As Israel’s brutal onslaught entered its fourth month, Benjamin Netanyahu’s military has set some grim data when it comes to civilian demise toll, with greater than half of 23,000 useless being harmless girls and kids.
What is extra deplorable, it has tried to muzzle the voices reporting the fact on the bottom, by deliberate focusing on of journalists and members of the media.
Israel has positioned itself on the forefront of a disconcerting statistic, killing a minimum of one journalist every single day in its 94 days of battle.
According to the Gaza Media Office, a minimum of 109 journalists have been killed since Oct. 7, whereas a few of them have misplaced a number of members of the family to indiscriminate assaults.
The variety of media employees killed by Israel in roughly three months exceeds the whole depend of journalists killed all through all the six-year span (69) of World War II, in line with the Freedom Forum, a Washington-based basis advocating for press freedom.
In comparability to Gaza, through the 20-yearlong Vietnam War (1955-1975) 63 journalists had been killed whereas 17 media employees misplaced their lives within the three-year-long Korean War (1950-1953).
According to the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) based mostly in New York, within the battle between Russia and Ukraine that began in February 2022 and has been ongoing for about two years, a complete of 17 journalists have misplaced their lives.
In Gaza, nevertheless, the problem shouldn’t be solely homicide however how their instant households have additionally been focused by Israel.
Doha-based Al Jazeera’s veteran Gaza correspondent Wael al-Dahdouh, typically dubbed as a “mountain,” misplaced the fifth member of his household earlier Sunday after his son and one other journalist had been killed in an Israeli airstrike.
Al-Dahdouh’s spouse, two different kids and a grandson had died earlier within the battle.
However, he has continued to report on the combating between Israel and Hamas even because it has taken a devastating toll on his circle of relatives, changing into a logo for lots of the perils confronted by Palestinian journalists, dozens of whom have been killed whereas overlaying the battle.
Hamza al-Dahdouh, who was additionally working for Al Jazeera, and Mustafa Tharaya, a contract journalist, had been killed when a strike hit their automobile whereas they had been driving from Khan Younis to the southern city of Rafah, in line with the Gazan Media Office.
Despite the loss, Wael Al-Dahdouh, 53, has practically at all times appeared on air within the blue helmet and flak jacket worn to determine journalists within the Palestinian territories.
Speaking to Al Jazeera after his son’s burial, al-Dahdouh vowed to proceed reporting on the battle.
“The whole world must look at what is happening here in the Gaza Strip,” he stated. “What is happening is a great injustice to defenseless people, civilian people. It is also unfair for us as journalists.”
Earlier in December, a strike killed the daddy, mom and 20 different members of the family of one other Al Jazeera correspondent, Momen al Sharafi.
International issues
U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken on Sunday conveyed his condolences over the killing of Hamza al-Dahdouh, expressing he was “deeply, deeply sorry.”
“I am deeply, deeply sorry for the almost unimaginable loss suffered by your colleague, Wael Dahdouh. I am a parent myself, I can’t begin to imagine the horror that he has experienced, not once, but now twice,” Blinken informed a joint news convention with Qatari counterpart Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al-Thani in Doha.
Meanwhile, China stated Monday it was “deeply saddened” over the demise of Palestinian journalists, urging Israel to cease-fire “immediately.”
“We express our condolences to Al-Jazeera’s Gaza bureau chief Wael al-Dahdouh, who lost his son,” stated Mao Ning, spokeswoman of China’s Foreign Ministry.
Mao stated China urges “all parties concerned, especially Israel, to exercise restraint, effectively implement relevant U.N. resolutions, cease fire immediately and avoid further tragedy,” Mao stated.
Colombian President Gustavo Petro decried the killing of Hamza al-Dahdouh on Sunday.
“108 journalists have been murdered in the Gaza Strip by bombing in their homes,” Petro wrote on X.
“We are in shock,” Christophe Deloire of the media advocacy group Reporters Without Borders wrote Sunday on X, previously Twitter, calling the scenario a “never-ending slaughter.”
The Gazan press workplace has referred to as rights organizations to sentence the assault and to place strain on Israel to cease its assaults on the Palestinian folks.
Al Jazeera stated in a press release it “strongly condemns the Israeli occupation forces’ targeting of the Palestinian journalists’ car,” accusing Israel of “targeting” journalists and “violating the principles of freedom of the press.”
The TV community is working to file a authorized grievance with the International Criminal Court (ICC) following the Israeli “assassination” of its cameraman Samer Abu Daqqa final month.
Many worldwide authorized specialists have already stated that Israel’s actions in Gaza represent battle crimes or genocide, and nations akin to Türkiye and South Africa are working to deliver authorized instances to that impact in worldwide courts.
Source: www.dailysabah.com