November 11, 2025 • 37 mins
How do journalists report on war when they’re denied access?
“For the first time I think since the Second World War, Israel has not allowed foreign journalists to come into Gaza. This is unprecedented,” says Israeli journalist Meron Rapoport.
Palestinian journalists, who live in Gaza, have paid a terrible price for their reporting.
“Gaza has been a horror story. The Committee to Protect Journalists estimates that around 200 Palestinian journalists have been killed in the past two years,” says Nick Cumming-Bruce, contributor for the New York Times.
Many appear to have been deliberately targeted.
Irene Khan, UN Special Rapporteur on freedom of expression and opinion, says: “I’ve been told by journalists that wearing a jacket marked ‘press’ doesn’t protect you. It actually makes you a target. That is just unacceptable."
Aid agencies travel to Gaza – they, too, report on what they see.
“We’ve reported on a war on children, a famine and a polio outbreak. Always, always, and only with data and testimonials,” says James Elder from the UN children’s charity Unicef.
But often their evidence has been dismissed.
“There is no famine in the Gaza Strip. It is simply not true,” said Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Saar.
Should journalists have pushed harder for access?
“International media should have told Israel, ‘We won’t accept any comments from the Israeli government unless you allow us access,’” adds Rapoport.
Join host Imogen Foulkes for a fascinating discussion.
Get in touch!
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Host: Imogen Foulkes
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
SPEAKER_02 (00:07):
This is Inside Geneva.
I'm your host, Imogen Folkes,and this is a production from
SwissInfo, the internationalpublic media company of
Switzerland.
In today's programme.
SPEAKER_05 (00:20):
Every bit of news which comes out of Hamas of Gaza
is controlled by the terroristorganization.
But international journalistsare not allowed into Gaza, are
they?
Why not?
SPEAKER_08 (00:30):
For the first time, I think, since World War II,
Israel did not allow foreignjournalists to come in to Gaza.
This is unprecedented.
SPEAKER_02 (00:40):
Two years of this conflict, there's really been no
access for international media.
SPEAKER_03 (00:47):
Sad breaking news.
SPEAKER_07 (00:54):
Gaza has been a horror story.
The Committee to ProtectJournalists estimates around 200
Palestinian journalists killedin the last two years.
What we need is accountabilitywhere these abuses occur, and
that has been conspicuouslylacking.
SPEAKER_06 (01:09):
Be in no doubt that this is irrefutable testimony.
It is a famine.
The Gaza famine.
SPEAKER_00 (01:17):
There is no famine in Gaza Strip.
It is simply not true.
SPEAKER_09 (01:22):
We SC UN, specifically WHO, we have a role
to inform.
We've been informing from thestart.
We inform on health and weinform as factual as possible.
SPEAKER_04 (01:33):
Now in that time, we've reported on a war on
children, a famine, and a poliooutbreak.
Always, always and only withdata and testimonials.
SPEAKER_01 (01:43):
Israel can't have it both ways.
All Israel has to do is to allowinternational media in and let
international media see what isactually happening.
And I have said that quiteopenly.
This is a cover-up of genocide.
SPEAKER_08 (01:55):
I would suggest that international media should have
told Israel that we will nottake any comment from Israeli
government unless you let us goin.
SPEAKER_02 (02:14):
And today we're going to take a long and
slightly soul-searching look atthe challenges and the risks of
reporting on conflict.
We'll be hearing fromjournalists, UN aid agencies,
and press freedom analyststhroughout today's episode.
They'll bring us theirperspectives on those
challenges.
(02:34):
And listening with me here inthe studio, I've got New York
Times contributor Nick CummingBruce.
It's good to have you hereagain, Nick.
SPEAKER_07 (02:41):
Yeah, hello, Imogen.
SPEAKER_02 (02:42):
Now, our jobs at the moment are here in tranquil
Geneva.
But what some of our listenersmight not know is that to report
here from the UN in Geneva, it'salmost a prerequisite to have
spent some time reporting onwars, reporting from conflict
zones.
I know I have, I know you have,Nick.
(03:05):
Let's each of us tell ourlisteners something that stands
out.
SPEAKER_07 (03:09):
Well, I I think one of the first experiences of
violent conflict I ever had wasin Iran at the time of the
revolution.
Um and one of my firstexperiences, in fact, was
watching rioters scaling thewall and ransacking the British
Embassy in Tehran.
And while the event wasself-evident in one sense, you
(03:30):
could see it actually unfoldingin front of you, it kind of also
demonstrated the challenges ofreporting in conflicts.
It begged the question of whoexactly was doing it and why uh
was it spontaneous.
Was it a spontaneous outburst ofcrowd anger or carefully
planned?
And this is one of thechallenges.
Initial focus of diplomats andjournalists in that revolution
(03:51):
was largely on the sort of theliberal-minded lawyers and
critics of the Shah who hadopposed him in the early years
and who were soon swept asideand later brutally purged by the
forces of loyal to AyatollahKhomeini, who were in fact the
people really driving therevolution, but who were not
(04:12):
initially perceived to be doingso.
SPEAKER_02 (04:14):
That's really interesting, and I think there
is this phrase, isn't it, thefog of war, which kind of means
that you can you can see what'sin front of you.
You can't necessarily assessexactly what the big picture is,
what's really going on.
I've got my own anecdote.
I've been in a few conflictzones, but this is one, one of
(04:36):
the first ones I went to thatstands out for me.
I went to Macedonia when the warin Kosovo was starting.
NATO had started its bombing ofSerbia.
It hadn't started the uh groundinvasion.
And I went from the airport inSkopje Street to an empty,
(05:00):
echoing hotel ballroom and aFrench colonel with epaulettes
and a big map and one of thoselong pointers.
And he sat us all down andshowed us, you know, it was
like, you know, tanks on a map.
We are here, here, here, andhere.
And I was sitting therethinking, I want to get I need
(05:20):
to get out of here.
This is not what I came here forto sit in an echoey ballroom
looking at a map.
And so eventually I escaped,hitched a ride with a couple of
other journalists, and we wentto the border, and this was at
the moment when the real ethniccleansing, the push by Serbia of
(05:41):
Kosovars out of Kosovo washappening.
And I d I won't ever forget thatboiling hot sun, tens of
thousands of people, mostlywomen and children, sitting on
trucks and in unventilatedbuses.
They'd lost everything and theywere waiting just to get to a
bit of safety.
(06:01):
And that's when I thought this,if I am going to report on
conflict, it's this.
I want to talk to real peoplewho are really affected and not
sit in an empty ballroom with aFrench colonel and a map and a
long, a long pointer.
But the fact is, sometimes toget into a conflict to report on
(06:22):
it, you do have to, you do haveto spend a bit of time with the
colonel and his maps and hispointer.
What I would say, though,listeners, and I'm sure you're
expecting it, this program isgoing to focus on one particular
conflict, and that is thecurrent conflict, Israel-Gaza.
(06:43):
Because Nick, I think we wouldsay that the media has faced
unprecedented challengesreporting on this war.
SPEAKER_07 (06:52):
Well, yes, it's completely different in one very
essential sense, and that isthat media have always had
access to wars and conflicts,often facing extreme peril, um,
exemplified by the career ofsomeone like Marie Colvin of the
Sunday Times, who reported warsin Balkans, Iraq, and Sri Lanka,
and ultimately she paid with herlife after getting smuggled into
(07:14):
Syria.
