In a painful scene that sums up the tragedy of journalists in Gaza, Tel Aviv Tribune correspondent Muhammad Qariqa narrates how he found his mother a martyr outside Al-Shifa Hospital 14 days after losing contact with her.
“I found her sleeping as if she was waiting for someone to wake her up,” Quraqi’ says, adding that his mother was executed by an Israeli soldier’s bullets while she was sleeping, in stark evidence of the targeting of journalists’ families.
According to episode 10-28-2024 of the “The Story Has the Rest” program, which can be followed on the “Tel Aviv Tribune 360” platform, the incident of the martyrdom of Qariqi’s mother was not isolated, but rather falls within a clear pattern of systematic targeting of journalists and their families.
Since the beginning of the war on the Gaza Strip on October 7, 2023, 180 journalists have been martyred, the highest number of journalists in any conflict in modern history, exceeding the number of journalists who died in World War II and the Vietnam War combined.
The program devoted a paragraph to talk about the methods of the occupation targeting journalists, according to reports from the Palestinian Journalists Syndicate, which varied between 3 main methods: direct targeting by bombing and bullets, threats and blackmail, including threatening their families, in addition to physical assault and persecution.
Direct targeting
Tel Aviv Tribune correspondent Ismail Abu Omar – who lost his leg in an Israeli bombing – narrated to the camera the details of his direct targeting, and said, “I was wearing a press jacket, and the targeting was deliberate from a drone in a completely empty area.”
International investigations confirmed Abu Omar’s account of the deliberate targeting, as an investigation by the “Forbidden Stories” Union published in June 2024 revealed that at least 18 media crews in Gaza were targeted by strikes directed by drones, and the investigation indicated that the Israeli drones enable their operators to See the press jackets very clearly.
Despite the risks, journalists in Gaza continue their work, and this is what content creator Bisan Odeh said, who stressed that “the Palestinian story is right, and no attempt to cover it will succeed, and we document to guarantee people’s right to be heard and seen.”
War crimes
At the international level, the program pointed out that there are calls for international action, represented by the lawsuits filed by Reporters Without Borders before the International Criminal Court, accusing the occupation army of deliberately targeting journalists, stressing that the systematic targeting of journalists amounts to war crimes that require international accountability.
Qariqa confirmed that targeting journalists comes as part of a systematic Israeli attempt to prevent the true picture from emerging from the Gaza Strip. He said, “We are in a real battle over the narrative. The occupation is trying to obscure the truth, but we continue to document despite everything.”
Journalists describe their working conditions as the most difficult in the history of covering conflicts. “We work under constant bombardment, in the absence of the basic necessities of life, such as food, water, and electricity,” Quraiqa says, adding that journalists face great psychological challenges as a result of documenting daily massacres.
Despite the tragedies, Qariqa confirms that they derive their strength from the people themselves. He says, “People ask us to document, they push us to continue. Even the victims and their families insist on documenting their suffering.”
The battle of truth
The program confirms that the targeting of journalists was not limited to Gaza alone. Rather, reports indicate that Israel killed 46 journalists between 2000 and 2020, with 652 different cases of targeting, the most prominent of which was the assassination of Tel Aviv Tribune correspondent Sherine Abu Aqla in May 2022.
For his part, Abu Omar addressed the international community to take urgent action to protect them, saying, “We are performing our professional duty to document the truth, and there must be international protection for journalists.”
Despite the risks, the journalists hosted by the program confirm that they are continuing their work. Bisan Odeh says, “Gaza is the last test for humanity. If Gaza falls, the world falls, and what Gaza is doing now is giving the world a new opportunity every day to reconsider its values and ethics.”
The journalists emphasized that their battle is not just reporting news, but rather a battle for truth and justice. “We are documenting for future generations, so that the world knows what happened in Gaza,” says Muhammad Qureiqa, stressing that the ultimate goal is accountability and justice for the victims.