“If it wasn’t for the heroic efforts of journalists, Israel’s brutal assault on the Palestinian people would be taking place in a total media blackout.”
Grahame Morris
By Grahame Morris MP
Since the terrorist attacks launched by Hamas on October 7, the Israeli military response has resulted in, nearly a hundred journalists and media workers being killed in Gaza. If it wasn’t for the heroic efforts of these journalists, Israel’s brutal assault on the Palestinian people would be taking place in a total media blackout. Those working on the frontline of events are acting as the eyes and ears of the world.
Of these, 4 have been Israelis and 3 from Yemen, but the vast majority are Palestinian. In addition to those killed, many more journalists – like their fellow civilians – are suffering terribly, losing their homes and facing personal bereavement following the deaths of close family members.
The continued efforts of Wael Al-Dahdouh, Chief of Al-Jazeera’s Gaza bureau, is a stark illustration of this. Having lost his wife, his 7-year old daughter, and 15-year old son in an Israeli air strike in October, in January his 27-year old son, also a journalist, was killed when travelling in a car alongside a colleague and another freelance journalist who was also wounded.
In a statement, the Israeli Defence Force (IDF) admitted that the vehicle was deliberately targeted for attack, but sought to save face by making unsubstantiated claims that one of the passengers was a known “terrorist”. That Wael Al-Dahdouh continues to dedicate himself to exposing the truth of what is happening on the ground, despite suffering such grave personal loss, is a testimony to the incredible human resilience Palestinian journalists are showing amidst a catastrophic situation.
The Palestinian Journalists Syndicate, working with the International Federation of Journalists, has argued the history of Israel’s deliberate targeting of media workers long pre-dates the most recent attacks. A case under consideration by the International Criminal Court cites the killing of Shireen Abu-Akleh amongst a number of instances where evidence clearly appears to point to the complicity of the IDF in the deliberate acts of lethal violence against news gatherers. Recent events make a full investigation into the targeting of journalists an imperative.
As the National Union of Journalists in the UK and Ireland has noted, the IDF “have access to highly sophisticated surveillance equipment, such as Pegasus, and AI-assisted targeting technology, such as Gospel” which “allow individuals to be identified, and minutely targeted as never before – but they also record their actions in a way that has the potential to create an unprecedented digital evidence to support claims of targeting”.
As Co-Chair of the NUJ’s cross-party Parliamentary Group, I have tabled Early Day Motion 284 which seeks to raise awareness of the unprecedented rate at which journalists have been killed since October 7, and which argues that pressure must be brought to bear on the Israeli authorities for a de-escalation of the cycle of violence which has resulted in this mass slaughter of civilians and amidst a humanitarian catastrophe.
- Ask your MP to support Grahame Morris MP’s Early Day Motion on Journalists in Gaza here.
- Grahame Morris is the Labour MP for Easington, you can follow him on Twitter/X and Facebook.
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