But journalists found ways toget in.
Um but in this conflict, Israelhas essentially hermetically
sealed Gaza from access byinternational journalists.
It's denied that access, citingthe dangers that would face
reporters on the ground, whichis a rather brutal irony given
the Israeli military's record ofkilling journalists, and that
(07:38):
only kind of really fuelssuspicion that they were
imposing that kind of banbecause they wanted to prevent
any kind of scrutiny of theirconduct of hostilities on the
ground.
SPEAKER_02 (07:49):
I think it's the case.
I mean, many don't want us todraw that conclusion, but it's
hard to come up with anotherwhen you think that two years of
this conflict, there's reallybeen no access for international
media.
And even since the ceasefire,which is what, three weeks in
now, there's been one verysmall, very limited, organized
(08:14):
trip for the internationalmedia, accompanied at all times
by the Israeli defense forcejust inside the edge of Gaza.
So one trip in two years.
Now, I did say we were going tohear from other journalists and
aid agencies and so onthroughout this podcast.
(08:37):
And in fact, as I was preparingthis episode, the Israeli
journalist Meron Rappaport wasin Geneva.
Now, listeners not familiar withhis work, take a look at the
magazine plus 972 because it hashonest, heartfelt, but yeah,
critical coverage of the conductof the war in Gaza.
(09:00):
Now, Meron was in town to give atalk at the Graduate Institute
on the challenges, risks, andactually, as he said it, Nick,
the failures of the media inthis war.
And I was lucky enough to beable to sit down with him for an
interview, and the first thinghe really wanted to stress was
the number of Palestinianjournalists, because they have
(09:20):
been able to report on Gazabecause they lived there, the
number of them killed over thelast two years.
SPEAKER_08 (09:27):
This is unprecedented.
Certainly since World War II,and maybe even World War II,
there were not such hugenumbers, and if you take into
consideration that thepopulation Gaza is not that
huge, and the number ofjournalists there is not that
huge, this is really a hugenumber.
(09:48):
We have also, for the firsttime, I think, since World War
II, uh Israel did not allowforeign journalists to come in
to Gaza.
Uh, this is unprecedented, nointernational journalist media
allowed by Israel to come in, souh we depended totally.
(10:09):
The only information we got isfrom Palestinian journalists who
were very limited in theirability to move, and uh as so
many of them were killed.
So uh this is I think a big, bigfailure.
I would suggest thatinternational media should have
told Israel that we will nottake any comment from the
(10:32):
Israeli government unless youlet us go in.
I think international media wascompletely lenient about it.
It allowed Israel to do sowithout protesting and without
saying this is not the way itworks.
If you don't allow us in, wedon't report on you.
SPEAKER_02 (10:50):
Can I jump in there?
Because I think that's for me asa journalist, sharing the
frustration of this lack ofaccess, I think that's a very
interesting point.
And you might know that in theeditorial rooms of Western media
there have been quite sometensions.
(11:10):
This has been discussed quiteintensively.
But do you accept that it's veryhard for a media organization to
say, okay, then we're just notdoing it?
SPEAKER_08 (11:20):
No, I think it's not that uh complicated.
I think that uh big organizationlike the BBC and others could
have said to Israel, listen, ifyou don't allow us in, we don't
take the Israeli announcement ofthe IDF.
We just ignore them.
And uh you want to set rules ofthe game that are completely in
(11:42):
favor of Israel, we don't acceptit.
And I think BBC Americannetworks are strong enough,
Israel would have conceded thenext day.
I'm telling you, there was alack of consistency here by the
international media.
They just gave up and waited forIsrael, uh, and Israel still
(12:04):
does not allow them in.
The excuse is that they caredfor their lives, which is let's
say uh very problematic.
SPEAKER_02 (12:14):
If Do you think we we would have to take that with
a pinch of salt given how manyjournalists have actually been
killed in Gaza?
SPEAKER_08 (12:20):
A sack of salt, yes.
A huge sack of salt, 25 kilossack of salt.
SPEAKER_02 (12:26):
So Nick, I found that really interesting, but if
I'm honest, I wasn't entirelypersuaded by Meron's suggestion
that the uh the big mainstreammedia could just have said to
the Israeli government, look,let us in, or we're not gonna
report on your statements, we'renot gonna report on your your
(12:50):
line.
What do you think?
SPEAKER_07 (12:52):
Well, I'm not persuaded at all that that's
tenable.
Obviously, I I don't have hisknowledge of the IDF, but I
question whether their positionwould change particularly, as I
doubt that you would get all themajor media networks to agree to
this position, and so if thereare some that are willing to go
(13:12):
along and some that refuse, Idon't see that that would be a a
sufficient consensus to to swaythe IDF suddenly to change its
rules of engagement with thepress.
But I mean you also have thefundamental problem that I don't
think you can simply airbrushout of the picture one of the
dominant uh actors in the war.
(13:34):
It's our job to talk to thesepeople.
SPEAKER_02 (13:36):
Yeah, I agree with you.
I'm I'm not really convincedeither that that would be a
tenable position.
What did occur to me though isthat here in Geneva we are in
kind of a unique positionbecause we can't go to Gaza, our
colleagues can't go to Gaza, buthere you and I talk and
(13:59):
interview on a regular basispeople who do go to Gaza, who go
in and out, and they are thehumanitarian agencies.
Now they tell us what they see,they bring fact-based,
evidence-based witness accountsof what's happening there.
(14:23):
And I don't know about Unique,but I have found that very, very
valuable over the last couple ofyears.
SPEAKER_07 (14:30):
Absolutely.
And I think, you know, Meron'sbasic point about the timidity
of the media is is a valuableone.
Um it comes back to thisdifficult question of how you
balance reporting and therequirement to obtain an Israeli
comment on information inrelation to reporting on Israeli
atrocities or in the conduct ofhostilities invariably gets uh a
(14:52):
pro-former response that, youknow, essentially you're
gullible, that the media hasfallen prey to Hamas propaganda,
um, and that all the messagingthat's come out of Gaza from any
source has essentially beenthrough a prism that's been
approved by Hamas.
I I think there's been a lot ofcriticism of media timidity.
(15:13):
And I you while you can't benaive about the desire of Hamas
to try and shape coverage, youcan understand the anger and
frustration that people havefelt when interviews uh allowed
flagrantly misleading Israeliassertions.
For example, that there was noshortage of food in Gaza at a
time when starvation was takinghold, allowing those kind of
(15:36):
assertions to go largelyuncontested.
SPEAKER_02 (15:38):
Yeah, well, I did say at the start of this podcast
that we would hear from aidagencies because increasingly
you really sense the frustrationof the UN agencies.
Because let's just be clearabout this.
Humanitarian agencies havestandard, internationally
accepted ways of measuringthings, for example, like
(16:00):
malnutrition or maternalmortality, and they are using
those standards in Gaza.
And yet, as you said, Nick, theyare sometimes, they bring this
evidence and they're told, no,no, that's just what Hamas is
telling you, despite the factthat they have been in Gaza
witnessing the malnourishedchildren and the women who can't
(16:23):
get care when they're expectinga baby.
