The League Of War Reporters

'I haven't seen my wife or my children': The Gazan journalists reporting on life under the bombs

While the international media have no access to the Gaza Strip, Gazans themselves, both civilians and professional journalists, continue to report on the situation on the ground, risking their lives in the process. The FRANCE 24 Observers team spoke to one of them.

Issued on: 26/10/2023 - 21:54
1 min
Gazan journalists continue to report on the situation in the Palestinian enclave, which is under constant bombardment from the Israeli army.
Gazan journalists continue to report on the situation in the Palestinian enclave, which is under constant bombardment from the Israeli army. © Observers
By:
Mahmoud Naffakh
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Nineteen days after the bloody Hamas attack on Israel, the Gaza Strip is still under continuous bombardment from Israel. The zone remains cut off from international media.

No journalist has been able to leave or enter the Palestinian enclave.

Caught between the bombardments and the Israeli blockade, local correspondents and citizen journalists are continuing to report on the situation on the ground.

Madhat Hajjaj is one of them.

I'm a cameraman and editor. When the war started [on 7 October], I went out to film the bombings. When the war intensified, the Iraqi television station with which I was working ceased its activities because it was unable to guarantee my safety or compensate me for any damage if anything happened to me.

Since the first days of the war, I haven't seen my wife, my children or my parents. I left home on the first day of the war with my equipment and my bullet-proof vest.

I help a lot of journalists, including those working with international channels. I use the computer and Internet made available to me by the Government Information Office in Gaza.

We film the arrival of the victims and put the images on the Internet, which we then send to foreign journalists.

On Wednesday 25 October, family members of two Palestinian journalists were killed in the bombardments: Wael Al-Dahdouh, a well-known journalist working for the Arabic-language Al Jazeera channel, and Mohammad Farra, a journalist based in Ramallah in the occupied West Bank, whose family lives in Gaza.

According to the Hamas Ministry of Health, more than 7,000 people have been killed in the Gaza Strip by Israeli air strikes since October 7.

At least 19 Palestinian journalists have been killed since the start of the Israel-Hamas war.

Israel suffocating journalism in Gaza

Credit: Mohammed al-Zaanoun
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With journalists killed or wounded, media premises destroyed, Internet shutdowns and the threatened censorship of the Al Jazeera TV news channel, Israel has been steadily suppressing news reporting in the Gaza Strip for nearly two weeks, says Reporters Without Borders (RSF).

The Israelis are close to imposing an all-out media blackout in Gaza. General measures such as the long-imposed and recently reinforced blockade and the forced displacement of civilians in the past few days are affecting local journalists and their families. At the same time, news media and journalists are also being specifically endangered in various ways.

During the “bloody week” following the massacre of Israeli civilians by Hamas, ten journalists were killed in connection with their work – eight of them in Gaza and most if not all of them as a result of Israeli bombardments. The latest victim is Mohammad Baalouche, the director of the Palestine Today TV channel, who was killed by a targeted strike on his home on 17 October, according to the information obtained by RSF.

In addition to the ten journalists killed while covering the war, nine others have been killed in their homes in Gaza as a result of Israeli bombardments and airstrikes. RSF is investigating whether they were targeted because of their work.

The suppression of journalism is also taking other forms. Since 7 October, many media outlets have been entirely or partially destroyed in Gaza by Israeli air strikes. The Palestinian Press Syndicate says as many as 50. Most of the 24 radio stations broadcasting over the air or online – which are among the main news sources in the Gaza Strip – have been silenced by the airstrikes and bombardments or by the Israeli blockade, which prevents them from getting fuel.

On October 19, a strike near the Nasser hospital in Khan Younès destroyed a temporary tented newsroom sheltering teams from the BBC, Reuters, Al Jazeera, AFP and local news agencies, without causing any injuries.

Growing obstacles to reporting

While constantly risking their lives, at least 50 journalists – according to RSF estimates – have had to rush to evacuate their homes in Gaza City in recent days as a result of Israeli evacuation orders. They had to abandon reporting equipment, documents and protective gear in the course of this forced displacement.

