#violence against journalists

[a-tiny-voice-against-war-crimes]

Journalism is so, so important. Criticize journalists or the news all you will, but their work is absolutely vital in making sure we don't carry on with our lives oblivious and uncaring as war and genocide destroy the lives of thousands globally. Restricting and carrying out violence against journalists is one of the starkest warning signs of a government's tyranny. The sacrifices of journalists MUST be remembered, and I honor all of the journalists, other media reporters, influencers and ordinary civilians who have risked or even sacrificed their lives to atrocities for what they are.

I’d just like to acknowledge that South Africa wouldn’t have such a strong case without the work of the journalists, both alive and martyred, on the ground in Gaza supplying the world with firsthand information about the genocide and that they deserve thanks for it.

[endimpunityday]

SESSION I: Safety of journalists in Conflicts: Risks, Protections, and the role of the international community.

Session I: International Day to End Impunity for Crimes Against Journalists 2024.

9:50 - 10:10 am.

Keynote Speaker: H.E. Ourveena Geereesha Topsy-Sonoo, ACHPR Special Rapporteur on Freedom of Expression and Access to information in Africa.

- Ms. May Al-Rahal, Member, National Safety Committee of Iraq

Ms. Zoe Titus, Chair, Global Forum for Media Development (GFMD), ED, Namibia Media Trust

- Mr. Andreas Papaconstantinou (TBC), Director of the Division for Neighborhood and Middle East – DG ECHO

[youthchronical]

'I shouldn't have left': Trump revisits 2020 election defeat, says he wouldn't mind if someone shot through 'fake news' to get him - Times of India

Former US President Donald Trump Former US President Donald Trump gave a speech on Sunday in Lititz, Pennsylvania, where he talked about violence against journalists and reporters being shot. In his remarks, Trump further cast doubt on the integrity of the election and revisited old grievances from his 2020 defeat, as reported by the Associated Press.In his address, Trump also questioned the…

[palms-upturned]

Israel says reporters working during Hamas attack ‘accomplices in crimes against humanity’

Nov 9th, 10:50 GMT

The Israeli prime minister’s office says it has sent a letter to the bureau chiefs of international media outlets demanding explanations over their use of pictures taken by journalists during Hamas’s attack on October 7.

“These journalists were accomplices in crimes against humanity; their actions were contrary to professional ethics,” read a statement by the office.

Similar remarks were made by Israel’s war cabinet minister Benny Gantz: “Journalists found to have known about the massacre, and still chose to stand as idle bystanders while children were slaughtered – are no different than terrorists and should be treated as such,” Gantz said on X.

On Wednesday, Israeli monitoring group Honest Reporting questioned why Gaza-based journalists working for The Associated Press and Reuters were present in the early hours of the October 7 attack.

On Thursday, Reuters denied any suggestion it had prior knowledge of the Hamas attack.

Meanwhile, the number of journalists and media workers killed since the start of the war stands at 39, according to the Committee to Protect Journalists: 34 Palestinian, four Israeli and one Lebanese.

Reuters denies suggestions it was aware of Hamas attack

Nov 9th, 12:00 GMT

Reuters has denied suggestions made by HonestReporting that it had prior knowledge of Hamas’s attack on October 7.

Here’s the statement from the news agency:

“We are aware of a report by HonestReporting and accusations made against two freelance photographers who contributed to Reuters coverage of the Oct. 7 attack.

“Reuters categorically denies that it had prior knowledge of the attack or that we embedded journalists with Hamas on Oct. 7.

“Reuters acquired photographs from two Gaza-based freelance photographers who were at the border on the morning of Oct. 7, with whom it did not have a prior relationship.

“The photographs published by Reuters were taken two hours after Hamas fired rockets across southern Israel and more than 45 minutes after Israel said gunmen had crossed the border.

“Reuters staff journalists were not on the ground at the locations referred to in the HonestReporting article.”

Palestinian journalist told to evacuate from Gaza City

Nov 9th, 12:10 GMT

Palestinian journalist and writer Mohammed Mhawish said he received a call at about 1:30pm (11:30 GMT) in Gaza City from an unknown source who identified themselves as an officer of the Israeli army.

