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A long and exhausting day in Gaza is drawing to a close. These journalists are tired and hungry. It's been several days since they've eaten. Some struggle not to faint. Others already have. Sometimes life on air. But they feel a responsibility to continue working. The six men in this tent have spent the day documenting the events on the ground. Ibrahim Jahir, Muhammad Noufel, and Mu'amin Aliva are cameramen.
Muhammad Khuraiki, Muhammad Al-Kahlout, and Anas Al-Sharif are reporters. In just a few minutes, they'll all be dead. The Israeli military claimed one of them was a terrorist. Since the Hamas attacks in October 2023, Israeli strikes have reportedly killed between 235 and 310 media workers. Journalists, cameramen, photographers, and producers. The exact numbers vary depending on the source. For journalists, this war is now considered the deadliest of the 21st century.
They've been killed in strikes on residential buildings and civilian infrastructure, and while working in areas that were attacked. And in some cases, the Israeli military has been accused of deliberately targeting them. The army rejects these claims as false. This is a story about Gaza in wartime, about the people reporting on this war, surviving and dying in what has been called the graveyard of journalism. For this investigation, we spoke with a number of journalists. Some appear in this video, others provided important background information. We also reached out to the Israel Defense Forces and Hamas for comment. The IDF responded with a written statement. As always, you'll find our sources in the
description. On October 7th, 2023, the Islamist militant group Hamas carried out a terrorist attack on Israel. 251 people were taken hostage and around 1,200 people were killed. Israel responded by launching a large-scale military operation against Hamas in Gaza. In October 2025, Hamas and the Israeli government agreed to a ceasefire. Since then, each side has repeatedly accused the other of violating the agreement. Up until the ceasefire, tens of thousands were killed in Gaza and many more injured. The exact tolls are hard to verify. Estimates range from figures reported by Gaza's health
ministry to even higher numbers in independent analyses. Since the beginning of the war, the Israeli government has restricted most international journalists from entering Gaza without supervision. We asked them why. The IDF says it regularly facilitates access for foreign journalists. However, few actually obtain this access. Those who do enter as embeds are escorted and monitored by Israeli soldiers. Supposedly, the arrangement is intended to ensure safe reporting. We asked the IDF what criteria journalists have to meet to qualify as embeds.
They didn't respond. To understand what it's like to travel as an embed, we spoke with German investigative journalist Frederik Obermaier. He co-founded the investigative outlet Paper Trail Media and played a key role in exposing the Panama Papers, the Pegasus Project, and the Swiss Secrets. Embedded reporters are also often told to submit their research and footage to the IDF before publication. We asked the IDF about this, too. They didn't respond.
Other German journalists have worked as embeds said the IDF didn't impose any concrete editorial restrictions. Either way, it's inevitable that conditions like a mandatory military escort shape journalists' perspective on what they witness in Gaza. So, with foreign reporting severely curtailed, Palestinian journalists are the most important source of information on the ground. But, press freedom in Gaza has long been seen as heavily restricted by Hamas. In its press freedom index, the NGO Reporters Without Borders ranks Palestine 163 out of 180. Private and independent stations like Watan TV and Ajyal Radio exist. But, several media outlets have close ties to political groups. For example, Palestine TV is affiliated with the Fatah party.
The Shehab News Agency and Al-Aqsa Media Network are closely linked to Hamas. Hamas reportedly pressures outlets to adopt the party line on policy, repressing critical voices. Reporting from Gaza is extremely difficult. Sometimes, it's flat-out impossible. When the war began, only very limited insight on what was really happening in Gaza was available to the outside world. And even that didn't last long. This video doesn't have a sponsor, and that reflects a fundamental tension on this platform. The most important stories don't always get the most views, and advertisers often shy away from them. But, that will never stop us from
covering topics like this one. And we're building something new to make sure we can do more reporting like this, to build a firmer community around this channel, and to be less dependent on AdSense and advertisers. It's called Roots, and it starts with a newsletter. It'll feature a couple of stories every other week for now about things you've never heard of, things you've always wondered about, supported by high-quality graphics. We might also share some behind-the-scenes, and of course, we'll keep you posted on what Roots will become. You will be the first to know, the first to test, and you can give us feedback. The newsletter is totally free, and it won't have any ads ever. I hope a lot of you will join us.