“I evacuated my home in Gaza City last night,” RSF was finally told by its correspondent after she had spent more than six hours without a network connection on 14 October, a week into the conflict. “I'm having trouble talking to you. We barely have any Internet here and we can't charge our phones. I am doing my best to gather information. We live in fear, it's unbearable. This is not the first war I’ve covered in Gaza, but I have never seen anything like this.”

The pressure on journalists covering the situation in the Gaza Strip, even those covering it from outside the enclave, has increased since 7 October. At least one journalist has been arrested by Israeli occupation forces in the West Bank because of his coverage of the war in Gaza. In Jerusalem, Al Araby TV correspondent Ahmad Darwasha was threatened and insulted by a police officer during a live broadcast, while three BBC journalists were held at gunpoint by Israeli police in Tel Aviv.

“So that the outside world can receive freely reported and reliable coverage of the situation, journalists must be able to work. But journalism is becoming more dangerous every the day. For nearly two weeks, the Israeli armed forces have been doing everything possible to prevent the dissemination of images. We condemn the media blackout that Israel is trying to impose. Journalism is the antidote to the disinformation that is spreading with particular strength with regard to this region.”

Christophe Deloire
RSF secretary-general
Meanwhile, Al Jazeera will probably soon become inaccessible within Israel. In the “emergency regulations” that are due to be adopted on Sunday, Israeli government ministers plan to censor the Qatari broadcaster, which is one of the main sources of international TV coverage of the war in Gaza and its repercussions.

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INTERNATIONAL LAWS AND GOVERNANCE DIGITAL SPACE AND DEMOCRACY MODELS AND GOOD PRACTICES MEDIA SUSTAINABILITY NEWS
EU’s Artificial IntelliBreadcrumb
INTERNATIONAL LAWS AND GOVERNANCE DIGITAL SPACE AND DEMOCRACY MODELS AND GOOD PRACTICES MEDIA SUSTAINABILITY NEWS
EU’s Artificial Intelligence Act must safeguard right to reliable news and information, says RSF

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Reporters Without Borders (RSF) calls on the European Union to strengthen safeguards for the right to reliable news and information in its future Artificial Intelligence Act (or AI Act), now in the final stage of being negotiated.

The European Commission, European Parliament and Council of the European Union were due to meet today (24 October) for trilogue negotiation on the AI Act’s final form.

The challenge is historic. The three parties must agree on an initial regulatory framework for artificial intelligence systems, with the aim of ensuring that they serve society rather than harm it. To this end, the AI Act classifies the different AI systems according to the risks they could pose to democracy.

But there is a flaw. AI systems producing or distributing news and information are not currently considered “high risk.” If they were, they would be subject to stricter requirements before they could be placed on the market. This would provide the European public’s right to reliable news and information with stronger safeguards.

“RSF thinks the goal of the classification proposed in the AI Act is good but we urge negotiators to go further. All systems intended to produce news information or interfere with the flow of news and information should be considered 'high risk' and should be subject to radical evaluation criteria before they can be placed on the market.”

Vincent Berthier
Head of RSF’s Tech Desk



Recommendations for an AI sector that respects the right to information

To ensure that artificial intelligence systems provide greater safeguards for the European public’s right to reliable news and information, RSF proposes incorporating the following elements into the AI Act:

The databases used to train algorithms must respect the requirements of pluralism and accuracy and must not include content that is false, misleading or deceptive, or constitutes propaganda.
Content generated by large language models still in the supervised training phase must be verified by media and information professionals instead of simply being evaluated on the basis of its plausibility.
Chatbots used by the general public or professionals to obtain information must be programmed so as not to answer questions for which they do not have the answer. They must, moreover, systematically invite people to consult the sources they use to produce their content.
The content produced by chatbots that are used to obtain information must be based on sufficiently diverse sources to guarantee pluralism.gence Act must safeguard right to reliable news and information, says RSF

AFP
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Reporters Without Borders (RSF) calls on the European Union to strengthen safeguards for the right to reliable news and information in its future Artificial Intelligence Act (or AI Act), now in the final stage of being negotiated.