During the call, Mhawish was given 20 minutes to evacuate his house with about 30 members of his family.

“I have received several pre-recorded calls from the military to evacuate,” Mhawish told Al Jazeera.

“They were all generally addressed to the residents of the north and the centre of the Gaza Strip to go south,” he said, adding: “But this time, the speaker, who sounded [like] a Hebrew native, said my full name. He sounded threatening.”

Mhawish, who has been reporting on the war for Al Jazeera from Gaza City, was “sure the call meant to scare and silence him”.

He added that the Israeli military officer warned him not to return to his house again at all, and said: “We are warning you that we are bombing the house.”

[cairamelcoffee]

Dr. Ghada Abu Eida, a doctor at the Indonesian Hospital in Gaza, was working in the ER department when rescue crews carried in her daughter on a stretcher. Dr. Ghada was saving people injured in the Israeli air strikes on Jabalia Camp, unaware that her daughter was also targeted.

via

[chaiaurchaandni]

israel bombs vicinity of indonesian hospital in Gaza

just wanted to point out how after the baptist hospital massacre that killed HUNDREDS of Palestinians at once, israel faced a lot of outrage all over the world - as a response, now israel has stopped directly bombing hospitals but it regularly bombs the vicinity of several hospitals, and sometimes the courtyards (where displaced Palestinians find shelter, and where ambulances are either about to head out to bombed areas or bringing survivors/injured from bombed areas). also, instead of bombing the entire hopsital, it now bombs only a floor occasionally, in order to not garner outrage and slowly normalise the bombing of hospitals, while also doing considerable damage and killing Palestinian civilians/medical staff. bec of israeli bombing, the only cancer hospital in Gaza is no longer operational. israel also bombed a top floor of a children's hospital, and bombed ambulances that it guaranteed to allow to pass through rafah crossing.

[fedtothenight]

x

[ardate]

.

[darkesttiimelines]

yall india's fascism and censorship is growing so fucking quickly its genuinely terrifying

[endimpunityday]

Violence against journalists, the integrity of elections, and the role of public leadership - Panel Discussions

The International Day to end Impunity against journalists 2023 seeks to raise awareness and sensitize public opinion and the international community on the main challenges faced by journalists and communicators in the exercise of their profession, and on the escalation of violence and repression against them, particularly in Latin America and the Caribbean, which to date is the region with the largest number of fatal attacks against journalists.

It also seeks to highlight and warn about attacks and restrictions on the press in the context of coverage of social protests; the activation of judicial mechanisms against journalists for reasons related to their journalistic work on matters of public interest; and the forced exile, which is increasingly one of the main options for dealing with repression in some countries in the region. These facts, as already mentioned, are inserted in a context of constant stigmatization and discrediting by public officials and leaders towards the press, so it is also intended to reflect on the role of these people, based on their public discourse and specific obligations. This edition of IDEI also wants to emphasize the situation of violence against journalists and media workers during election periods. In this sense, it seeks to reaffirm the commitments of the States and the responsibilities of the other actors involved to prevent and counteract the intolerance, discrimination and deliberate disinformation that permeates much of the debate in these contexts.

The objective is to give visibility to the role of a safe and free press in ensuring the integrity of elections and our democratic systems. Finally, the sessions will delve into the obligation of States to adopt effective measures to protect the independent press and strengthen institutional frameworks that combat violence and impunity, and promote media independence, sustainability and diversity.

[notyourtoday]

[thethief1996]

I can't stop thinking about the news out of Palestine. Israel is sieging al Shifa hospital. Videos of people's limbs being severed off are haunting (graphic video tw). The hospital has ran out of fuel and 39 babies in incubators are fending for their lives by themselves, because Israel has stationed snipers around the hospital and is shooting all medical crew that walks into their sight.