If you enjoy what we do, you'll love this. Oh, and because you're early, there's a little gift waiting for you when you sign up. A printable freebie monitor for your desk or shelf. A link is in the description. This camera belongs to the French news agency AFP. It's mounted on a balcony on the 10th floor of [__] Tower, giving it a sweeping view of Gaza City. It's unmanned and broadcasting a 24/7 live feed that offers rare glimpses into an area almost completely cut off from the outside world.
Just a few hundred meters away is Al-Ghafari Tower, one of the tallest buildings in Gaza. Several media outlets have their offices there. Some Palestinian journalists even sleep there. About an hour ago, a missile struck the tower, leaving one journalist severely injured. The camera captured it all. Meanwhile, the AFP's own office is located a few floors above the camera. Eight employees usually work here, but the IDF ordered them to evacuate to southern Gaza weeks ago.
Around noon, [__] Tower is rocked by four explosions. At least two ammunitions scoring direct hits on the 11th floor. The camera below captures the exact moment one severely damages AFP's server room. Miraculously, the camera stays intact. But just a few days later, its live feed stops. There's no one left to reboot the transmission system. Reporting will later suggest the AFP's offices were hit by Israeli tanks, and that it may have been a targeted attack. The IDF denies the allegation. It claims a strike it carried out nearby might have caused debris.
According to the Palestinian Journalists Syndicate, at least 70 media facilities in Gaza have been partially or completely destroyed by the Israeli military. That includes TV and radio stations, news agencies, and journalism schools. We asked the IDF to comment. They told us that if we were able to provide the exact coordinate and date of each strike, each case could be addressed individually. Either way, journalists in Gaza have few places left to work. Some eventually decide to leave, but others stay trying to keep reporting.
Electricity is scarce, internet service is frequently interrupted, and sometimes stays down for days. Journalists can barely publish articles or upload footage. Many are forced to relocate to emergency shelters near hospitals and charge their equipment using hospital generators. Many live in specially marked tents, but that doesn't mean they're safe. The Israeli military is accused of deliberate, systematic attempts to obstruct and even prevent reporting from Gaza. Oh my god. The allegations are supported by reports from Reporters Without Borders, the Committee to Protect Journalists, the UN, and a joint investigation by several media outlets. We can't conclusively determine the truth of these accusations.
Most of the information comes directly from affected journalists and international observers. This is Youma al-Sayed. She has been working as a journalist for 8 years, reporting for international news outlets like TRT World, CNA, and the AP. Currently, she works for Al Jazeera English. One day, her husband receives an anonymous phone call. The caller claims to be with the Israeli military. He tells the family to leave their home immediately, or their lives will be in danger. In Gaza, evacuation orders are typically delivered via pre-recorded voice messages. And Assayd will later say no other family in the apartment block received the same call.
All this convinces her this call wasn't a warning. It was a threat. One directed at her, a journalist. She assumes the call went to her husband because she recently changed her SIM card, and the army didn't have her new phone number. Other journalists in Gaza also reported receiving threatening calls or text messages from the IDF. Among them, Anas Al-Sharif, the reporter who will die in that tent. Some were explicitly told they were risking their lives if they refused to stop reporting or leave Gaza. The IDF denies these accounts, writing, "The claim that the IDF directly contacts journalists to urge them to leave the Gaza Strip or to cease their
reporting is entirely false and unfounded." We also asked about two specific cases. No response was provided. So, the IDF might be threatening journalists and their families. But reportedly, that's not all. It's October 13th, 2025. These three men are being released from detention as part of the ceasefire. Alaa al-Saraj is a cameraman with the Palestinian news agency Alrai. Ahmad Zakaria Bader al-Frangi is the director of the independent online news website Watan. And Shadi Abu Zaidu is a journalist for the TV channel Palestine Today. According to Reporters Without Borders, all three were held for more than a year without formal charges. Al-Saraj spent more than 22 months in detention.
