Latest news with #Shabat
The National
16-04-2025
- Politics
- The National
Gaza is by far the most dangerous place for journalists
According to a new study published by Brown University on April 1, more Palestinian reporters have been killed by the Israeli army than the combined total of journalists in the US Civil War; First and Second World Wars, the Korean War and four other conflicts – including the former Yugoslavia, Cambodia and post 9/11 wars. As of March 26, 263 Palestinian journalists and aid workers have been killed since the war began on October 7, 2023. Gazan reporters were simply doing their job: telling us what international journalists, who are banned from entering the Gaza Strip by Israeli authorities, cannot. Without them, we are blind to the war crimes Israel is committing against Gazan civilians. They are witnessing war crimes that can later be used as evidence in The Hague. During the Syrian civil war, emergency workers at the White Helmets were reportedly targeted because they wore Go-Pro cameras on their helmets, documenting the war. Journalists should be protected under the Geneva Conventions as long as they do not take part in the hostilities. But Israel has not abided by any international law. Earlier this month, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu defied an International Criminal Court arrest warrant by travelling to Hungary. Journalists are possibly their biggest threat, even more so than Hamas's rockets. 'The Israel-Gaza war war has been the deadliest conflict that the CPJ [Committee to Protect Journalists] has ever documented and is unprecedented in both the devastation it has wrought on the local press corps but also in the complete ban on independent media access from outside,' says Jodie Ginsberg, chief executive of the CPJ. One among the deceased was 23-year-old Hossam Shabat, who worked for Al Jazeera Mubasher. He wrote a touching letter before he was killed in late March in northern Gaza. 'If you're reading this, it means I have been killed – most likely targeted – by the Israeli occupation forces. 'I documented the horrors in northern Gaza minute by minute, determined to show the world the truth they tried to bury. I slept on pavements, in schools, in tents – anywhere I could. Each day was a battle for survival. I endured hunger for months, yet I never left my people's side.' Shabat started reporting before completing his university degree as the war escalated, refusing to move south with his family when civilians were being evacuated. He was separated from them for more than 400 days. Shortly before his death, he posted a photograph of his joyous reunion with his mother after 427 days. Now Israeli hawks are attempting to defame Shabat by claiming he was a Hamas operative. This is the easy thing for them to do: anyone who criticises Israeli policy is branded a Hamas supporter – including foreign reporters and academics. As a former war reporter who lost many colleagues on the battlefield, I know very well the dangers of reporting war. But the journalists in Gaza who are dying are a very different case than my colleagues who died in Bosnia, Sierra Leone or Syria. There, they were caught in crossfires, mortar attacks or an unlucky sniper's bullet (aside from colleagues who died in an ambush by rebel forces in Sierra Leone's capital of Freetown in May 2000). The Gazans are dying because it appears the Israeli forces do not want them to live to tell their story. Last week in Perugia, Italy, thousands of journalists from around the globe gathered for the five-day International Journalism Festival that concluded on Sunday. There, reporters and scholars, media heads and donors attended panels, workshops and discussions about the threats to media in society, but also to highlight the dangers and restrictions. Last year, the CPJ's Ginsberg gathered hundreds of journalists in the town square for a moment of silence in solidarity with the Gazan journalists. It was one of the most moving moments of my long career. I would like to believe the Israeli authorities will read the report by Brown University and consider what it does to their reputation. But the Israeli propagandist machine, known by the generic term hasbara or 'explanation', feeds the population an entirely different version of the truth. The Israeli leadership has long believed that it is necessary 'to aggressively distort the truth to manipulate adversaries and allies', according to a report in The Intercept. Led by Likud Party and Netanyahu loyalists, they are basically rewriting history. But all of this does nothing for the grieving families of the 263 journalists. Nor does it help to fill the information vacuum their deaths leave. However, their deaths make other Gazan journalists more determined and steadier. They keep on going, knowing that their work is crucial. Last October, I was a judge at the Prix Bayeux for War Reporters in France, one of the most prestigious prizes in journalism. The Gazan reporters on all media fronts – long- and short-format documentaries, print and radio – swept the boards by winning nearly all the prizes. That is not an easy feat in an extremely competitive market. Ginsberg says this is the deadliest period for journalists since CPJ began gathering data in 1992, during the Bosnian War. In those days, we considered Bosnia to be the most dangerous place on Earth. Today, that terrible sobriquet goes to Gaza, where journalists struggle to describe the displacement of 90 per cent of the population and the destruction of 80 per cent of the buildings. These journalists are being starved, bombed and deprived of medical and suffering numerous threats such as cyber attacks, censorship and killing of family members even as they try to work. I wish that everyone could take a moment and look up the names of each and every one of them, look at their photos, and remember their short lives as a tribute to them. As well as the brave contribution they have made to keeping the narrative truthful in one of the most terrible wars against civilians in recent history.