First, the narrative was Israel would never bomb hospitals. Now, the hospitals are Hamas bases. Then, we respect journalists. Now, we have a fucking kill list of journalists because they are Hamas collaborators. First, we are not letting fuel in until the hostages are released. Now, we are not accepting the hostages back because that would stop our ground invasion and let Hamas win. And I could go on about every single lie they're making up. If you look up "Hamas rape" on google, the first link leads to Times of Israel saying Israel has found no forensic evidence of sexual violence, and only one eyewitness testimony out of 3.5k people attending the rave. If you Google "Hamas beheaded babies" the top links say they have no evidence for the claim besides word of mouth from extremist soldiers. Israeli extremists think about the ugliest goriest scene they can make out in their sick heads, tell that to a international journalist and they run away with it like it's gospel.

And children are being killed in the name of these lies. Thousands are being displaced in images that remind me of the pictures of Tantura 75 years ago, with their hands up so the tanks don't shoot them. Amputees are leaving the hospitals in wheelchairs hours after their surgeries because they are being shot at. Elders who survived the Nakba on 48 are having to walk towards Southern Gaza on foot (imagine walking from one end of your city to the other on foot), displaced again. People are cheering for the haunting images of white phosphorus bombs being dropped over Gaza. Gazan workers who were arrested in the West Bank are being thrust back into the bombings wearing numbered labels.

This is not normal. We are seeing the early stages of the settler colonial genocide of an indigenous population. Native leaders who have visited Gaza say its refugee camps look eerily like reservations. We can stop this. For the first time we are able to see wide scale accounts from the hands of the people suffering the genocide, and Israel is so scared of it they have cut all communications in Gaza.

This is our litmus test. I think we have never seen more clearly, with Palestine, Armenia, Congo and Sudan how colonialism has made our world a rotten place to live in.

The South African apartheid collapsed due to boycotts. We have to do everything in our power to stop Israel's hegemony. Even talking to a group of friends about Palestine changes the status quo. There's no world where we can live peacefully if Israel accomplishes their goals.

Keep yourself updated and share Palestinian voices. Muna El-Kurd said every tweet is like a treasure to them, because their voices are repressed on social media and even on this very app. Make it your action item to share something about the Palestinian plight everyday. Here are some resources:

Al Jazeera, Anadolu Agency, Mondoweiss

Boycott Divest Sanction Movement

Palestinian Youth Movement is organizing protests and direct action against weapons factories across the US

Mohammed El-Kurd (twitter / instagram)

Muhammad Shehada (twitter)

Motaz Azaiza (instagram) - reporting directly from Gaza.

Hind Khudary - reporting directly from Gaza. Her husband and daughter moved South to run from the tanks but she stayed behind to record the genocide. The least we can do is not let her calls fall on deaf ears.

You can participate in boycotts wherever you are in the world, through BDS guidelines. Don't be overwhelmed by gigantic boycott lists. BDS explicitly targets only a few brands which have bigger impact. You can stop consuming from as many brands as you want, though, and by all means feel free to give a 1 star review to McDonalds, Papa John, Pizza Hut, Burger King and Starbucks. Right now, they are focusing on boycotting the following:

Carrefour, HP, Puma, Sabra, Sodastream, Ahava cosmetics, Israeli fruits and vegetables

Push for a cultural boycott - pressure your favorite artist to speak out on Palestine and cancel any upcoming performances on occupied territory (Lorde cancelled her gig in Israel because of this. It works.)

If you can, participate in direct action or donate.

Palestine Action works to shut down Israeli weapons factories in the UK and USA, and have successfully shut down one of their firms in London.Some of the activists are going on trial and are calling for mobilizing on court.

Palestinian Youth Movement is organizing direct actions to stop the shipping of wars to Israel. Follow them.

Educate yourself. Read into Palestinian history and the occupation. You can't common sense people out of decades of propaganda. If your arguments crumble when a zionist brings up the "disengagement of Gaza", you have to learn more.

Read Decolonize Palestine. They have 15 minute reads that concisely explain the occupation (and its colonial roots) and debunk popular myths, including pinkwashing.

Read on Palestine. Here's an amazing masterpost.

Verso Book Club is giving out free books on Palestine (I personally downloaded Ten Myths about Israel by Ilan Pappe. If you still believe in the two states solution, this book by an Israeli professor debunks it).