Al-Frangi and Zaidu each spent a year and a half in Israeli jails. The report also claims Israel never specified why the men were detained. The IDF didn't respond to our questions about these specific cases. Reportedly, many journalists arrested by Israeli forces are held in so-called administrative detention. That allows for them to be detained indefinitely without formal charges. Others are detained for social media posts accused of incitement. According to the UN, such statements should fall under protected speech.
The IDF rejects the claim that it detains journalists because of their profession, calling it completely baseless. Supposedly, individuals were only detained and questioned if they were suspected of involvement in terrorist activity. Everyone else was released. As of April 2026, 29 Palestinian journalists were reportedly being held in Israeli prisons. 16 were arrested in Gaza and the West Bank between 2023 and 2025. 27 are reportedly being detained arbitrarily. Le Monde reports at least 140 arrests in the West Bank alone since October 7.
According to the Committee to Protect Journalists, Israel now ranks third in the world in the number of journalists it currently imprisons. Directly behind China and Myanmar. Former detainees released from Israeli prisons report cases of supposed torture, sexual violence, humiliation, and beatings. The IDF rejects allegations of systematic abuse and states that any suspected illegal treatment would be investigated by the relevant authorities.
Multiple organizations suspect that by detaining journalists, the IDF may be attempting to silence them. Media researcher Mohammad Waseem Ammar offers yet another interpretation. This tactic removes reporters from the field and serves as powerful deterrent to other journalists. But apparently, journalists in Gaza weren't just intimidated or detained. Some were killed. But before we look at these deaths, there's another, often overlooked, way journalists in Gaza are allegedly targeted by Israel.
Mahmoud Salama is a correspondent for the Jordanian channel Al Khat TV. Right now, he's covering a bombing in northern Gaza. Shortly after, he decides to help by transporting a family in his car. He films the scene and posts the video on social media. The same day, a pro-Israel account on X accuses him of having staged the footage. It claims the children in his video resemble children in another clip showing food distribution. The European Broadcasting Union runs a collaborative global fact-checking project called Spotlight. Their experts compared both clips and concluded that the allegations were unfounded. Salama also denied having manipulated the video.
According to Reporters Without Borders, accusations like these are common. Palestinian journalists are frequently accused of fabricating footage and staging scenes from their lives and work in Gaza. In one instance, official Israeli social media accounts accused AFP photographer Muhammad Abed of using a doll to stage a photo of a dead child. Abed denied it, and fact-checkers at AFP and other outlets found no evidence to support the claim. A journalist with Al Jazeera and Turkish news agency Anadolu faced similar allegations. Reportedly, an IDF officer accused Muhammad Abu Alloof of staging the rescue of a little girl during a fire.
Reporters Without Borders suspects Israeli officials may be trying to deliberately discredit Palestinian journalists. Both Addendum Investigative Research Outlet Correctiv say that labels like Gaza Wood and Pallywood are used systematically to suggest fabrication. They suspect it may be part of a broader smear campaign aimed at discrediting Palestinian media workers and their efforts to report from Gaza. The X account Gaza Wood claims to expose misinformation about the war, but the Israeli NGO Fake Reporter analyzed more than 700 of its so-called debunks. They concluded that only 42 of them were accurate. Most of Gaza's supposed debunkings were either false or
misleading. Israeli representatives have even attempted to discredit international journalists. In December 2025, they accused German correspondent Sophie von der Tann of biased reporting. IDF reserve spokesman Ari Shalikhar called her the face of modern German anti-semitism and anti-Israel sentiment. Many media professionals and organizations have since expressed their solidarity with von der Tann. Some of them backed her in an open letter rejecting the accusations made against her as an attempt to damage her reputation and undermine critical journalism.
The IDF and the Israeli government didn't respond to our request for comment on this matter. The most serious accusation directed against Palestinian journalists is that they're secretly Hamas terrorists. At times, the IDF has made these accusations without backing up with convincing evidence. But in Gaza, a terrorist label can have severe consequences. According to the Guardian, the designation is in effect a death sentence. Several organizations accused the Israeli military of deliberately killing journalists. The IDF has refuted this allegation in at least two separate statements.
Estimates of the number of journalists who may have been targeted vary. The Gaza project identifies at least 18. Reporters Without Borders puts the number at 56. The IDF admits that journalists may be harmed during air strikes or operational activity against military targets. The military also states it is internally investigating dozens of cases, but only specifies very few. The results of these internal investigations are often kept secret. One exception is the case of Al Jazeera journalist Shireen Abu Akleh. In 2022, she was killed while covering events in the West Bank.