And just a couple of weeks ago,I think in a way, this
frustration, it it really almostboiled over.
I think you were there too,Nick.
It was the UN aid agencybriefing.
And both UNICEF's James Elderand the World Health
Organization's Rick Papercorn,they were both in Gaza at the
(16:44):
time.
They hooked up with us via Zoomas they often do.
And let's have a listen to whatthey had to say, because I said
the frustration was reallypalpable.
SPEAKER_04 (16:55):
The media in this press room has been very
generous to listen to UNICEFbrief dozens of times since we
first bore witness to thecarnage in Gaza.
Now, in that time, we'vereported on a war on children, a
famine, and a polio outbreak.
Always, always and only withdata and testimonials.
Now, two days ago I was at NASAHospital and I saw children
(17:16):
who've been paralyzed, who'vebeen burnt, and who've had
amputations, all followingdirect hits on their tents or
tents in the surrounding area,all at around two o'clock in the
morning.
A couple of days earlier ataround Alexa Hospital, I met
children who've all been shot byquadcopters.
When the world adjusts andnormalizes this level of
(17:38):
violence and of deprivation,something is profoundly broken.
SPEAKER_09 (17:43):
We SCUN and also specifically WHO, we have a role
to inform.
We've been informing the publicand the member states from the
start.
We always inform on health andwe inform as factual as
possible.
That's why we came up now withthis report, for example, on
injuries in Gaza and theconsequences of that and the
(18:05):
insane kind of statistics thatone quarter 45,000 people will
have, will need lifelongrehabilitation, of which more
than 10,000 children.
Only that kind of facts.
There's been a lot of reports onmalnutrition and a lot of debate
on that.
Well, I've seen and havewitnessed the children talk to
(18:26):
the mothers and fathers ofchildren as I saw as a medical
doctor myself.
This channel is two years old.
SPEAKER_04 (18:37):
If you speak to the brave doctors through WHO, or
speak to the many, many doctorsand nurses who have been in Gaza
from Australia, from the UnitedKingdom, from the United States
of America, when they speak, itshould cut through politics.
They're trained to save lives,they're not trained to posture.
And so one would think that whenthey testify around children
with trapnel wounds when theywere sleeping in their beds or
(18:59):
shot by quadcopters when theywere getting water or denied
oxygen.
This is the raw truth from thefront line.
However, what makes it ever moredevastating is these most
trusted voices in our society,doctors, nurses, surgeons, even
when we hear their testimoniesin halls of power and they share
these horrific stories ofchildren and indiscriminate
(19:19):
attacks, it's not moved leadersto act.
So we're in the place where agovernment is accused of
systematic breaches ofinternational humanitarian law.
And even when its past denialsare shown to be false,
demonstrably false, that voiceis still somehow treated as
indispensable in balancing astory.
Now that's giving a platform tothose engineering starvation.
(19:42):
That's a real problem.
SPEAKER_02 (19:43):
Well, James, as we know, who's speaking there, has
been very passionate about whathe's witnessed in Gaza, and I
can genuinely understand that.
SPEAKER_07 (20:14):
Yeah, I mean I don't want to let media off the hook
here.
But the fact of the matter isalso that if the reporting
hasn't been adequate andsufficient, particularly in the
earlier stages of the conflict,when the world was still
reacting to the trauma of theHamas attack and the seizure of
hostages.
The fact of the matter is therehas been large amounts of
(20:37):
reporting detailing the abuses,the appalling cost of the
Israel's conduct of hostilitiesin Gaza.
And even with that reporting,politicians have not been taking
up the cudgels in in a way thatI think voters across large
parts of the world have found inany way adequate.
(20:58):
So, yes, I'm sure reportingcould do with a very serious
look at itself, and I'm surestudies will come to light as we
go forward on the shortcomingsof our performance.
But um politicians can't reallylook at that as an excuse for
their failure to uh act on theevidence that did come through
(21:21):
in quite a lot of reporting.
SPEAKER_02 (21:23):
Yeah, I mean, I think that's one of the things
I've heard many times fromhumanitarian workers.
But also sometimes I think wehave said it in our own reports,
is that this is a conflict wherethe people who might have had
the power to end it sooner can'targue that they didn't know.
We've had excellent reportingout of Gaza from Palestinian
(21:46):
journalists, many of whom, aswe've heard, have been killed,
more than 200 during thisconflict.
I still think we need to comeback a bit to the question of
access.
Because the idea that theinternational media shouldn't be
allowed into Gaza at all, into aconflict zone, is pretty much
unprecedented.
I mean, they went to the SecondWorld War, they went to Korea,
(22:07):
they went to Vietnam, they wentto former Yugoslavia.
So where does that fit in ouracceptance of what journalists
should be allowed to do, wherethey can report?
Now that's something I put toIrene Khan.
She's the UN Special Reporteuron freedom of expression, and
she's particularly concerned,like Meron Rappaport, that
(22:31):
Israel has perhaps takenunprecedented, perhaps
unacceptable measures, trying,as all governments do, to
control the narrative around aconflict it's involved in.
SPEAKER_01 (22:45):
On the one hand, it has blocked access to
international media, and on theother hand, it claims that local
journalists who very often areworking for international
outlets, either as freelancersor as employees, are either
associated with Hamas and it'snot telling the truth, but
Israel can't have it both ways.
All Israel has to do is to allowinternational media in and let
(23:06):
international media see what isactually happening.
And I have said that quiteopenly.
This is a cover-up of genocide,actually.
At this point, it is a cover-upof genocide, both the targeted
killing of journalists in Gaza,and at the same time restricting
or refusing access, blockingtotal access to international
media in an unprecedented way,what you're really doing is, as
(23:30):
Israel, is seeking to totallycontrol the narrative of what is
happening there.
It just goes against anythingthat we know about international
rules of behavior when it comesto media.
SPEAKER_02 (23:41):
Would you like to see some UN resolution, they
don't always do very much, aboutaccess for media into conflict
zones?
Because this is unprecedentedwhen you think of the wars that
have been covered by many of mycolleagues.
But this one no.
SPEAKER_01 (24:01):
Well, actually, it's interesting that you should
raise that.
Right now, I'm actually thinkingof a little project on looking
at strengthening access andprotection of journalists in
armed conflict situations.
Under international humanitarianlaw, journalists are civilians
and deserve to be protected likecivilians.
But journalists are a veryspecial kind of civilian.
They can't move away from thefighting.
(24:23):
They have to go where thefighting is, where the danger
is, because that's what they'resupposed to report on.
So they need to have a scene insomething equivalent to
essential workers.
I think in our digital age,information is a survival right,
particularly in the context ofarmed conflicts.
And journalists should have fulland free access to uh areas of
(24:44):
conflict.
And for that reason, I think weneed to go back.
I'm not asking for a revision ofthe Geneva Conventions, but I am
asking to recognize journalistsas being particularly relevant
in armed conflict situations andtherefore to find ways, first of
all, of enhancing theirprotection.
At the moment, I've been told byjournalists that if you wear a
(25:05):
jacket marked the press, itdoesn't protect you.
It actually makes you a target.
Now that is just unacceptable.
There needs to be greaterrespect for journalists from the
belligerent parties, and if theydo not, there has to be some
tough punishment for that.
