As journalist deaths climb in Israel-Hamas war, what can be done to protect them

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• John Yang:

  The Israel-Hamas war is inflicting a devastating toll on civilians. Tens of thousands of Palestinians and more than 1,000 Israelis have been killed since October. Among them are journalists. The Committee to Protect Journalists says it's the deadliest conflict for reporters, photographers and camera operators since the group began tracking casualties in 1992. Ali Rogin tells us what's driving this mounting death toll.

• Ali Rogin:

  Reporting from war zones has always been risky, but now experts say it's never been more dangerous. At least 97 reporters, 92 of them Palestinian, have been killed since the start of the Israel-Hamas war. Dozens more have been arrested, injured or vanished.

  Jodie Ginsberg heads the Committee to Protect Journalists. Jodie, thank you so much for being here. Tell us about what it's like right now for Palestinian journalists on the ground in Gaza to do their jobs.

  Jodie Ginsberg, Committee to Protect Journalists: It's extraordinarily difficult for journalists in Gaza right now to do their jobs. It's been seven months of war, seven months when they've not been able to leave. No one else has been able to get in. So they are bearing the brunt of the reporting. They are reporting the war and living the war. So they're subject to the same bombings, the same attacks.

  In some cases, we believe journalists have been deliberately targeted. So they're operating in extraordinarily difficult conditions. Shortages of food, shortages of fuel. Obviously, equipment is beginning to degrade. So it's becoming harder and harder to report out from Gaza and more dangerous.

• Ali Rogin:

  You mentioned that there is evidence that some of these journalists were deliberately targeted. Tell us a little bit more about that. What do we know?

• Jodie Ginsberg:

  So we know that in at least three cases journalists have been targeted, as the case of the Reuters journalist Issam Abdallah, who was killed on the border with Lebanon by Israeli fire. And there have been several independent reports that demonstrate it was quite clear that he was a journalist, visible as a journalist.

  Israel have admitted to targeting two journalists traveling in a car, Mustafa Thuraya and Hamza Al Dahdouh. It alleged that they were terrorists, but we've seen absolutely no credible evidence for that. And we believe there are other cases where it's probable that journalists have been deliberately targeted.

• Ali Rogin:

  Of course, this is an active war zone, but at this point, what would CPJ like to see in terms of seeking accountability for journalist deaths at the hands of the Israeli military and Hamas?

• Jodie Ginsberg:

  Well, obviously, we want to see transparent investigations into all of the killings of journalists since the start of October 7 and any killings of journalists in the region before that. We continue to stress that journalists are civilians and should never be targeted.

  We continue to call for international access to Gaza. It's really important that we have foreign media also able to get in, able to get a picture of what's happening inside Gaza.

• Ali Rogin:

  And on that issue of international access, Israel has only allowed entry by international journalists in very controlled situations. And much of the bulk of the reporting has been done by Palestinian journalists as well as citizen journalists. So why is it so important that international journalists have full access to war zones to report out?

• Jodie Ginsberg:

  It's really important that we have international media in any war because that's a way to be able to demonstrate and to verify the information that is being gathered by local reporters. Whenever you have only local reporters in a war setting enables one side to claim that perhaps those journalists are unreliable. They're domestic reporters. They might have biases and having international media from a number of different kinds of organizations allows us to verify and corroborate the material that's being shared by local journalists.

  The attacks that we've seen on journalists, the repeated communications blackout, some of the legislation that Israel has introduced, for example, giving it the power to ban foreign media outlets in which the prime minister has already said he would use against outlets like Al Jazeera.

  All of those speak to an environment in which freedom of the press is curtailed, and that's the actions of a dictatorship, not the actions of a democracy.

• Ali Rogin:

  What measures would you like to see implemented today to protect these journalists better?

• Jodie Ginsberg:

  Well, we've been part for a long time, of course, for a humanitarian ceasefire. We think it's very important that equipment be allowed into Gaza so that journalists can replace damaged laptops, damaged equipment. We want to see personal protective equipment, so those flak jackets that you often see with press written across them, none of that material has been allowed into Gaza, helmets and so on to keep journalists safe. And it's very important that we continue to speak out in solidarity with our Gaza and colleagues as well.

• Ali Rogin:

  And pulling out the scope a little bit, why is it so important that a free and safe press exists?

• Jodie Ginsberg:

  Well, we always say that truth is the first casualty in war. It's important that we have journalists to provide information so that we, as ordinary citizens, as ordinary, as members of the public, have the information we need to live our everyday lives.

  All of that information is information that journalists are providing day in, day out. And it's vital for us if we want to live in free and democratic society.

• Ali Rogin:

  Jody Ginsburg, head of the nonprofit Committee to Protect Journalists, thank you so much.

• Jodie Ginsberg:

  Thank you.