The Torch is a weekly newsletter from the Committee to Protect Journalists that brings you the latest press freedom and journalist safety news from around the world. Subscribe here.
The Israel-Gaza conflict has taken a severe toll on journalists since Hamas launched its unprecedented attack against Israel on October 7 and Israel declared war on the militant Palestinian group, launching strikes on the blockaded Gaza Strip.
“CPJ emphasizes that journalists are civilians doing important work during times of crisis and must not be targeted by warring parties,” said Sherif Mansour, CPJ’s Middle East and North Africa program coordinator. “Millions across the world are counting on reporters in the region to provide accurate information about the conflict.”
🔎CPJ is investigating all reports of journalists killed, injured, detained, or missing in the conflict. This list of verified journalist attacks, which is being updated regularly, includes names based on information obtained from CPJ’s sources in the region and media reports.
In May, CPJ published “Deadly Pattern,” a report on the killings of journalists by the Israeli military since 2001. CPJ documented at least 20 journalist killings by the IDF. The vast majority—18—were Palestinian. No one has ever been charged or held accountable for these deaths.
The report recommended changes to Israeli rules of engagement to prevent the use of unwarranted lethal force against journalists.
📣For more insights, check out CPJ Middle East and North Africa Program Coordinator Sherif Mansour speak to BBC Radio’s The Media Show and CNN’s Reliable Sources.
🦺 Share CPJ’s safety information on war reporting and covering civil unrest
🦺 Review resources from Headlines Network and The Dart Centeron vicarious trauma and on working with traumatic imagery
- Taliban intelligence agents detain three Radio Nasim journalists
- CPJ calls on Angolan authorities to release journalist Carlos Alberto
- Haitian rum manufacturer sues AyiboPost, editor-in-chief for criminal defamation
- Bangladeshi student journalist Mosharrof Shah attacked on university campus
- Journalist Jesús Gutiérrez shot dead in Mexican city near U.S. border
- Three journalists detained in Ethiopia, transferred to military camp
- Private news websites restricted in Guinea for over a month
- EU under pressure to defend journalists against abusive lawsuits
- Moroccan authorities briefly arrest journalist Abdelmjid Amyay, ban Abdellatif al-Hamamouchi from traveling
Spotlight
The smears began the day lawyer Christian Ulate began representing jailed Guatemalan journalist José Rubén Zamora: tweets accusing the lawyer of being a leftist or questioning his legal credentials. He began to fear he was being surveilled.
Lawyers representing journalists around the globe—from Hong Kong to Turkey—face retaliation for defending the right of the press to report the news, writes Katherine Jacobsen, CPJ’s U.S. and Canada program coordinator.
When a lawyer is harassed for representing a journalist, the threats can have chilling effects on the free flow of information. Inevitably, journalists unable to defend themselves against retaliatory charges are more likely to be jailed—leaving citizens less likely to be informed of matters of public interest.
- Opinion | Life after prison: Iranian women who stood up for Mahsa Amini — Yalda Moaiery, The Washington Post
- ‘Tight hugs, teary screams’: Cheng Lei releases first statement after release from detention in China — Ben Doherty, Helen Davidson and Daniel Hurst, The Guardian
- New media NGOs shaping Russian journalism — Veronica Snoj, The Fix
- The predator files: Caught in the net — Amnesty International Security Lab
- “Join us or die”: Rwanda’s extraterritorial repression — Human Rights Watch
- Relocation of journalists in distress in the European Union — Media Freedom Rapid Response
- Poland’s hard-right government wages war on a US-owned network — Jon Allsop, Columbia Journalism Review
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