SPEAKER_02 (25:21):
Part of me, you know, my heart lifted when I
heard that that the informationjournalists provide out of a
conflict zone should be treatedas as essential, like medicine,
like what aid workers do.
(25:42):
Part of me, I wasn't quiteconvinced.
What do you think?
SPEAKER_07 (25:46):
Well, it's I wouldn't want to dismiss
something until we know what theexactly is being proposed.
But I have to confess I'm also alittle bit skeptical here.
I mean, journalists like medicalworkers, and indeed civilians in
general, are already protectedunder IHL, under international
humanitarian law, under the lawsof war.
And I'm not sure that any newkind of regulation or convention
(26:11):
is going to make life safer forjournalists where there is not
an intention on the part ofwarring parties to observe it,
which is what we're seeing inthe context of Sudan, in Gaza.
Gaza has been a horror story.
The Committee to ProtectJournalists estimates around 200
Palestinian journalists killedin the last two years.
(26:33):
What we need is accountabilitywhere these abuses occur, and
that has been conspicuouslylacking.
The IDF, you know, has a prettyshocking record on this issue,
going back to the death of aBritish freelance journalist, uh
James Miller in 2003, or thehighly regarded Al Jazeera
reporter Shireen Abu Akle, whowas shot by an Israeli sniper
(26:57):
near Janine in the West Bank 18months before the Gaza War.
There has been no accountabilityfor these deaths.
And in the case of Shireen AbuAkli, who had US citizenship,
the US has done really nobetter.
I mean, it promised toinvestigate this.
I think there was supposed tohave been an FBI probe.
If there was, the results of ithave never been released.
(27:19):
So accountability is what'sneeded here rather than, I
think, more rules andregulations.
SPEAKER_02 (27:25):
Yeah, or maybe more worthy resolutions at the Human
Rights Council.
Now, good though they can be forputting something challenging on
the agenda, like, for example,the right of journalists to stay
alive and report with impunityin a conflict zone and not to be
killed by one side or another.
But as you say, Nick, thereappears to be no accountability.
(27:49):
And I don't know about you, butwhat I'm more worried about is
like everything going in theother direction.
That the way this has happenedwith this conflict, that one
party is completely preventinginternational media from going
in, that that it might set aprecedent.
I mean, if we look at the kindof governments we have around
the world now, some of them willbe looking at this and saying,
(28:12):
well, oh, Israel did this, youknow, Israel's an ally of ours,
or some of them.
Maybe we can do the same.
And in fact, this was somethingI actually talked to Meren
Rapport about, and he too isquite concerned that we could,
rather than getting theaccountability that you
mentioned, that we could begoing in the direction of more
(28:34):
and more conflicts beingcompletely shut to the press.
SPEAKER_08 (28:38):
Certainly, why not?
Why not tomorrow?
Uh the US will uh invadeVenezuela, something that's not
impossible to foresee, and thatuh they will they will not allow
journalists to go in and reportindependently and kill the local
journalists.
(28:59):
Why not?
If this went on for two yearsand I'm not talking about a
conflict that is far away fromthe international public
opinion, this is a conflict thathas become the most important
conflict in the world.
There's nothing similar.
(29:21):
So why should the US or I don'tknow whom not adopt the main
policy and tell internationalpress no?
You you went silent when Israeldid it.
Why are you harassing us?
SPEAKER_02 (29:36):
When I interviewed Irene Khan, the UN special
rapporteur on the freedom ofexpression, she wanted to set up
a project to work within the UNtowards something that would
require member states toundertake to grant access to
journalists and to be requiredunder international law.
(30:00):
Law to grant them protection.
Do you see this as possible oris it even now too little too
late?
SPEAKER_08 (30:08):
It is certainly too late for those uh more than 200
journalists who were killed inGaza.
But I don't think it's too late.
I think it is possible.
International law is not in avery good state now.
I think this war in Gaza Israelchallenged with the aid of the
(30:29):
US, it really uh challenged theinternational order and the
international law.
We have a prime minister that iswanted for crimes against
humanity, and he just completelyignores that.
And uh but yes, I think it isvery important first of all to
uh have journalists act freelyand being protected, at least as
(30:56):
uh medical staff.
Yes, I think it is important anduh should be adopted quickly
because especially with newmedia, there are such a vast
amount of information AI made,and uh without journalists going
(31:17):
reliable journalists going tothe ground to the witness with
their own eyes on the groundwhat's going on, everything
could be manipulated, and Ithink this is a great danger,
not not for only for Israelisand Palestinians, but for the
whole world.
SPEAKER_02 (31:34):
Well that warning from Mehron Rappapur brings us
just about to the end of thisprogram.
But I want, before we go, to askyou, Nick, for your final
thoughts.
How can we do better?
How can we persuade thosewarring parties to work with us
more?
How can we fix this?
SPEAKER_07 (31:52):
Well, I don't think there is any silver bullet here,
and I entirely agree withMerrill's sort of broad
concerns.
I would say that I think itwould be very difficult in in in
most conflicts for anygovernment to say this is a
no-go area and and seal offaccess in the way that it was
(32:14):
possible in Gaza, which is sucha finite physical piece of
geography.
You know, President Assad didnot open Syria to coverage by
the press, but journalists stillgot in there and were still able
to report atrocities that weregoing on.
And conversely, you know, theVietnam War, which was arguably
(32:34):
the most intensively covered warof any, that access didn't on
its own ensure a fullunderstanding of the trajectory
of the war.
And reporting was overshadowedby uh, you know, an aggressively
partisan narrative by the USadministrations, successive US
(32:55):
administrations.
And it took years to get thefull facts from the Pentagon
papers and books like NeilSheehan's wonderful study,
Bright Shining Lie.
So the other factor that anygovernment has to take into
account now, and which mediaalso can take advantage of, is
the huge access to better opensource material.
(33:19):
There is access to satelliteimagery, and there is the huge
amount of evidence that uh isavailable through social media,
through citizen journalists, ifyou like, through what people
film on their phones, that findsits way into public channels,
which is absolutely making itdifficult to hide completely
(33:42):
what is going on on the ground.
SPEAKER_02 (33:43):
Yeah, I think that's absolutely right.
In fact, it's, you know,somebody from UN Human Rights
told me a few years ago that,you know, if you want to commit
an atrocity, you can do it, butyou will never be able to hide
it anymore.
You will be found out becausethere's just too much
information and surveillance, infact, out there.
(34:05):
But what I would also say it'sthat what I mentioned at the
start, that thing, the fog ofwar.
Because there is such a hugewelter of information out there.
Online, some of it, as you said,Nick, is citizen journalism.
But some of this propaganda,it's twisting the facts.
All of it has to be verified.
(34:26):
And this does make it actuallyquite difficult if you don't
have professional journalists onthe ground.
So I would just say to wind up,there's another old saying that
in war, truth is the firstcasualty.
So, um, not to kind of bang ourdrum too loudly, but honestly,
if you want at least some truthfrom a conflict zone, trust
(34:49):
journalists and let us in.
Okay, we understand we need totake some advice from the
military, haven't forgotten thatFrench colonel from all those
years ago in Kosovo.
But let us in, because you know,it's not a good look to try and
hide a war.
