Why Israel Targets Journalists in Gaza: Silencing the Witnesses of Truth

Why Israel Targets Journalists in Gaza: Silencing the Witnesses of Truth

By Mohd Azmi Abdul Hamid
President, MAPIM (Malaysian Consultative Council of Islamic Organizations)

19th Octber 2025

Introduction: Journalism as Resistance

In Gaza, journalism is not just a profession — it is an act of resistance. Amid relentless bombings, siege, and destruction, journalists have stood as the last line of truth. They are the world’s eyes inside a sealed territory, documenting what Israel tries hardest to conceal — the human cost of its occupation and military aggression.

Since the beginning of Israel’s war on Gaza in October 2023, over 200 journalists have been killed, most of them Palestinian. This staggering figure marks the deadliest period for journalists in modern history. These were not accidents of war. The pattern is too deliberate, too precise, and too consistent. Israel targets journalists in Gaza because they are witnesses — and eliminating witnesses is a fundamental tactic of impunity.

1. Controlling the Narrative – The First Battlefield

Modern warfare is not only fought with missiles; it is fought with information. Israel has mastered the politics of narrative control. From its founding in 1948, Israel’s survival has depended on constructing a moral image — that of a “defensive democracy” surrounded by hostile neighbours. Any exposure of its war crimes, ethnic cleansing, or apartheid policies threatens that narrative.

Journalists in Gaza — especially local Palestinian reporters — dismantle that façade daily. Their videos, photographs, and testimonies from bombed hospitals, refugee camps, and mass graves challenge the propaganda machine that portrays Israel as the victim.

Every image of a blood-stained child, every report of a family buried under rubble, erodes Israel’s global narrative. Hence, the logic of the occupier: silence the messenger to protect the myth.

2. The Camera as a Weapon of Truth

Israel sees the camera as more dangerous than the rifle. For decades, the Israeli military has imposed strict censorship on war coverage, expelled foreign correspondents, and bombed media offices — including those of Al Jazeera, Associated Press, Reuters, and Anadolu Agency.

When an occupying power monopolises the narrative, independent journalism becomes a weapon that pierces the illusion. Palestinian journalists are the only consistent witnesses documenting crimes in real time, often streaming live amid shelling. Their footage becomes undeniable evidence used by international human rights bodies and the International Criminal Court (ICC).

Destroying those cameras and killing their operators is not just about silencing today’s news — it is about erasing tomorrow’s history. By eliminating documentation, Israel aims to deny future accountability for genocide, displacement, and collective punishment.

3. The Systematic Strategy of Impunity

The killings of journalists in Gaza are not isolated tragedies; they are a systematic state policy. Every stage of Israel’s war machinery is designed to ensure no transparency and no witnesses.

Precision Strikes: Many journalists have been killed at home with their families, after their locations were clearly marked “PRESS.” This shows targeted intelligence-based assassination, not collateral damage.

Targeting Media Infrastructure: Press buildings, satellite towers, and news offices are bombed on the pretext of “terrorist use,” echoing Israel’s long-standing tactic of labeling every civilian space as a Hamas facility.

Threats and Harassment: Journalists’ social media accounts are suspended, their families intimidated, and their movement restricted. This extends Israel’s censorship beyond physical warfare to digital repression.

Such systematic elimination of journalists ensures Israel can continue its campaign of annihilation in darkness, without global outrage fueled by verified evidence.

4. Western Complicity and the Hypocrisy of ‘Press Freedom’

The silence of Western governments and major media outlets has emboldened Israel to continue this policy. The same Western powers that preach “press freedom” in their rhetoric are the very ones supplying Israel with the weapons and diplomatic cover to carry out these atrocities.

When Russia, China, or any other state restricts journalists, global outrage follows. But when Israel kills over 200 journalists, it is described as a “tragic consequence of conflict.” This double standard is not ignorance; it is a calculated complicity.

By refusing to hold Israel accountable, the U.S. and its allies have turned the notion of human rights into a political tool, not a universal principle. Their silence signals to Israel that journalists in Gaza are expendable — mere “collateral” to protect geopolitical interests.

5. Journalism in Gaza: The Frontline of Humanity

Palestinian journalists work under impossible conditions. They report while their own families are under fire, their homes destroyed, their colleagues buried. They lack flak jackets, fuel, electricity, and food — yet they continue to broadcast, photograph, and document.

Their courage is unmatched because they understand the moral weight of their mission. They are not just covering a war; they are defending the truth against extinction.

Every story they publish is an act of defiance against silence. Every image they capture is a shield against oblivion. In their hands, journalism becomes jihad — the striving for justice through truth.

As one journalist in Gaza said before his death:

“If we don’t tell the world what happens here, who will? And if we die doing it, at least the truth will outlive us.”

6. Israel’s Fear of Exposure

Israel’s greatest fear is not Hamas rockets — it is the world seeing Gaza’s reality without filters. The images of flattened neighbourhoods, hospitals turned to dust, and starving children reveal what the Zionist project truly is: a colonial enterprise sustained through ethnic cleansing and terror.

For decades, Israel has relied on Western media to frame its wars as “self-defence.” But the rise of independent journalists and citizen reporters in Gaza has shattered that monopoly. The raw footage from local journalists spreads across social media before Israel’s propaganda machine can spin its narrative.

Killing journalists is thus a countermeasure — a desperate attempt to blind the world and regain control over perception. It is the modern equivalent of burning libraries and silencing chroniclers during war.

7. The Global Media Front: Resistance Through Exposure

Despite the danger, global solidarity among journalists is growing. Al Jazeera, Middle East Eye, Anadolu, and others have refused to stay silent, continuing to expose Israel’s crimes and demanding justice for their slain colleagues.

The campaign #JournalistsUnderFire has become an emblem of truth under siege. Independent media collectives now collaborate to preserve digital evidence, counter disinformation, and ensure that every murdered journalist’s last footage remains archived for history and accountability.

MAPIM supports this global call to action. Journalism must be protected as a sacred trust of humanity — not a privilege granted by the powerful. The blood of Gaza’s journalists has made it clear: truth is not free speech; it is a battlefield.

8. The Moral Question: Who Speaks for the Dead?

When a journalist is killed in Gaza, the world loses more than a voice — it loses a bridge to conscience. Their deaths are meant to make the world deaf and blind. But every fallen journalist leaves behind a testimony more powerful than any bullet: their final broadcast, their last photograph, their unfinished report.

Israel may destroy the messenger, but it cannot destroy the message. The truth of Gaza continues to live in the hearts of millions who refuse to look away.

This is why MAPIM insists that the killing of journalists in Gaza is not only a war crime — it is a moral crime against humanity itself. It represents the deliberate attempt to erase truth, memory, and justice.

Conclusion: The Truth Will Outlive the Tyrant

Israel’s war against journalists is part of its broader war against truth. But no bomb can destroy what has already entered the moral consciousness of the world.

From the rubble of Gaza, the voices of journalists continue to echo. They tell the story of children under siege, of mothers carrying their dead, of doctors performing surgeries without light — stories that no propaganda can erase.

History will remember them not as victims but as the defenders of truth, who stood unarmed before a ruthless army and still refused to be silent. Their courage exposes the weakness of the oppressor: the fear of truth itself.

In the end, Israel may silence the journalists of Gaza — but it cannot silence Gaza’s truth.