The European Commission, European Parliament and Council of the European Union were due to meet today (24 October) for trilogue negotiation on the AI Act’s final form.

The challenge is historic. The three parties must agree on an initial regulatory framework for artificial intelligence systems, with the aim of ensuring that they serve society rather than harm it. To this end, the AI Act classifies the different AI systems according to the risks they could pose to democracy.

But there is a flaw. AI systems producing or distributing news and information are not currently considered “high risk.” If they were, they would be subject to stricter requirements before they could be placed on the market. This would provide the European public’s right to reliable news and information with stronger safeguards.

“RSF thinks the goal of the classification proposed in the AI Act is good but we urge negotiators to go further. All systems intended to produce news information or interfere with the flow of news and information should be considered 'high risk' and should be subject to radical evaluation criteria before they can be placed on the market.”

Vincent Berthier
Head of RSF’s Tech Desk



Recommendations for an AI sector that respects the right to information

To ensure that artificial intelligence systems provide greater safeguards for the European public’s right to reliable news and information, RSF proposes incorporating the following elements into the AI Act:

The databases used to train algorithms must respect the requirements of pluralism and accuracy and must not include content that is false, misleading or deceptive, or constitutes propaganda.
Content generated by large language models still in the supervised training phase must be verified by media and information professionals instead of simply being evaluated on the basis of its plausibility.
Chatbots used by the general public or professionals to obtain information must be programmed so as not to answer questions for which they do not have the answer. They must, moreover, systematically invite people to consult the sources they use to produce their content.
The content produced by chatbots that are used to obtain information must be based on sufficiently diverse sources to guarantee pluralism.

Greece : RSF is concerned about the possible conviction of a French-Canadian reporter accused of issuing a false bomb alert

The journalist Romain Chauvet covering wildfires in Greece during the summer 2023
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The French-Canadian journalist Romain Chauvet is accused of having issued a false bomb alert concerning a flight arriving from Israel with Canadian citizens on board. Covering the plane’s arrival from the airport, he was arrested and is due to appear in court on October 26. RSF calls on the justice system to take into account the inconsistencies in the prosecution’s case.

Update on 26 October 2023: Accused of making a false bomb alert, Romain Chauvet has been sentenced by an Athens court to a six-month suspended prison sentence for “disseminating false information”. RSF is shocked by the conviction of a journalist in a word-against-word procedure without solid evidence which should have benefitted the accused. The organisation will continue to support him, while awaiting the appeal decision. Albeit not targeting a journalistic publication, the verdict potentially represents a dangerous precedent in the application of the law against fake news. For the first time in several years, this legislation has been used to convict a journalist.

An Athens-based freelance reporter for Radio Canada, the French TV news channel BFMTV and the news site Courrier des Balkans, Romain Chauvet is facing a possible three-year suspended prison sentence on a charge of “disseminating false information” under article 191 of the Greek Penal Code.

When Romain Chauvet went to Athens international airport on October 12 to cover the arrival of a Canadian flight evacuating Canadian citizens from Israel, because of the war in the Middle East, he was arrested for allegedly saying there was a bomb aboard the plane. He was held in police custody for 24 hours. Thereafter, on the only basis of police sources, it was widely reported in the media that the journalist “wanted to test the airport security systems”.

However, the accusation against the journalist seems to be based solely on the testimony of a counter agent at the airport. Romain Chauvet explained to RSF that the police told him that she had accused him of saying there was a bomb aboard the plane. The reporter denied the allegation, and said that he was just trying to find out from her when the plane was exactly due to arrive. He had a permit from the airport press office allowing him to film in the airport.

“We urge the Greek justice system to take into account the flimsiness of the evidence against Romain Chauvet in this case that does not hold up. Why would a journalist who had reported his presence to the airport authorities issue a false bomb alert, and then remain in the airport waiting to be arrested? While the police rushed to tell the media he was guilty, RSF calls on the Greek justice system to demonstrate independence and impartiality.

Pavol Szalai
Head of RSF's EU-Balkans desk
Just one hour after arresting Romain Chauvet, the police told the media that a “journalist has confessed he wanted to test the airport security systems”. A pro-government media outlet published the first article based on the police claim, without any verification. The story then went viral in the Greek media, in both Greek and English-language outlets.