Call your representatives. The Labour Party in the UK had an emergency meeting after several councilors threatened to resign if they didn't condemn Israeli war crimes. Calling to show your complaints works, even more if you live in a country that funds genocide.

FOR PEOPLE IN THE USA: USCPR has developed this toolkit for calls, here's a document that autosends emails to your representatives and here's a toolkit by Ceasefire in Gaza NOW!

FOR PEOPLE IN EUROPE: Here's a toolkit by Voices in Europe for Peace targeting the European Parliament and one specific for almost all countries in Europe, including Germany, Ireland, Poland, Denmark, Sweden, Netherlands, Greece, Norway, Italy, Portugal, Spain, Finland, Austria, Belgium Romania and Ukraine

FOR PEOPLE IN THE UK: Friends of Al-Aqsa UK and Palestine Solidarity UK have made toolkits for calls and emails

FOR PEOPLE IN AUSTRALIA: Here's a toolkit by Stand With Palestine

FOR PEOPLE IN CANADA: Here's a toolkit by Indepent Jewish Voices for Canada

Join a protest. Here's a constantly updating list of protests:

Global calendar

Another global calendar (go to the instragram of the organizers to confirm your protest)

USA calendar

Australia calendar

Feel free to add more.

[girlfictions]

something i’ve been thinking about lately is like. growing up muslim right after 9/11 is something i’d never really reflected on much because it was all i’d ever known — at 5, my friend’s mum didn’t let her invite me to her birthday party because i was the only brown girl in our class, at 12, my classmates would joke about my family being part of isis, at 16, my dad was interrogated by american airport security for hours — and it always stung and it always hurt but it was just the way things were because the western world hated muslims. but i don’t think i’ve ever fully comprehended the extent to which we were hated until now.

palestine is being turned into a mass graveyard. every single day there are new photos of the atrocities being carried out against them and videos of them pleading for help and still those who can actually intervene turn a blind eye. israel is claiming to only be targeting hamas “terrorists” while bombing a refugee camp. israeli police raided and assaulted a non-zionist jewish neighbourhood. israeli soldiers are posting tiktoks of them torturing captured palestinians. this is not a complicated issue and it never has been. ethnic cleansing is being committed right in front of us. and yet the western world leaders refuse to call for a ceasefire.

and while zionist organisations accuse pro-palestine demonstrations of anti-semitism, while zionist celebrities insist that they’re afraid to leave their mansions in los angeles, a six year old muslim boy was stabbed to death and his mother wounded in the same attack in chicago. a muslim doctor was murdered while sitting outside her apartment complex in texas. hundreds of peaceful protesters have been arrested (many of whom have been jewish). despite what zionists want you to believe, this is not a jewish/muslim conflict. i have so much love and gratitude to my brave jewish brothers and sisters all over the world who are condemning israel for their actions.

ultimately, israel have been granted impunity by the west. they have slaughtered thousands upon thousands of innocent palestinians. they have bombed hospitals and schools indiscriminately. they have used white phosphorus, violating the geneva convention. they have completely eradicated nearly 900 bloodlines. how many more need to be wiped out? how many more children need to be buried underneath the rubble? how many more doctors need to be confronted with the bodies of their own family members? how many more journalists need to detail the horrific acts of violence they are witnessing? what more can be done to the palestinian people that has not been done already?

i truly believe that palestine will be free one day. i believe the palestinian people will receive the justice they finally deserve. but what breaks my heart is how much they have suffered and will continue to suffer before they are deemed worthy of help. and it would be to all of our detriment if we ignored how much of a factor palestine being a predominantly muslim state has played into the way the world has reacted to their genocide.

[fursasaida]

This article is from 2022, but it came up in the context of Palestine:

Here are some striking passages, relevant to all colonial aftermaths but certainly also to the forms we see Zionist reaction taking at the moment:

Over the decade I lived in South Africa, I became fascinated by this white minority [i.e. the whole white population post-apartheid as a minority in the country], particularly its members who considered themselves progressive. They reminded me of my liberal peers in America, who had an apparently self-assured enthusiasm about the coming of a so-called majority-minority nation. As with white South Africans who had celebrated the end of apartheid, their enthusiasm often belied, just beneath the surface, a striking degree of fear, bewilderment, disillusionment, and dread.