Al Jazeera
10-04-2025
- Politics
- Al Jazeera
Unpacking Israel's war on international humanitarian law
On March 24, Israel struck a car in northern Gaza and killed Al Jazeera correspondent Hossam Shabat. The 23-year-old is one of countless civilians – men, women and children – Israel has killed since launching what legal scholars describe as a 'genocidal' war on Gaza. Israel often justifies its killings by claiming that the targets are people sympathetic or affiliated with Hamas or other armed factions. This was the justification given for killing Shabat. Israel also regularly destroys entire neighbourhoods and buildings, killing dozens – often hundreds – at a time, ostensibly to target a single Hamas operative. For years, Israel has tried to justify these practices by employing lawyers to create shadowy quasi-legal concepts in the hope of establishing new, dangerous precedents, according to legal scholars and experts. However, legal scholars told Al Jazeera that neither so-called 'targeted killings' nor disproportionate attacks against civilians have any grounding in international law. 'Is there any semblance of law or legal justification for the war tactics Israel is using in Gaza? The simple answer is no. There isn't,' said Heidi Matthews, assistant professor of law at York University in Toronto, Canada. On September 28, 2000, Palestinians across the occupied West Bank and Gaza began demonstrating against Israel's ever-entrenching occupation in what became known as the second Intifada. Israel's repression of the Intifada quickly prompted Palestinians to mobilise and fight back. Over the next five years, Israel launched what it named 'targeted killings', assassinating unarmed Palestinians. Israel claimed that these targets could pose a threat to Israelis in the future because of their alleged membership in an armed faction. 'Israel … strips protection from civilians based on their views or perspectives,' said Noor Kilzi, a researcher with Legal Agenda, a nonprofit in Lebanon that advocates for legal reform and human rights in the Middle East. Israel's concept of targeted killings laid out a blueprint which the United States adapted during its 'war on terror', analysts told Al Jazeera. '[In the early 2000s] Israel and the US changed their legal doctrines and implemented that as part of their military dogma,' York University's Matthews told Al Jazeera. 'When it came to distinguishing between civilians and combatants… the US and Israel began to view [anyone as a target] based on their membership to a group,' she added. According to the International Committee of the Red Cross, a person is only a legitimate target if they are directly engaged in armed combat at the time they are killed. This means that suspected membership in an armed group is not a sufficient basis to assassinate someone. Throughout Israel's war on Gaza, it has routinely dropped 2,000lb (900kg) bombs in densely populated residential areas, as well as systematically targeted schools, hospitals and displacement shelters. Israeli officials justify these attacks by claiming that Israel is fighting a 'just war' against barbarians. As a result, the ostensible goal of destroying Hamas outweighs minimising civilian casualties. This is rooted partly in the philosophy of Francis Leiber, a 19th-century German American military theorist, who was tasked with setting out the 'rules of conduct' for Unionist soldiers fighting the Confederates in the US Civil War. He argued that some wars are vital to the moral progress of civilised nations and require a quick victory, which can only be achieved using tactics that will likely cause huge civilian casualties. 'Leiber basically said that whatever is militarily necessary to carry out war is legal,' Alonso Gurmendi Dunkelberg, a legal scholar at the London School of Economics, told Al Jazeera. This terrifying reasoning is blatantly at odds with international norms and laws, Gurmendi Dunkelberg added. 'He believed in killing as many people as you can, so that you finish the job quickly. He believed that was more humane than trying to protect people to the point that the war drags on for say 15 years,' he said. Since the beginning of Israel's war on Gaza, its spokespeople have made similar arguments. Mark Regev, an adviser to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, said the goal was to 'get the [war] done quicker' when asked by PBS about why Israel had dropped 6,000 bombs in the first six days of attacks on the besieged enclave. Then spokesperson for the Israeli army, Daniel Hagari, also admitted during the first days of the war that the emphasis in Gaza was on 'damage and not accuracy'. In November 2024, the International Criminal Court (ICC) approved two arrest warrants for Netanyahu and his then-Defence Minister Yoav Gallant – accused of using starvation as a weapon of war and deliberately attacking civilians in Gaza. An earlier ruling by the International Court of Justice found that Palestinians in Gaza faced a real risk of genocide due to Israel's war practices. The rulings by the ICC and ICJ add weight to the argument that Israel has failed in trying to legally justify its war practices, which likely amount to multiple war crimes, crimes against humanity and even genocide. As a result, Israel and its western allies are now trying to sabotage the very institutions that were created to uphold international law and prosecute perpetrators of atrocities, said Nadim Khoury, former director at Human Rights Watch and the founder of the Arab Reform Initiative think tank. 