A few months later, the IDF publicly declared it could not conclusively determine where the shot came from, but there was, quote, a high possibility that Ms. Abu Akleh was accidentally hit by IDF gunfire. Experts suspect that this was a targeted attack. Akleh was reportedly wearing a blue press vest that clearly identified her as a journalist and did not pose an immediate threat. Sadly, her death is no exception. In January 2024, Al Jazeera cameraman Hamza Al-Dahdouh was on his way to his next assignment when his car was hit by an Israeli airstrike. Six months later, journalists Ismail Abu and Rami Al-Rifi were also killed in an IDF airstrike.
Both were sitting in a car that was clearly marked as a press vehicle. The CPJ accuses the Israeli military of having deliberately targeted all three men. The IDF claims that Ismail Abu was a terrorist. As evidence, it attached a WhatsApp screenshot showing Abu's photo next to a table in Arabic. The quality of the image was too poor to examine it more closely. We followed up, but didn't get a more high-res image. In early 2025, the IDF killed Al Jazeera correspondent Hassan Shabat. And again, the military is accused of deliberately targeting a journalist. Just like in the case of Anas Al-Sharif. Anas Al-Sharif was born on December 3, 1996 in Gaza's Jabalia refugee camp. The camp was established by the UN
in 1948 to accommodate Palestinians displaced during the founding of Israel. And it's where Al-Sharif will grow up. In December 2008, Israeli forces launched a large-scale military operation against Palestinian militant groups like Hamas. Al-Sharif was 12 years old at the time. The attacks lasted only 3 weeks, but they devastated large parts of the Gaza Strip. During the conflict, Al Jazeera journalists covered the events on the ground. One day, one of them stood directly in front of young Anas Al Sharif. Years later, Al Sharif will post an image of that very moment on X. Before the war, Al Sharif repeatedly
shared statements posted by Hamas. He used green heart emojis to react to anti-Israel messages, shared photos with senior Hamas officials, and received members of the group's political bureau in his home. In 2021, Al Sharif quoted a slogan from the Hamas charter on Telegram. "From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free." The phrase refers to the entire territory between the Jordan River in the east and the Mediterranean Sea in the west that covers Israel, Gaza, and the West Bank. The slogan is controversial. Some see it as anti-Semitic because it can be interpreted as a call to destroy and wipe out Israel. During the Hamas attack on October 7, 2023, Al Sharif posted this on Telegram.
"9 hours in and the heroes are still roaming the country, killing and capturing. God, God, how great you are." He later deleted the post, but it can still be found in web archives. Al Sharif apparently approved and glorified the horrible crimes committed by Hamas on October 7, at least in the conflict's early stages. In December 2023, Al Sharif starts working for Al Jazeera. For almost 2 years, he reports daily on the events in Gaza. According to him, he does so despite being repeatedly threatened and even tracked by the Israeli military. Al Sharif refuses to leave Gaza or stop reporting.
The same month he started working for Al Jazeera, his family home in Jabalia was hit by an Israeli airstrike. His father got killed. It cannot be conclusively determined if the attack was directly connected to his work. Al Sharif believed that it was. Around the same time, Al Sharif becomes a symbol of hope for many people in Gaza. When he breaks down in tears during a live broadcast, someone off camera shouts, "Keep going, Anas. You are our voice." At one point during this time, he reportedly criticizes the Hamas negotiating team. In a post on X from October 2024, the Israeli military accuses Al Shariff of being a Hamas member.
The allegations against Al Shariff have been repeatedly rejected by his employer Al Jazeera, by international journalist organizations, and by the UN. On X, he wrote, "I, Anas Al Shariff, am a journalist with no political affiliations. My only mission is to report the truth from the ground as it is, without bias. At a time when a deadly famine is ravaging Gaza, speaking the truth has become, in the eyes of the occupation, a threat." The statement will not be enough to save his life. An Israeli drone hovers almost silently over the ruins of Gaza. It's equipped with sensors, a radio receiver, an autopilot, and a guidance computer.
