Journalists say ethnic cleansing taking place in northern Gaza news void

Journalists film while standing before destroyed buildings in the Jabalia camp for Palestinian refugees in the northern Gaza on October 9, 2024. (Photo: AFP/Omar Al-Qattaa)
Journalists film destroyed buildings in the Jabalia camp for Palestinian refugees in northern Gaza on October 9, 2024. (Photo: AFP/Omar Al-Qattaa)

Israel has stepped up systematic attack on journalists and media infrastructure since the start of its northern Gaza campaign in early October.

Israeli strikes killed at least five journalists and the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) began a smear campaign against six Al Jazeera journalists reporting on the north, where there are now almost no professional journalists left to document what they and several international institutions describe as an ethnic cleansing campaign.

Journalists interviewed by CPJ in late October and early November said the continued attacks on the media – along with the food shortages, continual displacement, and communications blackouts experienced by all Gazans – placed severe constraints on coverage of the impact of Israel’s offensive, which the Israeli military says is a bid to stop militant Hamas fighters from regrouping.

 “Israel is accused of adopting a ‘starve or leave’ policy to force Palestinians out of northern Gaza. It seems clear that the systematic attacks on the media and campaign to discredit those few journalists who remain is a deliberate tactic to prevent the world from seeing what Israel is doing there,” said CPJ Program Director Carlos Martinez de la Serna, in New York. “Reporters are crucial in bearing witness during a war, without them, the world won’t be able to write history.”

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As COP29 opens, CPJ calls for jailed Azerbaijani journalists to be freed

The United Nations' climate change conference opened in Azerbaijan on November 11, 2024.
The United Nations conference opened in Azerbaijan on Monday, amid criticism of Azerbaijani authorities’ crackdown on the press and critical voices. (Photo: Reuters/Murad Sezer)

With the opening of the U.N.’s annual climate talks in Azerbaijan, the Committee to Protect Journalists calls on visiting delegations to press Azerbaijan to end its unprecedented media crackdown.

“With at least 15 journalists awaiting trial on charges that could see them jailed for between eight and 20 years, Azerbaijan’s treatment of the press is absolutely incompatible with the human rights values expected of a United Nations host country,” said Gulnoza Said, CPJ’s Europe and Central Asia program coordinator.

Read more

CPJ, partners’ letter to European Union

More CPJ Azerbaijan coverage


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Journalists Attacked

Myat Thu Tan

MURDERED

Myat Thu Tan, a contributor to the local news website Western News and correspondent for several independent Myanmar news outlets, was shot and killed on January 31, 2024, while in military custody in Mrauk-U in Myanmar’s western Rakhine State.

He was arrested on September 22, 2022, and held in pre-trial detention under a broad provision of the penal code that criminalizes incitement and the dissemination of false news for critical posts he made on his Facebook page. Myat Thu Tan had not been tried or convicted at the time of his death.

The journalist’s body was found buried in a bomb shelter, with the bodies of six other political detainees, and showed signs of torture.

Myanmar’s military junta has cracked down on journalists and media outlets since seizing power in a February 2021 coup.

In at least 8 out of 10 cases, the murderers of journalists go free. CPJ is waging a global campaign against impunity.

journalists killed in 2024 (motive confirmed)
imprisoned in 2023
missing globally