'Israel has clearly hit the limit of what they can get away with by using legal arguments. Now, they're just acting with total impunity to undermine the institutions trying to enforce international laws,' he told Al Jazeera. Several legal scholars and experts expressed dismay that Netanyahu may be able to visit countries in Europe that are parties to the Rome Statute, the legal framework underpinning the ICC. Countries such as Hungary, Belgium and France have said they will not arrest Netanyahu if he visits their countries or passes through their land or airspace. York University's Matthews believes states that claim to uphold international law must act quickly to salvage what's left of the system, acknowledging that it was never a perfect model. 'Other states – beyond America and Israel – need to take action to save or salvage the system as a whole, or it will fade away quickly,' she told Al Jazeera. 'We are at an inflection point and it doesn't look good.'
Yahoo
30-03-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
I'm a Palestinian journalist. Reporting on this war has been an act of survival.
When Israel resumed airstrikes on Gaza on March 18, Amna Asfour, a 36-year-old mother of four in Khan Younis, was jolted awake by a deafening explosion. 'My son clung to my arm and whispered, 'Mama, is it starting again?'' she recounted. During the brief pause in attacks following the January ceasefire, she had dared to hope that her children might sleep without fear. But reality set in quickly that night. 'I tell them again: Sleep in your shoes. Keep your bag by the door, though I don't know where else to go after we've already fled four times.' For 15 months, Palestinians in Gaza have endured relentless bombardment, starvation and displacement. When a ceasefire finally arrived on Jan. 19, it merely offered a brief, fragile pause to bury the dead, tend to the wounded, and cling to the remnants of life before it was disrupted. In Gaza, the expectation of devastation is as constant as breathing. I covered the first phase of this war from the ground before I fled Gaza for my family's and my safety. Now, reporting from Cairo as airstrikes continue to fall with unimaginable intensity, I see that for those still on the ground, there is no safety or calm, only the certainty that every lull is merely the prelude to even more destruction. Even with reports of a new ceasefire deal on the horizon, this latest return of airstrikes has felt more like a confirmation that no pause will ever lead to lasting peace. And the deepening psychological toll — a burden that now rests on the ashes of over a year of agony and terror — means the fear of death or injury has become secondary to the slow erosion of hope. By the weekend, more than 750 people had been killed — most of them women and children — while hundreds more were wounded. After Israel broke the ceasefire, health officials reported the death toll in Gaza since the war began in October 2023 surpassed 50,000. For Palestinian journalists, reporting on this war is both a professional duty and an act of survival. On March 24, the IDF killed two more Palestinian journalists: Al Jazeera Mubasher correspondent Hossam Shabat and Palestine Today reporter Mohammed Mansour. Shabat was killed when his car was targeted in Beit Lahiya, while Mansour died in a bombing that struck his apartment in Khan Younis. The IDF confirmed both killings, claiming both journalists were terrorists. The Committee to Protect Journalists condemned the deaths and denied that claim, a spokesperson stating, 'The deliberate and targeted killing of a journalist, of a civilian, is a war crime.' Al Jazeera had denied earlier claims that Shabat was a terrorist. Their deaths add to the staggering toll of journalists and media workers killed in the war — more than 200 since October 2023, according to the Palestinian Journalists Syndicate — as those who remain continue risking their lives to document the unfolding devastation. The targeting of media workers in Gaza has been routine. Press vehicles, clearly marked as such, have been struck by Israeli forces, and shelters housing displaced civilians and journalists have not been spared. We've seen numerous reports of journalists being personally targeted and threatened by the Israeli military. Despite these relentless attacks, journalists in Gaza continue to do their job. Abdelhakim Abu Riash, a freelance photojournalist in northern Gaza, says he is 'running out of places to report from — and of colleagues to report with.' But stopping isn't an option, he says, 'because then there would be no one to tell the world what's happening.' Sulaiman Hijjy, another photojournalist who has been reporting from Gaza, has grown accustomed to this grim reality. Since the airstrikes resumed less than two weeks ago, he found himself reliving the earliest days of the conflict. 