Media organisations from across the world have renewed calls for the killing of journalists in Gaza to stop – warning there will “soon be no one left to keep you informed”.
The campaign is also demanding foreign media is allowed free access to Gaza and an “end to the impunity for crimes perpetrated by the Israeli army” against Palestinian journalists.
Reporters Without Borders (RSF) and Avaaz, a non-profit organisation which promotes global activism, said hundreds of media groups in more than 50 countries were supporting its demands.
They included the emergency evacuation of journalists wanting to leave Gaza – and for governments to help Palestinian media seeking to leave the region.
RSF said 220 journalists had been killed in Gaza since October 2023 by the Israeli army, which has previously insisted its forces do not target the media.
But in recent attacks, six media workers were killed on 10 August while five journalists died just over a fortnight later.
RSF director general Thibaut Bruttin said: “At the rate journalists are being killed in Gaza by the Israeli army, there will soon be no one left to keep you informed.
“This campaign calls on world leaders to do their duty: stop the Israeli army from committing these crimes against journalists, resume the evacuation of the journalists who wish to leave Gaza, and ensure the foreign press has independent access to the Palestinian territory.”
Journalism industry trade magazine and website, Press Gazette, warned that more deaths of media workers would “not only plunge the region into darkness, they will send a message out to conflict zones around the world that journalists are fair game for the military”.
The US-based Committee To Protect Journalists said there were 21 cases where journalists were targeted because of their profession – and described these killings as “murder”.
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A month ago, more than 100 journalists, photographers and war correspondents signed a petition demanding “immediate and unsupervised foreign press access to the Gaza Strip”.
And in June, the managing director of Sky News, Jonathan Levy, joined the ongoing calls for international journalists to be allowed in and out of Gaza.
“The ongoing denial of access to Gaza feels much less about the safety of journalists and more about preventing proper scrutiny and accountability of the desperate situation there,” he wrote.
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Levy added there was “a war on truth” and this was “at odds with Israel’s proud and oft-repeated claim to be the Middle East’s only democracy and it should not be allowed to stand”.