During his interrogation by the police, the journalist was asked to name the source who had told him the number of the flight coming from Israel, although this information had been published in the Canadian media and was available on FlightRadar24, a live flight tracking application.

When questioned by RSF about the evidence against Romain Chauvet, the Greek Ministry of Citizen Protection, which is responsible for law enforcement, simply responded that his arrest was “the result of special investigative operations carried out by the airport police authorities (analysis of visual material from security cameras), which made it possible to identify him”.

Greece is ranked 107th out of 180 countries in RSF's 2023 World Press Freedom Index – the lowest ranking of any European Union country.

VIOLENCE AGAINST JOURNALISTS NEWS
RSF calls for investigation after 100 armed individuals attacked a Liberian daily newsroom, injuring two staff members
Liberia New Dawn journalists press freedom
The New Dawn, premier journal privé du Liberia, est vendu dans les rues de Monrovia, la capitale du pays. AFP Sanogo
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Reporters Without Borders (RSF) condemns a night-time attack by around 100 armed individuals on the headquarters of New Dawn, Liberia’s leading privately-owned newspaper, in which two employees were injured. The authorities must conduct an investigation in order to identify and punish those responsible.

Armed with machetes, clubs and knives, the assailants stormed New Dawn’s premises in the capital, Monrovia, at around 1:30 a.m. on 18 October, when the night shift was supervising the printing of the newspaper.

The assailants took equipment, including phones, and beat two employees. But their injuries were not life threatening and they returned to work at the start of this week, said managing editor Othello Garblah, who rushed to the newspaper as soon as learned that an attack was under way and got there before the assailants left.

The newspaper filed a complaint about the attack but the police have not carried out any investigation. New Dawn also requested police protection but a week has gone by without any being provided, although the newspaper was the target of a similar night-time attack by around 100 people in August 2022.

This attack on New Dawn’s premises, which occurred between the two rounds of the presidential election, is unacceptable. Press freedom must be preserved and protected, especially when elections are taking place. RSF condemns this invasion and calls on the authorities to conduct an investigation, punish those responsible and install police protection around the newspaper’s premises.

Sadibou Marong
Director of RSF’s sub-Saharan Africa bureau
Garblah said the assailants were “zogos”, homeless people living on Monrovia’s streets, some of whom are sometimes paid by politicians to carry out crimes. Garblah nonetheless insisted that at this point, he has “no reason to believe someone sent them”.

Only a police investigation could determine who was responsible for the attack.

: free the publisher of elPeriódico imprisoned in Guatemala!
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VIOLENCE AGAINST JOURNALISTS COMMUNICATION CAMPAIGN
RSF launches global “Collateral Damage” campaign highlighting the danger of the Assange prosecution to media and the public’s right to know

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Reporters Without Borders (RSF) has launched a new global communications campaign as part of its longstanding efforts for the release of WikiLeaks publisher Julian Assange. Starting on 18 October, media supporters around the world will run RSF content, in print and online, highlighting the danger posed to all media and to the public’s right to know by the US government’s prosecution of Assange.

Developed in partnership with the French advertising agency BETC, RSF’s new communications campaign features a depiction of Assange with his facial features made up of the logos of dozens of media organisations from around the world. These media are among those that initially ran stories based on the leaked classified documents published by WikiLeaks in 2010.

“As Julian Assange’s fate hangs in the balance, it is more crucial than ever for media organisations and journalists around the world to speak out in support of the principles at stake. If the US government succeeds in extraditing Assange and prosecuting him under the Espionage Act, anyone who publishes stories based on leaked classified information could be next - and the resulting impact will ultimately be on all of our right to know. It’s time for global solidarity in support of journalism and press freedom, before it’s too late.

Rebecca Vincent
RSF’s Director of Campaigns

The campaign tagline “Collateral Damage” refers to the danger that the US government’s prosecution of Assange poses to media around the world, as well as the public’s right to information. It is also a reminder of the “Collateral Murder” video that was among the leaked materials published by WikiLeaks in 2010, exposing an air-to-ground attack by a US military Apache helicopter in a Baghdad suburb, which killed at least a dozen civilians, including two Reuters journalists.