'For 15 months, I have filmed mass graves, bombed-out neighborhoods, entire families erased in a single airstrike,' he recalled. 'When the ceasefire came, I thought maybe I could breathe.' But there was no relief. Now, Hijjy files stories between airstrikes, capturing what remains of lives and landscapes before they, too, are erased. The names of our fallen colleagues like Hossam, Mohammed and so many others before them should be voices that echo in newsrooms, not carved into gravestones. Even reporting from Cairo, the images of death don't haunt me as a distant horror; they are a daily reality for me and thousands who remain in Gaza. They remind me that even as I report, I am also mourning. Documenting all of this means standing at the edge of life and loss, and continuing to write even when the world reads our words yet refuses to act. Carrying out this work is to ask, time and again, whether anything we say will ever be enough to break the world's indifference. Journalists aren't the only ones fighting for life and dignity in Gaza. Dr. Yasser Shami, a surgeon at Nasser Hospital in southern Gaza, described the nearly impossible conditions of providing care in a hospital stripped of resources. 'For two months, we tried to prepare,' he recalled. 'We had no real supplies, but at least patients weren't pouring in every minute.' The current situation in his hospital's emergency room is even 'worse than before,' he says. He recently had to amputate a 9-year-old boy's leg with no anesthesia. He says the 'little boy screamed until he passed out,' before he moved on to the next patient. 'I don't think we're even allowed the time to grieve here,' he said. Each day, Shami faces impossible choices: who receives the last dose of antibiotics, who gets the only available ventilator, who might have a chance with urgent care, and who is already beyond saving. There is no proper triage — only a cruel calculus of survival dictated by scarcity. According to a United Nations report from last December, 136 Israeli strikes on hospitals in Gaza pushed the health care system to the brink of collapse. This dismantling of Gaza's health infrastructure means that even those who survive the bombs may not survive their wounds. Medics, surgeons and journalists alike continue to press on, despite ongoing bombardments and the dimming prospect of lasting peace. Every day, those journalists who have managed somehow to survive pick up their cameras, notebooks and microphones, even when they know they could be next. We grieve for those we've lost, yet we dare not stop — we owe it to them to keep telling the stories of those who can no longer speak for themselves. This article was originally published on
Morocco World
28-03-2025
- Politics
- Morocco World
Free Press Organizations Respond to Israel's Killing of Two Palestinian Journalists
Rabat — Following the deaths of two Palestinian journalists Monday, March 26, free press organizations have come forward with statements calling for the support of the international community in condemning Israel's crimes against journalists working in Gaza. The two journalists — Hossam Shabat, a 23-year-old correspondent working for Al Jazeera and contributing to the online news outlet Drop Site, and Mohammed Mansour, who worked for Palestine Today — were killed in separate airstrikes on Monday. The news of their death has been widely shared on social media. On Monday, Shabat published a photo to Instagram of Mansour with the caption, 'The martyrdom of journalist Mohammad Mansour when the occupation targeted a house south of Khan Younis, southern Gaza Strip.' Less than an hour later he himself was killed. Following Shabat's death, a statement published by his team on X has circulated on multiple platforms. 'If you're reading this I have been killed,' he begins. 'Do not let the world look away. Keep fighting, keep telling our stories—until Palestine is free.' Israel's criminalization of Palestinian journalism According to an article published in the Times of Israel, the IDF has confirmed their hand in Shabat death, rekindling claims made in October 2024 of Shabat's involvement in terrorist activity. These claims have not been substantiated and, in 2024, were refuted by Al Jazeera and Shabat himself. 