Israeli-imposed ban on foreign journalists in Gaza still in place, despite ceasefire

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The Gaza Strip remains closed to independent foreign journalists for the foreseeable future, despite the highly anticipated opening this week of the Rafah crossing for returning Palestinians.

That opening, alongside the return last week of the remains of the last of the 251 Israeli hostages held in Gaza by Hamas and other militant groups, is among the many significant signs for Palestinians and Israelis that the fragile ceasefire that went into effect last October is still holding - even though low-level fighting continues.

But the ban on foreign journalists imposed by Israel when the war started on Oct. 7, 2023, has remained in place.

Hussam al-Masri, Reuters journalist killed by Israeli strike, reported on Gaza while living in a tent

The Foreign Press Association in Israel (FPA), which represents some 400 foreign journalists and 130 news and media-related groups, pushed back at the ban, filing two petitions to Israel’s High Court of Justice. The first one failed; the second one, from September, 2024, is still under adjudication.

The issue has been freedom of the press and integrity in reporting, in a country that prides itself on being a democracy. In the past, Israel allowed foreign reporters to enter Gaza and to operate freely there during wartime.

The absence of independent foreign journalists on the ground has left reporting of one of the most highly visible and dangerous global conflicts in recent times to Palestinian journalists in Gaza.

After killing of prominent journalist in Gaza, media’s struggle to cover the war becomes even greater

FPA board chairperson Tania Kraemer lauded the work of her Palestinian colleagues, explaining, “They are the ones who are reporting this war. They have been the ones reporting the story that they are living themselves, having been displaced and having lost their homes.”

The push to enter Gaza is a call to build on their work, and to provide a space to report alongside them, she said.

The legal process, however, has gone so slowly that it has outlasted the war. Following a hearing on Jan. 26, the court gave the state until the end of March to file an update, prior to issuing any decision. The FPA filed an urgent request two days later to shorten that timeline.

“The matter becomes ever more urgent now. The time that elapsed since the filing of this case is totally disproportionate from any angle you look at it,” the FPA’s attorney, Gilead Sher, told The Globe and Mail on Thursday.

In court filings and hearings, Israel has argued that the situation in Gaza is too dangerous to allow for independent foreign journalists to report from the field, even with a ceasefire. It argued that to support the media, it has organized supervised day trips into Gaza for local Israeli and foreign journalists both during the war and in the months of the ceasefire.

More than 70,000 people have been killed in Gaza in over two years of war, according to Palestinian health ministry officials in the strip.

The New York-based Committee to Project Journalists, which is a party to the case, says 252 of the dead are journalists. Israel has claimed that some of those journalists were also militants.

State attorney Yonatan Nadav told the court in January that despite the changes in Gaza “for security reasons, it is still risky” for journalists to operate in the strip without an Israeli army escort. To underscore this point, the state held a sidebar conference with the judges to present classified information. During the hearing, the judges had pressed the state on why journalists were barred when humanitarian aid workers were allowed to enter.

Attorney Michael Sfard, who represents Reporters sans frontières, one of the parties to the case, said he had argued that journalists and aid workers perform a crucial, public interest function that provides protection to civilians in times of war.

Both Mr. Sher and Mr. Sfard argued that one problematic aspect of the situation was that it was a blanket ban, which did not take into account the nuanced differences in Gaza, where some areas were safer than others for journalists.

The Ukrainian army divides areas into those that are accessible and those that are not, said Mr. Sfard. Israel has not done that, which raises suspicion that the issue is censorship rather than security, he added.

Mr. Sher said, “I would expect the government to explore the ways to respect the basic rights of freedom of expression, freedom of the press and the right of the public to know.” He stressed that, “No true journalism is possible without compliance of the incumbent government with fundamental rights.”