If you’re reading this, chances are you believe in freedom of the press. Us too. However, as we celebrate International Human Rights Day this month – commemorating the signing of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights – that freedom is under more threat than ever, and nowhere more so than in Gaza.
Seventy-seven years ago, after a genocide that world powers swore would never be repeated, delegates from countries including the United States, India, Brazil and Egypt signed the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. The Declaration recognizes that all human beings are born equal in dignity and rights and that everyone has the right to life, liberty and security. Crucially for our fields – cinema and journalism respectively – the Declaration also recognizes freedom of expression as a fundamental right, including the “freedom to hold opinions without interference and to seek, receive and disseminate information and ideas through all media and regardless of frontiers”. The anniversary of the Declaration, December 10, should be cause for celebration; Today, however, it serves as a grim reminder of how far we are from fulfilling the promises it contained.
As of this writing, 126 journalists and media workers have been murdered around the world since the start of the year, according to figures documented by the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ). That puts 2025 tied with 2024 as the deadliest year for journalists that CPJ has recorded in more than three decades of data collection. Journalists have been murdered in countries from Sudan to Ukraine, Mexico to the Philippines, but the vast majority (86) of those killed this year have been at the hands of the Israeli military, including 52 Palestinians killed in Gaza.
Since October 7, 2023, the Israeli army has killed 206 Palestinian journalists and media workers in Gaza. Palestinian journalists like Bilal Jadallah, a journalist who helped train young journalists in Gaza, were killed by an Israeli airstrike that hit his car. Journalists like Roshdi Sarraj, founder of a Palestinian production company, who returned to Gaza from a foreign trip at the start of the genocide because he wanted to report, and who was killed a few weeks later when an Israeli missile hit the family home, injuring his wife and young daughter. Journalists like Anas Al-Sharif, killed in an Israeli attack that targeted a tent housing journalists and killed the entire team of six Al Jazeera journalists. Journalists such as AP photographer Mariam Abu Dagga, killed when Israel attacked a hospital staircase from which journalists were operating, while covering the aftermath of an earlier attack that killed Reuters cameraman Hussam Al Masri.
Journalists are civilians: international humanitarian law clearly states this. Journalists are not a target and they – and the facilities they work in – must be protected. Not only did Israel fail to respect this obligation to protect, but in many cases it is clear that the army attacked journalists knowing that they were journalists. This constitutes a war crime. The Israeli army must be held responsible for these deaths, as must all those responsible for the murder of journalists. Failure to do so creates a culture of impunity that harms us all: decades of data show that failing to punish those responsible for killing journalists creates an environment in which these deaths persist and become normalized. The assassination of journalists has a profound impact because journalism is an essential pillar of all our freedoms: its function is to reveal information that others would prefer to hide – political corruption, corporate abuses, the horrors of war.
A strong defense of our fundamental and universal freedoms must include a strong and clear defense of those who play a critical role in reporting when these rights are violated. Therefore, as we mark this anniversary, we call on the international community to take three steps that can help ensure the protection and justice due to Palestinian journalists and, in doing so, contribute to the defense of journalism around the world.
Governments must demand access to Gaza for international media. No media outside Gaza have been allowed independent access to the territory for more than two years, and reporting is often limited to visits escorted by the army, a level of restriction unprecedented in any conflict in recent years. Independent international access would allow journalists to corroborate the work of Gaza journalists, who bore the full responsibility – and danger – of documenting and reporting on the genocide for outside audiences, as well as being subject to Israeli smear campaigns aimed at discrediting any information originating from Gaza.
Means of justice must be intensified for those killed and illegally detained by Israel. It is clear that Israel has not been held accountable for decades, and before the current conflict, a report published by CPJ in May 2023 showed that 20 journalists had been killed by the Israeli army since 2001. No one was ever held accountable for these deaths: justice was never served.
The International Criminal Court’s ongoing investigation into Gaza technically includes examining the killings of journalists, but its mandate on Gaza is so broad and its resources so limited that it is unclear whether it will ever pursue war crimes against journalists. States must do more to advance justice, including through the use of universal jurisdiction, a legal principle that allows national courts to prosecute the most serious international crimes, regardless of where they were committed or the nationality of the perpetrator or victim.
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