'We convey the truth on Al Jazeera Mubasher, and we move within the areas classified by Israel as safe,' Shabat previously told the Committee to Protect Journalists in response to the IDF's initial claims. 'We are citizens, and we convey their voices. Our only crime is that we convey the image and the truth.' International organizations committed to free press have since released statements condemning the attacks. In an article published Monday , the CPJ condemned the deaths of both Mansour and Shabat, calling for 'an independent international investigation into whether they were deliberately targeted.' Jonathan Dagher, Head of the RSF Middle East Desk, said in a statement published on the Reporters Without Borders (RSF) website on Tuesday: 'RSF calls on the international community to do everything in their power to pressure the Israeli authorities to instate protections for journalists in Gaza.' This statement follows four complaints lodged by RSF with the ICC for Israel's war crimes against journalists, which the RSF identifies on their website as an 'attempt to impose a 'media blackout' on the territory.' The status of journalists reporting from Palestine has come under increasing attack since October 2023. The CPJ estimates the number of journalists killed in Gaza since October at 170, while other organizations like the Palestinian Journalists' Syndicate place the number much higher. The Syndicate estimates that the deaths of Shabat and Mansour have brought the number of journalists killed by the IDF since October 2023 to 208. Palestinian journalists face inhumane conditions In a statement on the CPJ's website, Program director Carlos Martinez de la Serna in New York said: 'The international community must act fast to ensure that journalists are kept safe and hold Israel to account for the deaths of Hossam Shabat and Mohammed Mansour, whose killings may have been targeted. Journalists are civilians and it is illegal to attack them in a war zone.' Sharif Abdel Kouddous, Shabat's former editor at Drop Site, told Democracy Now! reporter Amy Goodman of the surreal violence and nightmarish working conditions journalists face to document Israel's relentless war on Palestine. Sharing the stories other journalists working with Drop Site News, namely Rasha Abou Jalal and Abubaker Abed, Kouddous condemned the daily violence, the lack of basic necessities—food, medicine, fuel—that these journalists endure to shed light on the genocide in Gaza. He described Shabat's conditions as similarly insupportable, speaking highly of his work over the past months. 'His ability to cover one of the most brutal military campaigns in recent history was almost beyond comprehension. He was witness to untold suffering and death almost every single day. He was often hungry, didn't have enough food,' Kouddous recalled. 'He told me he was displaced 20 times. He didn't have anywhere to sleep. He was exhausted. And he buried many friends and many of his journalist colleagues over this time. He himself was wounded in an Israeli airstrike. Despite all of this, he somehow managed to continue reporting relentlessly every single day.' Tags: children of Gazadeath toll in Gaza
The Guardian
28-03-2025
- Politics
- The Guardian
Friday briefing: How Gaza is becoming the deadliest conflict zone for journalists
Good morning. More than 170 journalists have been killed in Gaza since 2023, with some estimates putting the toll as high as 206. It is the deadliest conflict for media workers in recent history. In a sobering report, Thaslima Begum gathered some of their stories. And attacks on journalists worldwide are on the rise, with deaths occurring everywhere from the Middle East to Europe. Just this week, Hossam Shabat, a 23-year-old reporter, was killed in Gaza. Shabat had feared death since Israel accused him of terrorist activity. He had already written a message to be published in the event of his death: 'For the past 18 months, I have dedicated every moment of my life to my people. I documented the horrors in northern Gaza minute by minute, determined to show the world the truth they tried to bury … I risked everything to report the truth, and now, I am finally at rest – something I haven't known in the past 18 months.' For today's newsletter, I spoke with Palestinian journalist Hind Khoudary, who has been reporting from Gaza since the start of the war, about the situation on the ground for reporters and Guardian journalist Ruth Michaelson about what is driving the decline in press freedom around the world. That's right after the headlines. UK economy | Lower-income households are on track to become £500 a year poorer by the end of the decade as a result of the UK chancellor's spring statement, according to analysis by the Resolution Foundation. Monarchy | King Charles required hospital observation on Thursday after experiencing 'temporary side-effects' as