It also carries a guided missile, a weapon that can change its flight trajectory post-launch to correct for targeting errors and increase precision. The drone's onboard sensors scan the environment, detecting heat, movement, and silhouettes. Then the drone identifies its target, a tent near Al Shifa Hospital. Its technology is advanced enough to pick up details smaller than the size of a thumb. So, in theory, it's possible that it can read what's written on the roof of the tent.
Al Shariff and his colleagues are killed instantly. Eight other people are reportedly injured in the strike. Following Al Shariff's death, the IDF publishes a post on X, "Struck Hamas terrorist Anas Al Shariff, who posed as an Al Jazeera journalist. A press badge isn't a shield for terrorism. The military justifies the attack saying he led a Hamas terrorist cell and advanced rocket attacks against Israeli civilians and IDF troops. The IDF also produces alleged evidence, documents it claims to have recovered during ground operations in Gaza. According to these documents, al-Sharif injured his left eye and ear in an explosion during military training. He is said to have
enlisted to Hamas at age 17 in 2013 and to have been paid a salary of about $200. We talked to a professional fact-checker who confirmed that the documents were translated correctly. But she also noted that their evidential value was difficult to assess without proper context. For example, it's unclear whether the list contains only Hamas members or also civilians. It's also unclear what exactly they were used for. According to media reports and other sources, there's currently no conclusive evidence that al-Sharif was actually the head of a terror cell or that he may have held any operational role within Hamas.
What we do know is that al-Sharif was a journalist. He could be visibly recognized as press. And according to international humanitarian law, journalists shall be considered as civilians as long as they do not engage in armed hostilities. Targeting them intentionally is illegal and may constitute a war crime. The same applies to the other five men killed. So far, the IDF has not accused them of being actively involved in hostilities or presented relevant evidence. The IDF states that it only targets legitimate military objectives. It claims to be consistently implementing all feasible measures to minimize harm to civilians, including journalists.
Everything else would contradict the IDF's values, orders, and operational practices. In the conflict between Israel and Hamas, both sides are trying to gain power by controlling the narrative. Both parties are treating the media as an extension of the battlefield, and each side is pursuing its own goals. According to a neoconservative think tank, Hamas' media strategy aims to undermine Israel's legitimacy by distributing images of destruction and humanitarian catastrophe in Gaza. Hamas is allegedly seeking to generate international outrage over Israel's actions and to mobilize support in other Arabic countries. At the same time, Hamas presents itself as a victim of the Israeli attacks, often without
accounting for the fact that the war was triggered by its own assault on October 7. We can't conclusively determine if and to what extent Hamas is controlling the images and reports coming out of Gaza. Our request for comment went unanswered. Israel, on the other hand, has been trying to legitimize its actions in Gaza since October 7 and to secure both domestic and international support. Israel's media strategy keeps emphasizing that the IDF only targets military objectives. Those who criticize the army's actions are often accused of anti-Semitism or of missing the point. At the same time, Israel's foreign ministry reportedly spent up to 7.1
million dollars on advertisement campaigns in October 2023 alone. According to American news magazine Foreign Policy, the ministry's goal was to frame Palestinian supporters as being complicit in Hamas' crimes. An Israeli government document revealed that between June and August 2025, Israel spent at least 49 million dollars on ad campaigns across platforms like YouTube and X. A report suggests this was part of Israel's broader strategy to promote the country's image abroad. Multiple media outlets report that Israel's foreign ministry plans to increase its budget for public diplomacy in 2026.
Another report suggests Israel has repeatedly put pressure on social media platforms. Meta appears to have subsequently removed large amounts of pro-Palestinian content, often labeling it as promoting terrorism. Human Rights Watch documented 1,050 takedowns by Meta in October and November 2023 alone. In the end, it will be up to the courts to determine which side committed which crimes in this war. And to do so, they will have to rely on evidence. Evidence that is often gathered by journalists. But when journalists are detained, discredited, or pressured, they lose their ability to follow and document military actions altogether. And when they're killed, the world loses eyewitnesses and voices.
So, what happens to journalists in Gaza is more than an attack on press freedom. It's an attack on our right to be informed and our right to form an adequate image of reality.