The campaign is supported by Le Monde (France) and The Guardian (UK), who were among the original media partners that worked with WikiLeaks in 2010 on the “Cablegate” documents – a tranche of more than 250,000 leaked diplomatic cables. The campaign has also been supported by other media around the world, including: Il Dubbio (Italy); El Espectador (Colombia); Brecha (Uruguay); El Ciudadano (Chile); Prensa Comunitaria (Guatemala); El Mostrador (Chile); Radio Universidad de Chile (Chile); El Clarín (Chile); Aristegui Noticias (Mexico); Proceso (Mexico); El Sol de México (Mexico); El Universal (Mexico); Diario Digital de Radio Concierto (Paraguay); Alto Paraná (Paraguay); Diario Digital 24/7 (Paraguay).

RSF has launched this campaign less than a week before Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese’s state visit to Washington DC, from 23 to 26 October, where he will be hosted by US President Joe Biden. The two leaders have been urged to use this opportunity to find a diplomatic solution to the Assange case. RSF will also be launching a global tweetstorm targeting President Biden and Prime Minister Albanese the weekend leading up to the state visit, from 20 to 22 October.

The campaign launch also takes place in the run-up to the final stage of legal proceedings in the UK, where a hearing is expected to be called at any point – a date being referred to as “Day X.” This hearing will mark the final stage of domestic proceedings, leaving only the possibility of an application to the European Court of Human Rights if the UK court rejects Assange’s appeal against the extradition order.

The US and UK are respectively ranked 45th and 26th out of 180 countries in RSF’s 2023 World Press Freedom Index.

Notes to editors:

For media organisations that would like to support this communications campaign by running the content in print or online, please contact RSF’s Director of Communications and Engagement Emilie Poirrier on [email protected].
For interviews on the case of Julian Assange, please contact RSF’s Director of Campaigns Rebecca Vincent on [email protected].
EUROPE - CENTRAL ASIA
United Kingdom
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Royaume-Uni
26
/ 180
Score : 78.51
AMERICAS
United States
Découvrir le pays
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45
/ 180
Score : 71.22
Published on 17.10.2023
Americas
United States
Europe - Central Asia
United Kingdom
Asia - Pacific
Australia
Violence against journalists

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VIOLENCE AGAINST JOURNALISTS NEWS
Russia: Novaya Gazeta reporter badly injured in attack in Chechnya, RSF appalled by this barbaric act of intimidation

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Reporters Without Borders (RSF) is appalled by the latest violent attack on Novaya Gazeta reporter Elena Milashina, who was badly beaten and threatened shortly after arriving in the Russian republic of Chechnya this morning on 4 July to cover a trial. Such barbaric acts of intimidation will not prevent reporters from doing their job, RSF said.



Read in Russian / Читать на русском

A shocking photo shows Elena Milashina afterwards, doused in a green antiseptic, with her head shaved and her fingers bandaged. In the attack, which prevented the RSF Laureate for Courage in 2020 from attending the trial, several of her fingers were broken and she suffered a head trauma and bruising on her body. She has been transferred to a hospital in Beslan, in the neighbouring republic of North Ossetia, together with the lawyer who was accompanying her, Aleksandr Nemov, who was himself stabbed in the attack.

“You have been warned – leave here and write nothing,” one of the assailants shouted at Milashina and Nemov, threatening them with a gun, after he and other masked men intercepted their car on the road from the airport to the Chechen capital, Grozny, early this morning, according to the Memorial Centre.

Sergey Babinets, the head of the Team Against Torture (former Committee Against Torture) managed to reach Milashina and Nemov after the attack. He reported on Telegram that their assailants beat them with clubs and kicked them, took their phones, smashed their equipment and destroyed their documents, all that while insulting them and referring to the trials and cases they have been following.

