Paris, Sept 2, (dpa/GNA) – More than 250 media outlets from more than 70 countries, blacked out their front pages and website homepages, and interrupted their broadcasts on Monday to protest the killing of journalists in the Gaza Strip.
Reporters without Borders, which organized the protest, said 220 journalists have been killed by the Israeli military in the Gaza Strip in less than two years.
“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 isn’t just a war against Gaza, it’s a war against journalism,” Reporters without Borders Director General Thibaut Bruttin said in a statement.
The Israeli military consistently emphasizes that its attacks only target the Palestinian Islamist group Hamas and other terrorist organizations, and that it is trying to spare civilians.
It has also repeatedly accused journalists in the Gaza Strip of belonging to Hamas or of being involved in the attack on Israel on October 7, 2023, which triggered the Gaza war.
After five journalists were among those killed in an attack last week, Israeli Chief of General Staff Eyal Zamir expressed regret over civilian casualties.
Bruttin said journalists in Gaza were being deliberately targeted, killed and defamed. “Without them, who will alert us to the famine? Who will expose war crimes? Who will show us the genocides?”
He said Palestinian journalists must be protected and should be taken in by other countries if they want to be evacuated from the Gaza Strip.
Reporters without Borders also demanded that foreign media be granted independent access to the Gaza Strip. Since the beginning of the war, Israel has only allowed foreign journalists to visit the embattled territory if they are “embedded” with the Israeli military.
Israel’s Foreign Ministry criticized the protest, which it said shows “the bias against Israel” in the global media.
“The reports we see in the global media regarding Gaza do not tell the real story there. They tell the campaign of lies that Hamas spreads.” the ministry said in a statement on X.
GNA