My friends and family and everyone else in Gaza are facing unimaginable hardship. From the outset, it has been all too clear that Israel’s war on Gaza would be long and merciless and would cause devastating losses for everyone – not least journalists.
Earlier this week, IMS’s Gaza-based partner organisation, Filastinyat, published a survey that captures some of those losses. The report, which builds on responses from 181 women journalists, documents widespread loss of relatives, extensive displacement and homelessness and a lack of bare necessities, from food and clean water to warm clothes and baby formula.
The report lists a number of stark findings: almost 40 percent Gaza’s women journalists have lost relatives in the war, while four out of five have been displaced from their homes and more than one in five are in need of medical treatment. A forthcoming survey of men journalists is all but sure to reflect similar hardship.
As shocking as the facts outlined in the report are, what really stuck with me is how one of the surveyed journalists, whose home was destroyed in an Israeli airstrike, described her situation:
“I have been displaced multiple times with my family while being in the ninth month of pregnancy. I lack access to water and food, and I need hygiene essentials. Diseases are spreading in the school where I sought refuge. I don’t know where I will give birth to my child and there is no safe place for me.”
Unfortunately, her situation is characteristic of the depth of the disaster Gaza’s civilians are facing – including the many journalists who are still working day and night. Without any other functioning human rights organisations in Gaza, journalists are also fulfilling the role of human rights defenders, keeping the world informed of the inhumane realities of the war and gathering evidence of potential war crimes.
While we wait for world leaders to take the responsibility to end a war in which a child is killed every 15 minutes, I would be immensely grateful if you would consider supporting us in supplying Gaza’s journalists with food, clothes, blankets and other essentials and – when conditions allow for it – safety equipment and psychological support.
Lama Hourani