When, as Nick said, given allthe information that's already
out there, all the horrificthings we have seen,
(35:12):
particularly about Gaza, youstill can't hide it.
Thanks to all my interviewpartners and to Nick for joining
us here in the studio.
We hope you found this editioninteresting.
(35:33):
Join us again next time.
Thank you for listening.
A reminder you've been listeningto Inside Geneva, a Swiss Info
production.
You can subscribe to us andreview us wherever you get your
podcasts.
Check out our previous episodeshow the International Red Cross
(35:57):
unites prisoners of war withtheir families, or why survivors
of human rights violations turnto the UN in Geneva for justice.
I'm Imogen Folks.
Thanks again for listening.
This is Inside Geneva.
I'm your host, Imogen Folkes,and this is a production from
SwissInfo, the internationalpublic media company of
Switzerland.
In today's programme.
SPEAKER_05 (00:20):
Every bit of news which comes out of Hamas of Gaza
is controlled by the terroristorganization.
But international journalistsare not allowed into Gaza, are
they?
Why not?
SPEAKER_08 (00:30):
For the first time, I think, since World War II,
Israel did not allow foreignjournalists to come in to Gaza.
This is unprecedented.
SPEAKER_02 (00:40):
Two years of this conflict, there's really been no
access for international media.
SPEAKER_03 (00:47):
Sad breaking news.
SPEAKER_07 (00:54):
Gaza has been a horror story.
The Committee to ProtectJournalists estimates around 200
Palestinian journalists killedin the last two years.
What we need is accountabilitywhere these abuses occur, and
that has been conspicuouslylacking.
SPEAKER_06 (01:09):
Be in no doubt that this is irrefutable testimony.
It is a famine.
The Gaza famine.
SPEAKER_00 (01:17):
There is no famine in Gaza Strip.
It is simply not true.
SPEAKER_09 (01:22):
We SC UN, specifically WHO, we have a role
to inform.
We've been informing from thestart.
We inform on health and weinform as factual as possible.
SPEAKER_04 (01:33):
Now in that time, we've reported on a war on
children, a famine, and a poliooutbreak.
Always, always and only withdata and testimonials.
SPEAKER_01 (01:43):
Israel can't have it both ways.
All Israel has to do is to allowinternational media in and let
international media see what isactually happening.
And I have said that quiteopenly.
This is a cover-up of genocide.
SPEAKER_08 (01:55):
I would suggest that international media should have
told Israel that we will nottake any comment from Israeli
government unless you let us goin.
SPEAKER_02 (02:14):
And today we're going to take a long and
slightly soul-searching look atthe challenges and the risks of
reporting on conflict.
We'll be hearing fromjournalists, UN aid agencies,
and press freedom analyststhroughout today's episode.
They'll bring us theirperspectives on those
challenges.
(02:34):
And listening with me here inthe studio, I've got New York
Times contributor Nick CummingBruce.
It's good to have you hereagain, Nick.
SPEAKER_07 (02:41):
Yeah, hello, Imogen.
SPEAKER_02 (02:42):
Now, our jobs at the moment are here in tranquil
Geneva.
But what some of our listenersmight not know is that to report
here from the UN in Geneva, it'salmost a prerequisite to have
spent some time reporting onwars, reporting from conflict
zones.
I know I have, I know you have,Nick.
(03:05):
Let's each of us tell ourlisteners something that stands
out.
SPEAKER_07 (03:09):
Well, I I think one of the first experiences of
violent conflict I ever had wasin Iran at the time of the
revolution.
Um and one of my firstexperiences, in fact, was
watching rioters scaling thewall and ransacking the British
Embassy in Tehran.
And while the event wasself-evident in one sense, you
(03:30):
could see it actually unfoldingin front of you, it kind of also
demonstrated the challenges ofreporting in conflicts.
It begged the question of whoexactly was doing it and why uh
was it spontaneous.
Was it a spontaneous outburst ofcrowd anger or carefully
planned?
And this is one of thechallenges.
Initial focus of diplomats andjournalists in that revolution
(03:51):
was largely on the sort of theliberal-minded lawyers and
critics of the Shah who hadopposed him in the early years
and who were soon swept asideand later brutally purged by the
forces of loyal to AyatollahKhomeini, who were in fact the
people really driving therevolution, but who were not
(04:12):
initially perceived to be doingso.
SPEAKER_02 (04:14):
That's really interesting, and I think there
is this phrase, isn't it, thefog of war, which kind of means
that you can you can see what'sin front of you.
You can't necessarily assessexactly what the big picture is,
what's really going on.
I've got my own anecdote.
I've been in a few conflictzones, but this is one, one of
(04:36):
the first ones I went to thatstands out for me.
I went to Macedonia when the warin Kosovo was starting.
NATO had started its bombing ofSerbia.
It hadn't started the uh groundinvasion.
And I went from the airport inSkopje Street to an empty,
(05:00):
echoing hotel ballroom and aFrench colonel with epaulettes
and a big map and one of thoselong pointers.
And he sat us all down andshowed us, you know, it was
like, you know, tanks on a map.
We are here, here, here, andhere.
And I was sitting therethinking, I want to get I need
(05:20):
to get out of here.
This is not what I came here forto sit in an echoey ballroom
looking at a map.
And so eventually I escaped,hitched a ride with a couple of
other journalists, and we wentto the border, and this was at
the moment when the real ethniccleansing, the push by Serbia of
(05:41):
Kosovars out of Kosovo washappening.
And I d I won't ever forget thatboiling hot sun, tens of
thousands of people, mostlywomen and children, sitting on
trucks and in unventilatedbuses.
They'd lost everything and theywere waiting just to get to a
bit of safety.
(06:01):
And that's when I thought this,if I am going to report on
conflict, it's this.
I want to talk to real peoplewho are really affected and not
sit in an empty ballroom with aFrench colonel and a map and a
long, a long pointer.
But the fact is, sometimes toget into a conflict to report on
(06:22):
it, you do have to, you do haveto spend a bit of time with the
colonel and his maps and hispointer.
What I would say, though,listeners, and I'm sure you're
expecting it, this program isgoing to focus on one particular
conflict, and that is thecurrent conflict, Israel-Gaza.
(06:43):
Because Nick, I think we wouldsay that the media has faced
unprecedented challengesreporting on this war.
SPEAKER_07 (06:52):
Well, yes, it's completely different in one very
essential sense, and that isthat media have always had
access to wars and conflicts,often facing extreme peril, um,
exemplified by the career ofsomeone like Marie Colvin of the
Sunday Times, who reported warsin Balkans, Iraq, and Sri Lanka,
and ultimately she paid with herlife after getting smuggled into
(07:14):
Syria.
But journalists found ways toget in.
Um but in this conflict, Israelhas essentially hermetically
sealed Gaza from access byinternational journalists.
It's denied that access, citingthe dangers that would face
reporters on the ground, whichis a rather brutal irony given
the Israeli military's record ofkilling journalists, and that
(07:38):
only kind of really fuelssuspicion that they were
imposing that kind of banbecause they wanted to prevent
any kind of scrutiny of theirconduct of hostilities on the
ground.
SPEAKER_02 (07:49):
I think it's the case.