“We condemn this shocking attack on Elena Milashina. Such barbaric acts of intimidation by thugs working for the Chechen Republic’s boss, Ramzan Kadyrov, will not prevent journalists from continuing to cover what is happening there. Novaya Gazeta, a martyred newspaper co-founded by Nobel peace laureate Dmitry Muratov, whose licences have been suspended in Russia, has had five of its journalists murdered since Vladimir Putin came to power. We salute the incredible courage of Elena Milashina and her colleagues. Journalists continue tirelessly to investigate and report, despite the danger. Killing one of them does not kill their investigations.

Jeanne Cavelier
The head of RSF’s Eastern Europe and Central Asia desk
Kadyrov threatened Milashina with violence in January 2022, shortly after the abduction of Zarema Musayeva, the woman whose trial was the reason for her visit to Chechnya. Sentenced today to five and a half years in prison, Musayeva is the wife of a former federal judge and mother of the presumed founders of the 1ADAT news site. She was “arrested” (abducted) by Chechen security forces at her home in Nizhny Novgorod, in the central part of European Russia.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov described today’s attack as “a very serious attack that requires vigorous measures.” The head of the Presidential Council for Human Rights, Valery Fadeyev, said he would refer the attack to the prosecutor general's office and the Investigative Committee. So far, no Russian judicial investigation into any of the murders of a Novaya Gazeta journalist, including Anna Politkovskaya, has resulted in the arrest of any of the instigators.

Today’s attack came just one day after the 20th anniversary of the death of Novaya Gazeta deputy editor and investigative reporter Yuri Shchekochikhin, who had been threatened on several occasions, had covered corruption cases and had worked on Chechnya. He died in hospital on 3 July 2003, ten days after being admitted in a coma. The newspaper believed he was poisoned but the official investigation concluded that his death was the result of an allergy.

Content monetisation platform Steady backs RSF’s Journalism Trust Initiative

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Journalism is losing its competitive edge in the face of rampant disinformation, opaque algorithms and powerful tech companies that deprive it of its visibility, reach and revenue worldwide – which the Journalism Trust Initiative (JTI) aims to overturn. Reporters Without Borders (RSF) is pleased to announce that European digital content monetisation platform, Steady is backing the JTI.

A Berlin-based company created to defend media pluralism and enable journalists to fund themselves independently through their own communities, Steady began last month to support the JTI, a mechanism designed by RSF to promote quality journalism by providing those who practice it with a competitive advantage, and thereby rebuild the public’s trust in the news media.

From now on, Steady’s nearly 1,700 content creators, who are followed by more than 200,000 paying members and subscribers, will be encouraged to begin the certification process according to the JTI benchmark.

“We are very pleased that our cooperation with Steady helps to make the Journalism Trust Initiative more attractive to smaller media outlets and independent journalists. Adhering to professional journalistic standards and guaranteeing trustworthy content are not a privilege reserved for major news organisations. They are a challenge that we should all take up."

Christian Mihr
Reporters Without Borders (RSF) Germany Managing Director
News aggregators, membership and subscription platforms or content monetisation platforms at large can point to the JTI standard in their guidelines to the publishers, media and content creators they host. Steady plans to begin drawing attention to the JTI at once, with a training workshop in mid-July for the publishers that are available on Steady.

“Many media professionals use Steady to publish or monetise their journalistic content, including those at Krautreporter, Übermedien and Volksverpetzer,” Steady managing director Tina Dingel said. “I am very proud that our association with the Journalism Trust Initiative will now enable us to help journalists and publishers to strengthen media professionalism and public trust in the media, and to encourage more digital creators to adhere to the JTI.”

An independent, stand-alone mechanism that is in the process of being adopted all over the world as a way to guarantee the quality of journalistic content and news reporting, the JTI was created at RSF’s initiative with support from the European Broadcasting Union and the French news agency Agence France-Presse (AFP). Developed by a group of international experts under the aegis of the European Committee for Standardisation (CEN), the standard was published in December 2019.

More than 600 media have begun or completed the process of self-evaluating their compliance with the JTI standard and nearly 100 of them have published the results in the form of a transparency report on the JTI app platform. Sixteen media have obtained full JTI certification, including GMX News and Web.de News in Germany, the French public broadcaster France Télévisions and the Swiss news site Swissinfo.ch.