to be opened, the Israeli authorities continue to prevent Gazan journalists from leaving and to block access to the enclave for foreign journalists.

As Gaza killings rise, so does the toll on Palestinian journalists.   Video: Al Jazeera

A chilling toll
According to the Palestinian Journalists’ Syndicate (PJS), about 50 local and international media outlets in Gaza have been totally or partially destroyed by the Israeli army since October 7, in addition to the appalling death toll.

RSF filed two complaints with the Office of the Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court (ICC) on 31 October and 22 December 2023 in connection with the killings of journalists and the destruction of media outlets.

In the aftermath of the killings of independent videographer Moustafa Thuraya and Al Jazeera journalist Hamza Dahdouh on January 7, RSF obtained a decision from the ICC prosecutor to include crimes against journalists in its investigation into the situation in Palestine.

Two days later, RSF called on the UN Security Council to urgently address Israel’s violations of Resolution 2222 on the protection of journalists.

The struggle of journalists in the field
Against this terrifying backdrop, Palestinian reporters in Gaza are showing untold courage in continuing to report on the war.

Most have lost loved ones. Forced to move, they live in tents, with no electricity and very little food or water.

Wounded journalists have very limited access to medical care. In partnership with Arab Reporters for Investigative Journalism (ARIJ), RSF has been providing grants to Gazan journalists since the start of the war to support their reporting work.

Pacific Media Watch collaborates with Reporters Without Borders.

Al Jazeera rejects Israeli forces’ attempt to justify crimes against journalists

Al Jazeera Media Network has rejected the Israeli occupation forces’ attempt to justify the killing and targeting of journalists.

In a statement this week, the network has condemned the accusations against its journalists and recalled Israel’s “long record of lies and fabrication of evidence through which it seeks to hide its heinous crimes”.

The statement continued:

“At a time when its correspondents and field crews are making great sacrifices to cover what is happening in Gaza, Al Jazeera’s employment policies stipulate that employees are not to engage in any political affiliations that may affect their professionalism, and to adhere to the controls and directives contained in the Network’s code of ethics and code of conduct.

“Al Jazeera ensures that all its journalists and correspondents adhere to the editorial standards.

“The network recalls the systematic targeting of Al Jazeera by the Israeli authorities, which includes:

• the bombing of its office in Gaza twice,
• the assassination of its correspondent Shireen Abu Akleh,
• the killing of colleagues Samer Abu Daqa and Hamza Al-Dahdouh,
• the deliberate targeting of a number of Al Jazeera journalists and their family members, and
• the arrest and intimidation of its correspondents in the field.

“Given Israel’s unprecedented campaign against journalists, Al Jazeera urges media outlets worldwide to exercise the utmost caution and responsibility when headlining Israel’s justifications for its crimes against journalists in Gaza.”

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The mother of Al Jazeera’s award-winning Gaza bureau chief Wael Dahdouh has died at a hospital in Gaza due to illness, reports Al Jazeera.

Dahdouh, who has become a symbol for the perseverance of Palestinian journalists in Gaza, had lost his wife Amna, son Mahmoud, daughter Sham and grandson Adam to an Israeli air raid in October.

Dahdouh was later wounded in an Israeli drone attack that killed his colleague, Al Jazeera cameraman Samer Abudaqa. He is currently being treated for his injuries in a hospital Doha, Qatar.

Last month, his eldest son, Hamza — a journalist who worked with Al Jazeera — was also killed in an Israeli attack alongside fellow journalist Mustafa Thuraya, a freelancer.

Last Friday, India’s Kerala Media Academy announced that its Media Person of the Year award has been given to Wael Al-Dahdouh in recognition of his exceptional journalistic courage.

‘Global face of courage’
The academy said in a statement that Al-Dahdouh was “a global face of journalistic courage, who continues to work despite the heavy losses borne by his family”.

Anil Bhaskar, secretary of the academy, told Arab News that Al-Dahdouh was recognised for his fearless reporting that allowed the world see the “true picture of the catastrophe” in Gaza.

“His commitment and bravery are exemplary and set an example for other journalists not only in India but all over the world,” Bhaskar said.

According to UN reports, more than 122 journalists and media workers have been among more than 27,000 people killed in Israel’s nearly four-month offensive in Gaza.

Press freedom watchdog the Committee to Protect Journalists said last month that journalists were being killed in Gaza at a rate with no parallel in modern history and that there was “an apparent pattern of targeting of journalists and their families by the Israeli military.”

‘Struggling to keep alive’
Meanwhile, Ayman Nobani, reporting from Nablus in the occupied West Bank, says Palestinian journalists are “struggling to keep alive”.

He reported that Shorouk al-Assad, a member of the general secretariat of the Palestinian Journalists Syndicate, as saying that journalists in the besieged coastal enclave were living through unprecedented times as they were being targeted by Israeli forces.

“The most important challenge today is the survival of journalists in light of their targeting and bombardment by Israel, in addition to the killing of their families, the destruction of their neighbourhoods, and the death of their colleagues,” she told Al Jazeera.

She also said:

• At least 73 media offices have been bombed since October 7;
• All of Gaza’s radio stations are no longer operating due to bombardment, power outages, or the killing or displacement of staff;
• Only 40 journalists remain in northern Gaza and they are besieged and isolated, with no means to send food or relief items to them; and
• Some 70 journalists have lost close family members

Earlier reports have indicated 78 Palestinian journalists have been killed in the Israeli war on Gaza, many of them targeted.

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The International Federation of Journalists has called for the urgent reinstatement of Nasser Abu Bakr, head of the Palestinian Journalists Syndicate, following his victimisation by the French news agency AFP.

Abu Bakr, who has worked for Agence France-Presse (AFP) for more than 20 years, was sacked without valid reason, in what the IFJ’s leading body has called “a clear case of victimisation for his trade union activities, in contravention of the law and international standards”.

The dismissal came following the agency’s concerns over his strong public defence of the rights of Palestinian journalists in his role as president of the PJS.

Abu Bakr, who is an elected member of the IFJ’s executive committee, had been instrumental in filing complaints about the systematic targeting of Palestinian journalists by Israeli forces to the United Nations Special Rapporteurs and in documenting and exposing attacks on Palestinian journalists and media.

The IFJ will launch a global campaign to demand justice for Nasser.

Already support has flowed in from public bodies in Palestine, from unions around the world and from the Palestinian General Federation of Trade Unions.

Journalists in Palestine have staged protests outside the offices of AFP. Unions representing staff at AFP’s headquarters and other offices around the world have pledged their support.

The IFJ has already been in contact with AFP management in Paris.

IFJ general secretary Anthony Bellanger said: “The dismissal of Nasser, an elected trade union leader, for nothing more than giving a voice to Palestinian journalists under threat and facing daily attacks is totally unacceptable.

“He must be reinstated.”

12 plus Palestinian journalists arrested
Al Jazeera reports that more than a dozen Palestinian journalists were recently arrested by Israeli authorities after attempting to report the news under often “extremely stressful and dangerous” conditions.

Wahbe Mikkieh, one of the journalists detained and later released, told Al Jazeera the message the Israeli police was trying to send was meant to frighten journalists.

“The occupation forces claimed that I tried to obstruct the arrest of my colleague Zeina [Halawani] and that I assaulted the occupation army. That did not happen,” said Mikkieh, who was hit on the head with the butt of a gun causing him to bleed, describing the five days in prison as the hardest in his life.

Republished from the International Federation of Journalists.

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