I mean, many don't want us todraw that conclusion, but it's
hard to come up with anotherwhen you think that two years of
this conflict, there's reallybeen no access for international
media.
And even since the ceasefire,which is what, three weeks in
now, there's been one verysmall, very limited, organized
(08:14):
trip for the internationalmedia, accompanied at all times
by the Israeli defense forcejust inside the edge of Gaza.
So one trip in two years.
Now, I did say we were going tohear from other journalists and
aid agencies and so onthroughout this podcast.
(08:37):
And in fact, as I was preparingthis episode, the Israeli
journalist Meron Rappaport wasin Geneva.
Now, listeners not familiar withhis work, take a look at the
magazine plus 972 because it hashonest, heartfelt, but yeah,
critical coverage of the conductof the war in Gaza.
(09:00):
Now, Meron was in town to give atalk at the Graduate Institute
on the challenges, risks, andactually, as he said it, Nick,
the failures of the media inthis war.
And I was lucky enough to beable to sit down with him for an
interview, and the first thinghe really wanted to stress was
the number of Palestinianjournalists, because they have
(09:20):
been able to report on Gazabecause they lived there, the
number of them killed over thelast two years.
SPEAKER_08 (09:27):
This is unprecedented.
Certainly since World War II,and maybe even World War II,
there were not such hugenumbers, and if you take into
consideration that thepopulation Gaza is not that
huge, and the number ofjournalists there is not that
huge, this is really a hugenumber.
(09:48):
We have also, for the firsttime, I think, since World War
II, uh Israel did not allowforeign journalists to come in
to Gaza.
Uh, this is unprecedented, nointernational journalist media
allowed by Israel to come in, souh we depended totally.
(10:09):
The only information we got isfrom Palestinian journalists who
were very limited in theirability to move, and uh as so
many of them were killed.
So uh this is I think a big, bigfailure.
I would suggest thatinternational media should have
told Israel that we will nottake any comment from the
(10:32):
Israeli government unless youlet us go in.
I think international media wascompletely lenient about it.
It allowed Israel to do sowithout protesting and without
saying this is not the way itworks.
If you don't allow us in, wedon't report on you.
SPEAKER_02 (10:50):
Can I jump in there?
Because I think that's for me asa journalist, sharing the
frustration of this lack ofaccess, I think that's a very
interesting point.
And you might know that in theeditorial rooms of Western media
there have been quite sometensions.
(11:10):
This has been discussed quiteintensively.
But do you accept that it's veryhard for a media organization to
say, okay, then we're just notdoing it?
SPEAKER_08 (11:20):
No, I think it's not that uh complicated.
I think that uh big organizationlike the BBC and others could
have said to Israel, listen, ifyou don't allow us in, we don't
take the Israeli announcement ofthe IDF.
We just ignore them.
And uh you want to set rules ofthe game that are completely in
(11:42):
favor of Israel, we don't acceptit.
And I think BBC Americannetworks are strong enough,
Israel would have conceded thenext day.
I'm telling you, there was alack of consistency here by the
international media.
They just gave up and waited forIsrael, uh, and Israel still
(12:04):
does not allow them in.
The excuse is that they caredfor their lives, which is let's
say uh very problematic.
SPEAKER_02 (12:14):
If Do you think we we would have to take that with
a pinch of salt given how manyjournalists have actually been
killed in Gaza?
SPEAKER_08 (12:20):
A sack of salt, yes.
A huge sack of salt, 25 kilossack of salt.
SPEAKER_02 (12:26):
So Nick, I found that really interesting, but if
I'm honest, I wasn't entirelypersuaded by Meron's suggestion
that the uh the big mainstreammedia could just have said to
the Israeli government, look,let us in, or we're not gonna
report on your statements, we'renot gonna report on your your
(12:50):
line.
What do you think?
SPEAKER_07 (12:52):
Well, I'm not persuaded at all that that's
tenable.
Obviously, I I don't have hisknowledge of the IDF, but I
question whether their positionwould change particularly, as I
doubt that you would get all themajor media networks to agree to
this position, and so if thereare some that are willing to go
(13:12):
along and some that refuse, Idon't see that that would be a a
sufficient consensus to to swaythe IDF suddenly to change its
rules of engagement with thepress.
But I mean you also have thefundamental problem that I don't
think you can simply airbrushout of the picture one of the
dominant uh actors in the war.
(13:34):
It's our job to talk to thesepeople.
SPEAKER_02 (13:36):
Yeah, I agree with you.
I'm I'm not really convincedeither that that would be a
tenable position.
What did occur to me though isthat here in Geneva we are in
kind of a unique positionbecause we can't go to Gaza, our
colleagues can't go to Gaza, buthere you and I talk and
(13:59):
interview on a regular basispeople who do go to Gaza, who go
in and out, and they are thehumanitarian agencies.
Now they tell us what they see,they bring fact-based,
evidence-based witness accountsof what's happening there.
(14:23):
And I don't know about Unique,but I have found that very, very
valuable over the last couple ofyears.
SPEAKER_07 (14:30):
Absolutely.
And I think, you know, Meron'sbasic point about the timidity
of the media is is a valuableone.
Um it comes back to thisdifficult question of how you
balance reporting and therequirement to obtain an Israeli
comment on information inrelation to reporting on Israeli
atrocities or in the conduct ofhostilities invariably gets uh a
(14:52):
pro-former response that, youknow, essentially you're
gullible, that the media hasfallen prey to Hamas propaganda,
um, and that all the messagingthat's come out of Gaza from any
source has essentially beenthrough a prism that's been
approved by Hamas.
I I think there's been a lot ofcriticism of media timidity.
(15:13):
And I you while you can't benaive about the desire of Hamas
to try and shape coverage, youcan understand the anger and
frustration that people havefelt when interviews uh allowed
flagrantly misleading Israeliassertions.
For example, that there was noshortage of food in Gaza at a
time when starvation was takinghold, allowing those kind of
(15:36):
assertions to go largelyuncontested.
SPEAKER_02 (15:38):
Yeah, well, I did say at the start of this podcast
that we would hear from aidagencies because increasingly
you really sense the frustrationof the UN agencies.
Because let's just be clearabout this.
Humanitarian agencies havestandard, internationally
accepted ways of measuringthings, for example, like
(16:00):
malnutrition or maternalmortality, and they are using
those standards in Gaza.
And yet, as you said, Nick, theyare sometimes, they bring this
evidence and they're told, no,no, that's just what Hamas is
telling you, despite the factthat they have been in Gaza
witnessing the malnourishedchildren and the women who can't
(16:23):
get care when they're expectinga baby.
And just a couple of weeks ago,I think in a way, this
frustration, it it really almostboiled over.
I think you were there too,Nick.
It was the UN aid agencybriefing.
And both UNICEF's James Elderand the World Health
Organization's Rick Papercorn,they were both in Gaza at the
(16:44):
time.
They hooked up with us via Zoomas they often do.
And let's have a listen to whatthey had to say, because I said
the frustration was reallypalpable.
SPEAKER_04 (16:55):
The media in this press room has been very
generous to listen to UNICEFbrief dozens of times since we
first bore witness to thecarnage in Gaza.
Now, in that time, we'vereported on a war on children, a
famine, and a polio outbreak.