part of his medical treatment for cancer, Buckingham Palace said. Canada | Mark Carney, the Canadian prime minister, has said the era of deep ties with the US 'is over' as governments from Tokyo to Berlin and Paris sharply criticised Donald Trump's sweeping tariffs on car imports, with some threatening retaliatory action. Asia-Pacific | Japan has for the first time released plans to evacuate more than 100,000 civilians from some of its remote islands near Taiwan in the event of conflict amid escalating tensions between Beijing and Taipei. Environment | Supporters of the climate group Just Stop Oil have announced that after three years of disruptive protests they are ending their campaign of civil resistance. Hannah Hunt, whose speech on Valentine's Day 2022 marked the beginning of the campaign, made the announcement outside Downing Street in London on Thursday. This week, two Palestinian journalists were killed in Israeli airstrikes: Al Jazeera's Shabat (above left), who died in Beit Lahiya, and Palestine Today's Mohammed Mansour (above right), who was killed in his home alongside his wife and son. Israeli forces deny targeting journalists, but in this case the IDF confirmed it had deliberately killed both reporters, calling them terrorists. Shabat, widely known for his reporting from northern Gaza, had already rejected such claims when they were first levelled against him in October, calling them part of a 'systematic propaganda campaign to justify the unjustifiable'. Israel has barred foreign journalists from entering Gaza, an unprecedented move in modern times, leaving the task of documenting the violence solely to Palestinian reporters working on the ground without protection. Within months of the war starting, press freedom organisations accused the Israeli military of targeting journalists and their families. In the occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem, reporters face growing hostility from Israeli forces. Human Rights Watch has said the Israeli government 'has taken an unprecedented series of steps to curtail media freedom, effectively resulting in the establishment of a censorship regime'. Life as a journalist in Gaza Journalists in Gaza are not only working under heavy bombardment. Like every other civilian, they are contending with perilous conditions. Khoudary, who has been displaced in Deir al-Balah in the central Gaza Strip for the past year and a half, does not remember the last time she saw her family, who evacuated to Cairo. 'Since then I have been on my own,' she says. 'All I want is a hug after a very harsh day. I want to sit on my mother's lap and hug my brothers. It has been so hard losing everything you own and love. I never thought that I would ever live this in my life.' Khoudary says the situation has been particularly bad since the collapse of the ceasefire and the renewal of the total blockade of aid. 'Journalists have been literally living everything they have been reporting – we have been displaced, starved, dehydrated, not sleeping,' she says. Making things harder, she adds, is the distress of learning that colleagues and friends have been injured or killed. Shabat's death was felt particularly acutely because he was one of the few journalists who remained in northern Gaza. 'There was an intimacy to his coverage, the way he documented his home and what was happening there, and because of this the outside world had grown to know him,' Ruth says. 'The other thing Shabat said was that he felt like he was being hunted, and that is a sentiment we hear time and time again from our colleagues reporting in Gaza – that they feel like they are being singled out for attack.' The Israeli government has strenuously denied targeting journalists, or has said that those who have been targeted were involved in violent activity. This is not the first time Israeli authorities have made such claims. Last year they designated six Al Jazeera journalists based in Gaza as members of Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ), an allegation the network vehemently denies. The Committee to Protect Journalists has previously condemned Israeli authorities for the 'smearing of killed Palestinian journalists with unsubstantiated 'terrorist' labels'. Foreign media have been pressuring the Israeli government to allow them into Gaza, but Ruth points out that this slightly obscures the reality that Palestinian journalists are already reporting for international outlets. Khoudary says Palestinian journalists have been marginalised and neglected: 'People have been using us as tools for their media agencies. Most of us don't have protection gear, we are working with the bare minimum of tools to tell the story. 'Sometimes people forget the fact that we are also humans,' Khoudary continues. 