[...]

Yet these progressives’ response to the end of apartheid was ambivalent. Contemplating South Africa after apartheid, an Economist correspondent observed that “the lives of many whites exude sadness.” The phenomenon perplexed him. In so many ways, white life remained more or less untouched, or had even improved. Despite apartheid’s horrors—and the regime’s violence against those who worked to dismantle it—the ANC encouraged an attitude of forgiveness. It left statues of Afrikaner heroes standing and helped institute the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, which granted amnesty to some perpetrators of apartheid-era political crimes.

But as time wore on, even wealthy white South Africans began to radiate a degree of fear and frustration that did not match any simple economic analysis of their situation. A startling number of formerly anti-apartheid white people began to voice bitter criticisms of post-apartheid society. An Afrikaner poet who did prison time under apartheid for aiding the Black-liberation cause wrote an essay denouncing the new Black-led country as “a sewer of betrayed expectations and thievery, fear and unbridled greed.”

What accounted for this disillusionment? Many white South Africans told me that Black forgiveness felt like a slap on the face. By not acting toward you as you acted toward us, we’re showing you up, white South Africans seemed to hear. You’ll owe us a debt of gratitude forever.

The article goes on to discuss:

"Mau Mau anxiety," or the fear among whites of violent repercussions, and how this shows up in reported vs confirmed crime stats - possibly to the point of false memories of home invasion

A sense of irrelevance and alienation among this white population, leading to another anxiety: "do we still belong here?"

The sublimation of this anxiety into self-identification as a marginalized minority group, featuring such incredible statements as "I wanted to fight for Afrikaners, but I came to think of myself as a ‘liberal internationalist,’ not a white racist...I found such inspiration from the struggles of the Catalonians and the Basques. Even Tibet" and "[Martin Luther] King [Jr.] also fought for a people without much political representation … That’s why I consider him one of my most important forebears and heroes,” from a self-declared liberal environmentalist who also thinks Afrikaaners should take back government control because they are "naturally good" at governance

Some discussion of the dynamics underlying these reactions, particularly the fact that "admitting past sins seem[ed] to become harder even as they receded into history," and US parallels

And finally, in closing:

The Afrikaner journalist Rian Malan, who opposed apartheid, has written that, by most measures, its aftermath went better than almost any white person could have imagined. But, as with most white progressives, his experience of post-1994 South Africa has been complicated. [...]

He just couldn’t forgive Black people for forgiving him. Paradoxically, being left undisturbed served as an ever-present reminder of his guilt, of how wrongly he had treated his maid and other Black people under apartheid. “The Bible was right about a thing or two,” he wrote. “It is infinitely worse to receive than to give, especially if … the gift is mercy.”

[aeide-thea]

the thing about stele3's addition to this post is that i'm 100% with it until the final sentence—nonconsensual outing is heinous! and does, i agree, feel especially egregious coming from someone who's gay himself!—and then i start to have a serious problem with it.

like. 'traitor'? you really want to deploy the language of nationalism here, and connect moylan's actions (that, again, i too decry!) to legal charges that in the united states incur the death penalty? that's really how you want to play this? 'and should be treated as such'? if a conservative used this kind of ambiguous-but-suggestive language to paint a target on someone's back, we'd call it stochastic terrorism; it doesn't sound any better to me coming out of a liberal's mouth, and i'd like to suggest that it shouldn't sound better to you, either.

thinking about the whole "only queer ppl should play queer characters" thing and how Lee Pace got flack for playing a gay drag queen back in the day by his homophobic father. when he accepted the role he said "there was something about telling this story that was important to me" even before he was out / maybe even before he himself knew that he wasn't straight....like maybe we should stop demanding that actors either out themselves or give up roles that speak to them, even if he hadn't come out, the role meant something to him, it meant challenging his father's attitude, and fuck if it didn't have a profound impact on me as a young in-the-closet teen watching him perform it.