President Joe Biden should press Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on the unprecedented number of journalists killed in the Gaza Strip and the near-total ban on international media entering the Strip, the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) and seven other human rights and press freedom organizations said in letters to the White House and U.S. Congressional leaders.
The letters call on the U.S. to ensure that Israel stops killing journalists and takes urgent steps to enable the press to report freely throughout the region. The letters also outline press freedom violations and Israel’s failure to hold journalists’ killers to account. Netanyahu is expected to meet with Biden on Tuesday and to address a joint session of Congress on Wednesday.
The letters were signed by Amnesty International USA, Freedom of the Press Foundation, Knight First Amendment Institute, the National Press Club, PEN America, Reporters Without Borders, and the Tahrir Institute for Middle East Policy.
“More than 100 journalists have been killed. An unprecedented number of journalists and media workers have been arrested, often without charge. They have been mistreated and tortured,” CPJ CEO Jodie Ginsberg said in a video message to Netanyahu last week.
On May 17, veteran Venezuelan radio host Antonio Di Giampaolo planned to broadcast an interview with opposition presidential candidate Edmundo González, but executives at the station Éxitos 93.1 FM nixed the plan with no explanation, according to the journalist.
Di Giampaolo believes the radio station did not want to risk offending President Nicolás Maduro, who will face González at the polls on July 28 in a critical presidential election.
To journalists and press freedom groups who spoke with CPJ, the episode typifies how government control of the media and self-censorship has distorted election coverage in Venezuela and deprived voters of vital information about the presidential candidates, writes John Otis.
We defend the right of journalists to report the news safely and without fear of reprisal.