Always, always and only withdata and testimonials.
Now, two days ago I was at NASAHospital and I saw children
(17:16):
who've been paralyzed, who'vebeen burnt, and who've had
amputations, all followingdirect hits on their tents or
tents in the surrounding area,all at around two o'clock in the
morning.
A couple of days earlier ataround Alexa Hospital, I met
children who've all been shot byquadcopters.
When the world adjusts andnormalizes this level of
(17:38):
violence and of deprivation,something is profoundly broken.
SPEAKER_09 (17:43):
We SCUN and also specifically WHO, we have a role
to inform.
We've been informing the publicand the member states from the
start.
We always inform on health andwe inform as factual as
possible.
That's why we came up now withthis report, for example, on
injuries in Gaza and theconsequences of that and the
(18:05):
insane kind of statistics thatone quarter 45,000 people will
have, will need lifelongrehabilitation, of which more
than 10,000 children.
Only that kind of facts.
There's been a lot of reports onmalnutrition and a lot of debate
on that.
Well, I've seen and havewitnessed the children talk to
(18:26):
the mothers and fathers ofchildren as I saw as a medical
doctor myself.
This channel is two years old.
SPEAKER_04 (18:37):
If you speak to the brave doctors through WHO, or
speak to the many, many doctorsand nurses who have been in Gaza
from Australia, from the UnitedKingdom, from the United States
of America, when they speak, itshould cut through politics.
They're trained to save lives,they're not trained to posture.
And so one would think that whenthey testify around children
with trapnel wounds when theywere sleeping in their beds or
(18:59):
shot by quadcopters when theywere getting water or denied
oxygen.
This is the raw truth from thefront line.
However, what makes it ever moredevastating is these most
trusted voices in our society,doctors, nurses, surgeons, even
when we hear their testimoniesin halls of power and they share
these horrific stories ofchildren and indiscriminate
(19:19):
attacks, it's not moved leadersto act.
So we're in the place where agovernment is accused of
systematic breaches ofinternational humanitarian law.
And even when its past denialsare shown to be false,
demonstrably false, that voiceis still somehow treated as
indispensable in balancing astory.
Now that's giving a platform tothose engineering starvation.
(19:42):
That's a real problem.
SPEAKER_02 (19:43):
Well, James, as we know, who's speaking there, has
been very passionate about whathe's witnessed in Gaza, and I
can genuinely understand that.
SPEAKER_07 (20:14):
Yeah, I mean I don't want to let media off the hook
here.
But the fact of the matter isalso that if the reporting
hasn't been adequate andsufficient, particularly in the
earlier stages of the conflict,when the world was still
reacting to the trauma of theHamas attack and the seizure of
hostages.
The fact of the matter is therehas been large amounts of
(20:37):
reporting detailing the abuses,the appalling cost of the
Israel's conduct of hostilitiesin Gaza.
And even with that reporting,politicians have not been taking
up the cudgels in in a way thatI think voters across large
parts of the world have found inany way adequate.
(20:58):
So, yes, I'm sure reportingcould do with a very serious
look at itself, and I'm surestudies will come to light as we
go forward on the shortcomingsof our performance.
But um politicians can't reallylook at that as an excuse for
their failure to uh act on theevidence that did come through
(21:21):
in quite a lot of reporting.
SPEAKER_02 (21:23):
Yeah, I mean, I think that's one of the things
I've heard many times fromhumanitarian workers.
But also sometimes I think wehave said it in our own reports,
is that this is a conflict wherethe people who might have had
the power to end it sooner can'targue that they didn't know.
We've had excellent reportingout of Gaza from Palestinian
(21:46):
journalists, many of whom, aswe've heard, have been killed,
more than 200 during thisconflict.
I still think we need to comeback a bit to the question of
access.
Because the idea that theinternational media shouldn't be
allowed into Gaza at all, into aconflict zone, is pretty much
unprecedented.
I mean, they went to the SecondWorld War, they went to Korea,
(22:07):
they went to Vietnam, they wentto former Yugoslavia.
So where does that fit in ouracceptance of what journalists
should be allowed to do, wherethey can report?
Now that's something I put toIrene Khan.
She's the UN Special Reporteuron freedom of expression, and
she's particularly concerned,like Meron Rappaport, that
(22:31):
Israel has perhaps takenunprecedented, perhaps
unacceptable measures, trying,as all governments do, to
control the narrative around aconflict it's involved in.
SPEAKER_01 (22:45):
On the one hand, it has blocked access to
international media, and on theother hand, it claims that local
journalists who very often areworking for international
outlets, either as freelancersor as employees, are either
associated with Hamas and it'snot telling the truth, but
Israel can't have it both ways.
All Israel has to do is to allowinternational media in and let
(23:06):
international media see what isactually happening.
And I have said that quiteopenly.
This is a cover-up of genocide,actually.
At this point, it is a cover-upof genocide, both the targeted
killing of journalists in Gaza,and at the same time restricting
or refusing access, blockingtotal access to international
media in an unprecedented way,what you're really doing is, as
(23:30):
Israel, is seeking to totallycontrol the narrative of what is
happening there.
It just goes against anythingthat we know about international
rules of behavior when it comesto media.
SPEAKER_02 (23:41):
Would you like to see some UN resolution, they
don't always do very much, aboutaccess for media into conflict
zones?
Because this is unprecedentedwhen you think of the wars that
have been covered by many of mycolleagues.
But this one no.
SPEAKER_01 (24:01):
Well, actually, it's interesting that you should
raise that.
Right now, I'm actually thinkingof a little project on looking
at strengthening access andprotection of journalists in
armed conflict situations.
Under international humanitarianlaw, journalists are civilians
and deserve to be protected likecivilians.
But journalists are a veryspecial kind of civilian.
They can't move away from thefighting.
(24:23):
They have to go where thefighting is, where the danger
is, because that's what they'resupposed to report on.
So they need to have a scene insomething equivalent to
essential workers.
I think in our digital age,information is a survival right,
particularly in the context ofarmed conflicts.
And journalists should have fulland free access to uh areas of
(24:44):
conflict.
And for that reason, I think weneed to go back.
I'm not asking for a revision ofthe Geneva Conventions, but I am
asking to recognize journalistsas being particularly relevant
in armed conflict situations andtherefore to find ways, first of
all, of enhancing theirprotection.
At the moment, I've been told byjournalists that if you wear a
(25:05):
jacket marked the press, itdoesn't protect you.
It actually makes you a target.
Now that is just unacceptable.
There needs to be greaterrespect for journalists from the
belligerent parties, and if theydo not, there has to be some
tough punishment for that.
SPEAKER_02 (25:21):
Part of me, you know, my heart lifted when I
heard that that the informationjournalists provide out of a
conflict zone should be treatedas as essential, like medicine,
like what aid workers do.
(25:42):
Part of me, I wasn't quiteconvinced.
What do you think?
SPEAKER_07 (25:46):
Well, it's I wouldn't want to dismiss
something until we know what theexactly is being proposed.
But I have to confess I'm also alittle bit skeptical here.
I mean, journalists like medicalworkers, and indeed civilians in
general, are already protectedunder IHL, under international
humanitarian law, under the lawsof war.