'We have been reporting with zero break, no days off, because there is no days off. I just want the world to know that we are very tired and overwhelmed and we do not want to lose more.' West Bank and East Jerusalem The attacks on media are not limited to Gaza. In September, Israeli forces raided Al Jazeera's office in the occupied West Bank and banned its operations in Israel. And last weekend a German journalist was arrested by Israeli police in the occupied West Bank for allegedly assaulting a settler, despite video footage showing settlers blocking him and acting threateningly. A few days later Oscar-winning director Hamdan Ballal was attacked by settlers and then arrested, in what he says was retaliation for his documentary on the displacement of Palestinians in Masser Yaffa. 'As we tragically saw with the killing of Shireen Abu Akleh in 2022, no Palestinian journalist is too high-profile to be targeted or harmed,' Ruth says. The latest data from the CPJ shows that 75 journalists have been arrested in the Palestinian territories of the occupied West Bank and Gaza, as well as in Jerusalem. In 2024 Israel was added to the list of the 'worst jailers of journalists' for the first time and according to the UN, Israeli forces have fired live ammunition at journalists or their vehicles while they were reporting on military operations and civilian casualties. The image that emerges is one of a country deeply hostile to and suspicious of critical coverage, willing to go to great lengths to clamp down on it. The Palestinian Authority in the occupied West Bank has also mirrored Israeli crackdowns on the press, suspending Al Jazeera from broadcasting due to its coverage of fighting between the PA and Palestinian armed groups. 'The PA has a track record of detaining journalists and curbing coverage it doesn't like,' Ruth says. 'It is, unfortunately, not a free media environment, and that is really cutting off visibility to the outside world.' It's a problem everywhere In the past few months alone, the press has faced an onslaught. In the US, the Trump administration has moved to withdraw funding for Radio Free Europe and Voice of America, threatened media outlets with lawsuits, and revoked press credentials of organisations critical of the White House. In Turkey this week, journalists have been arrested and deported. In Indonesia, reporters are facing increasing intimidation, with decapitated pigs and rats being sent to their offices. Media crackdowns can also take the form of seemingly mundane bureaucratic obstacles. In India, the government has been refusing to renew work permits for some foreign journalists. 'When a journalist is mistreated, it should be an international incident,' says Ruth. 'One of the consequences when it isn't is this increasing climate of impunity towards journalists, which we've seen over at least the past decade, since 2012, when Marie Colvin and Rémi Ochlik were killed in Syria.' Can a £20 pot from Aldi really match up to a £300 Le Creuset? Dale Berning Sawa puts heavy bottomed pans to the test so you don't have to … Toby Moses, head of newsletters Sandra Laville and Michael Goodier have spoken with activists who are urging the government to do more about the sewage that is still being pumped into Britain's waterways, including in Windermere, a lake once known for its beauty but marred by pollution. Nimo Lloyd Green is fascinating on how the spirit of the confederacy is alive and well in Trump's Maga movement: 'He has even heaped praise upon Robert E Lee, the leader of the losing army during the US civil war.' Toby 'The lessons are clear: understand the science and check the small print. You were never customers; you were always the product,' Adam Rutherford writes on the demise of the commercial genetic testing company 23andMe. Nimo Geoffrey Rush is a blast in our reader interview, on ageing ('I'm 73 and I still think inside I'm a brunette'), pirates ('I remember having to go and voice some lines after a day on another film, and rolling my eyes going: 'Oh my God, will this never go away?'') and John Lithgow ('The first conversation we had on a Zoom he said: 'I've got this guy to make some special teeth.' And I went: 'You're my kind of actor.'') Toby Football | Goals from Sandy Baltimore, Nathalie Björn and Mayra Ramírez gave Chelsea a 3-0 WCL win against Manchester City and a 3-2 aggregate victory. Salma Paralluelo and Clàudia Pina scored twice to help Barcelona thrash Wolfsburg 6-1 and win 10-2 on aggregate. Sign up to First Edition Our morning email breaks down the key stories of the day, telling you what's happening and why it matters after newsletter promotion Formula One | Red Bull have confirmed they will replace their driver Liam Lawson with Yuki Tsunoda from their sister team Racing Bulls. Lawson has been dropped before next weekend's Japanese Grand Prix after the New Zealander took part in only two races for the team. Cricket | Former England fast bowler Peter Lever has died at the age of 84. As part of the England team, Lever won the Ashes in Australia in 1970-71. He represented his country in 17 test matches, and a further 10 one-day internationals. The Guardian leads with 'Fears Reeves may be forced into further tax increases'. Keir Starmer and Volodymyr Zelenskyy standing together are the front-page picture – and while we're on Vladimir Putin's war the i leads with 'UK sends military chiefs to Kyiv, as Trump goes after Ukraine's gas, oil and metals'. A 'Coalition course' is what Starmer and Emmanuel Macron are setting with their Ukraine plans, says the Metro. 