‘This does not feel like an Israel-Gaza ceasefire – people keep being killed’

The ceasefire in Gaza has been in place for months now – but life is still uncertain for the dozens of Palestinian journalists still on the ground.

With some 247 of their colleagues killed since 2023, simply documenting what’s happening in Gaza has been a life-threatening responsibility.

The United Nations has previously condemned what they described as ‘the Israeli military’s pattern of killings of journalists in Gaza’. In August, five journalists were killed in a ‘double-tap’ massacre, which Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu dubbed a ‘tragic mishap’.

Witnesses said the second hit took place after rescue workers, journalists and other people had rushed to the site of the initial attack.

Wael al-Dahdouh, Al Jazeera’s Gaza Bureau Chief, has been in the region through it all.

Earlier this year, he sat down with Metro and spoke about his experience, which saw him lose more than 16 of his immediate family members in Israeli strikes.

‘Right from the beginning of this war, Israel closed the border crossings, cut off water and electricity, cut off most supplies, and, more importantly, banned our colleagues, the international reporters and journalists, from entering Gaza,’ he said.

‘This looks very much like an attempt to isolate the journalistic community and the people of Gaza from the rest of the world.

‘We were left on our own to face the music, and the feeling was that we were being put between a rock and a hard place: the sea on one side and the Israeli army on the other.’

Fighting for the truth, even after a ceasefire 

The battle to allow media into the besieged strip is still ongoing, even after Israel and Hamas agreed their hostage-truce deal.

The Middle East and North Africa regional director for the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ), Sara Qudah, told Metro that this access cannot just be for international media.

‘We demand access for local Israeli journalists and other journalists who are outside Gaza. We’re asking for independent access for journalists to go inside Gaza and investigate,’ she explained.

‘This means journalists should be able to cover and investigate what’s happening in Gaza without interference or military escort.’

A handful of correspondents have been escorted into Gaza in recent months by the military, which Sara said clearly violates press freedom.

‘Journalists need independence to do their work – they should not fear censorship, harassment, or attacks,’ she said.

Wael said that though the press on the outside is facing issues telling stories from Gaza, journalists inside Palestine are paying an even higher price in the pursuit of telling what’s going on in their home.

‘No journalistic school or textbook can teach us how to face this,’ he said, staring at his hands.

‘It’s a stark reality, something you have to figure out for yourself. You have to learn how to live with and cope with it as an individual, as a professional, as a father, as a grandfather, as someone who lost most of his family.’

‘It’s the most difficult thing in life to lose so much and manage to ignore your pain while trying to be professional and do a job which is all about covering the very events that you’ve just been made the victim of.’

Israeli journalist for Haaretz Gideon Levy has also called for protection of Palestinian journalists and access for outside press, giving testimony on the need for international intervention at the United Nations headquarters.

He said: ‘Being an Israeli journalist in this war means, like any other foreign journalist from all over the world, not to be able to get to the battlefields and see with my own eyes in an independent way.’

Covering a story of their own

Israel has violated international laws regarding the protection of journalists as civilians throughout the conflict, Sara said.

In September, the UN issued a statement condemning the killings of clearly marked journalists.

The UN has demanded independent criminal investigations into these killings of journalists in Gaza, alongside free and full access for the international media.

‘Israel has the ability to stop targeting journalists and to protect them if they choose to, but they haven’t done that,’ Sara added.

‘This does not feel like a ceasefire. The only thing that’s really changed is that the large-scale killings have decreased, but they have not stopped. After the ceasefire began, two journalists were killed – one from a Palestinian militia, and the other by Israeli forces.’

Sara said that after one journalist was killed, Israel claimed he was a member of Hamas, which they investigated. There was no proof he was anything but a journalist.

‘Journalists in Gaza are still afraid. They don’t trust the ceasefire and they feel they’re still in danger,’ she said.

B’Tselem, an Israeli human rights organisation, has highlighted the need for international access and documented journalists’ testimonies in Gaza.

Its director Anat Saragusti – an Israeli journalist, publicist and jurist – wrote that ‘Israel’s public is not getting the full picture on Gaza because the media is intimidated and overreliant on the IDF.’

In her article in The Jewish Independent, she criticised how government intimidation and lack of access meant coverage of Gaza in the media ‘does not reflect professional journalism’.

Documentation of the conflict and killing is key to future accountability, according to Sara. She said: ‘We need to investigate independently and gather evidence that proves these killings were war crimes – that these journalists were targeted and killed because of their work, as retaliation.’

She added that the CPJ has been documenting, researching and recording ‘every case where we believe journalists were specifically targeted’.

‘What we’re seeing now is an information war where the official narrative is trying to erase the witness accounts from the ground. International journalists need to put more pressure on their governments to push Israel to allow them to go inside Gaza and document what’s happening.

‘They must be the witnesses and open a window to the world.’

Paying the price in blood

Though Wael has lost most of his family, he still continues his work in exile. He’s currently staying in Qatar, healing from his injuries – both physical and emotional.

But he’s not done yet.

‘My deep love, conviction, and belief in the cause of journalism have always been the driving force in my life. I do not live for my own benefits or my own interests. It goes beyond that,’ he told Metro.

‘At university and journalism schools, they teach you a lot of things. They teach you that no matter how big and important the story is, it’s not worth a drop of a journalist’s blood,’ he said.

Wael added that more than 200 of his colleagues had to ‘pay the ultimate price’ for their work. ‘We had to pay tons of blood,’ he said.

‘If the kind of people who commit these acts can feel impunity and get away with it today, someone else somewhere else tomorrow will feel the same and probably do the same.’

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