And I'm not sure that any newkind of regulation or convention
(26:11):
is going to make life safer forjournalists where there is not
an intention on the part ofwarring parties to observe it,
which is what we're seeing inthe context of Sudan, in Gaza.
Gaza has been a horror story.
The Committee to ProtectJournalists estimates around 200
Palestinian journalists killedin the last two years.
(26:33):
What we need is accountabilitywhere these abuses occur, and
that has been conspicuouslylacking.
The IDF, you know, has a prettyshocking record on this issue,
going back to the death of aBritish freelance journalist, uh
James Miller in 2003, or thehighly regarded Al Jazeera
reporter Shireen Abu Akle, whowas shot by an Israeli sniper
(26:57):
near Janine in the West Bank 18months before the Gaza War.
There has been no accountabilityfor these deaths.
And in the case of Shireen AbuAkli, who had US citizenship,
the US has done really nobetter.
I mean, it promised toinvestigate this.
I think there was supposed tohave been an FBI probe.
If there was, the results of ithave never been released.
(27:19):
So accountability is what'sneeded here rather than, I
think, more rules andregulations.
SPEAKER_02 (27:25):
Yeah, or maybe more worthy resolutions at the Human
Rights Council.
Now, good though they can be forputting something challenging on
the agenda, like, for example,the right of journalists to stay
alive and report with impunityin a conflict zone and not to be
killed by one side or another.
But as you say, Nick, thereappears to be no accountability.
(27:49):
And I don't know about you, butwhat I'm more worried about is
like everything going in theother direction.
That the way this has happenedwith this conflict, that one
party is completely preventinginternational media from going
in, that that it might set aprecedent.
I mean, if we look at the kindof governments we have around
the world now, some of them willbe looking at this and saying,
(28:12):
well, oh, Israel did this, youknow, Israel's an ally of ours,
or some of them.
Maybe we can do the same.
And in fact, this was somethingI actually talked to Meren
Rapport about, and he too isquite concerned that we could,
rather than getting theaccountability that you
mentioned, that we could begoing in the direction of more
(28:34):
and more conflicts beingcompletely shut to the press.
SPEAKER_08 (28:38):
Certainly, why not?
Why not tomorrow?
Uh the US will uh invadeVenezuela, something that's not
impossible to foresee, and thatuh they will they will not allow
journalists to go in and reportindependently and kill the local
journalists.
(28:59):
Why not?
If this went on for two yearsand I'm not talking about a
conflict that is far away fromthe international public
opinion, this is a conflict thathas become the most important
conflict in the world.
There's nothing similar.
(29:21):
So why should the US or I don'tknow whom not adopt the main
policy and tell internationalpress no?
You you went silent when Israeldid it.
Why are you harassing us?
SPEAKER_02 (29:36):
When I interviewed Irene Khan, the UN special
rapporteur on the freedom ofexpression, she wanted to set up
a project to work within the UNtowards something that would
require member states toundertake to grant access to
journalists and to be requiredunder international law.
(30:00):
Law to grant them protection.
Do you see this as possible oris it even now too little too
late?
SPEAKER_08 (30:08):
It is certainly too late for those uh more than 200
journalists who were killed inGaza.
But I don't think it's too late.
I think it is possible.
International law is not in avery good state now.
I think this war in Gaza Israelchallenged with the aid of the
(30:29):
US, it really uh challenged theinternational order and the
international law.
We have a prime minister that iswanted for crimes against
humanity, and he just completelyignores that.
And uh but yes, I think it isvery important first of all to
uh have journalists act freelyand being protected, at least as
(30:56):
uh medical staff.
Yes, I think it is important anduh should be adopted quickly
because especially with newmedia, there are such a vast
amount of information AI made,and uh without journalists going
(31:17):
reliable journalists going tothe ground to the witness with
their own eyes on the groundwhat's going on, everything
could be manipulated, and Ithink this is a great danger,
not not for only for Israelisand Palestinians, but for the
whole world.
SPEAKER_02 (31:34):
Well that warning from Mehron Rappapur brings us
just about to the end of thisprogram.
But I want, before we go, to askyou, Nick, for your final
thoughts.
How can we do better?
How can we persuade thosewarring parties to work with us
more?
How can we fix this?
SPEAKER_07 (31:52):
Well, I don't think there is any silver bullet here,
and I entirely agree withMerrill's sort of broad
concerns.
I would say that I think itwould be very difficult in in in
most conflicts for anygovernment to say this is a
no-go area and and seal offaccess in the way that it was
(32:14):
possible in Gaza, which is sucha finite physical piece of
geography.
You know, President Assad didnot open Syria to coverage by
the press, but journalists stillgot in there and were still able
to report atrocities that weregoing on.
And conversely, you know, theVietnam War, which was arguably
(32:34):
the most intensively covered warof any, that access didn't on
its own ensure a fullunderstanding of the trajectory
of the war.
And reporting was overshadowedby uh, you know, an aggressively
partisan narrative by the USadministrations, successive US
(32:55):
administrations.
And it took years to get thefull facts from the Pentagon
papers and books like NeilSheehan's wonderful study,
Bright Shining Lie.
So the other factor that anygovernment has to take into
account now, and which mediaalso can take advantage of, is
the huge access to better opensource material.
(33:19):
There is access to satelliteimagery, and there is the huge
amount of evidence that uh isavailable through social media,
through citizen journalists, ifyou like, through what people
film on their phones, that findsits way into public channels,
which is absolutely making itdifficult to hide completely
(33:42):
what is going on on the ground.
SPEAKER_02 (33:43):
Yeah, I think that's absolutely right.
In fact, it's, you know,somebody from UN Human Rights
told me a few years ago that,you know, if you want to commit
an atrocity, you can do it, butyou will never be able to hide
it anymore.
You will be found out becausethere's just too much
information and surveillance, infact, out there.
(34:05):
But what I would also say it'sthat what I mentioned at the
start, that thing, the fog ofwar.
Because there is such a hugewelter of information out there.
Online, some of it, as you said,Nick, is citizen journalism.
But some of this propaganda,it's twisting the facts.
All of it has to be verified.
(34:26):
And this does make it actuallyquite difficult if you don't
have professional journalists onthe ground.
So I would just say to wind up,there's another old saying that
in war, truth is the firstcasualty.
So, um, not to kind of bang ourdrum too loudly, but honestly,
if you want at least some truthfrom a conflict zone, trust
(34:49):
journalists and let us in.
Okay, we understand we need totake some advice from the
military, haven't forgotten thatFrench colonel from all those
years ago in Kosovo.
But let us in, because you know,it's not a good look to try and
hide a war.
When, as Nick said, given allthe information that's already
out there, all the horrificthings we have seen,
(35:12):
particularly about Gaza, youstill can't hide it.
Thanks to all my interviewpartners and to Nick for joining
us here in the studio.
We hope you found this editioninteresting.
(35:33):
Join us again next time.
Thank you for listening.
A reminder you've been listeningto Inside Geneva, a Swiss Info
production.
You can subscribe to us andreview us wherever you get your
podcasts.
Check out our previous episodeshow the International Red Cross
(35:57):
unites prisoners of war withtheir families, or why survivors
of human rights violations turnto the UN in Geneva for justice.
I'm Imogen Folks.
Thanks again for listening.
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