'Billionaire Mittal to leave Britain after tax crackdown on 'non-dom' residents' – that's the Financial Times. 'King in hospital for cancer side effects' reports the Telegraph while the Express headlines that story with 'King suffers 'bump in the road' during cancer care' and the Mirror sees it similarly: 'King cancer 'bump in the road''. 'Charles is forced to cancel full day of visits' says the Daily Mail and the Times does likewise: 'King has to cancel visits after return to hospital'. Our critics' roundup of the best things to watch, read, play and listen to right now TVThe Studio | ★★★★☆ The chair of Continental Studios, Griffin Mill (Bryan Cranston) is keen to deliver a decisive blow with the hammer of his newly acquired IP. He has just fired his long-serving studio head, Patty Leigh (Catherine O'Hara), for her preference for art over commerce and is on the verge of promoting studio executive Matt Remick (Seth Rogen) to the big job. What's a guy to do – even if he is a devoted cinephile who dreams of adding his contribution to the illustrious roll call of meaningful movies? He kisses the ring. And with that we are off to the races for 10 fast, furious and farcical episodes of Rogen's new Hollywood satire The Studio, created with his partner since their Superbad-minting days, Evan Goldberg. Lucy Mangan Film The End | ★★★★★ Michael Shannon and Tilda Swinton play the last super-rich couple in the world. He is a breezily self-assured energy magnate and she a former ballerina. After an environmental catastrophe 25 years ago, they retreated from civil disorder, deep underground into an eerily well-appointed suite of rooms with food, air and medicines in which they keep their colossal fine art collection. They carry out emergency drills with survival suits, and practise on the firing range in case a member of the angry underclass shows up. This worst case scenario becomes a reality when a young woman (Moses Ingram) somehow finds her way into the compound. Peter Bradshaw Music Lucy Dacus: Forever Is a Feeling | ★★★☆☆Last February, the American 'indie rock supergroup' Boygenius – AKA Julien Baker, Phoebe Bridgers and Lucy Dacus – announced an indefinite hiatus. The first 'Boy' to return with a solo album, Dacus's comeback is audibly not much interested in attention-grabbing gestures. It is understated, almost to a fault. There are songs with beautiful melodies here. More often, they settle for being perfectly nice rather than particularly arresting: nothing really grabs you, a state of affairs compounded by the album's unobtrusive sound. Alexis Petridis PodcastJourney Through TimeThe first big historical event retold by David Olusoga and Sarah Churchwell in their new series is a terror attack on New York – but no, it's not 9/11. They want to tell us about the world-shaping moments we're not taught about, which in this case was the Black Tom 1916 bombing. England's great storm of 1703 – one of the worst natural disasters ever – and female pirates of the Caribbean Anne Bonny and Mary Read are also on the meaty agenda. Hollie Richardson From the Oscars to Israeli detention: the attack on No Other Land director Hamdan Ballal What does the attack on an Oscar-winning Palestinian director say about the situation in the West Bank today? Adrian Horton and Lorenzo Tondo report A bit of good news to remind you that the world's not all bad Bafta-nominated actor Samuel Bottomley is lighting up Bradford with the launch of his drama school, the West Yorkshire Workshop. At 23, Bottomley – best known for his role in Channel 4's Somewhere Boy – is passionate about giving working-class northern talent the opportunity to shine in the TV and film industry. Inspired by the renowned Nottingham Television Workshop, his new school offers affordable evening and weekend courses, with tuition from Bottomley himself and esteemed directors like Molly Manning Walker and Penny Woolcock. 'I just thought the north needed some sort of hub where actors from all around the north can come together – normal people that just want to be actors, staying sharp and staying in the game.' Sign up here for a weekly roundup of The Upside, sent to you every Sunday And finally, the Guardian's puzzles are here to keep you entertained throughout the day. Until tomorrow. Quick crossword Cryptic crossword Wordiply
