Paradoxical observation: while the conflict between Israel and Hamas proves particularly deadly for journalists, 17 of them having lost their lives while doing their job, the overall number of reporters killed in the world has never been this low since 2002, according to RSF. In 2023, 45 journalists lost their lives in the line of duty, compared to 61 last year, according to the annual report from Reporters Without Borders, published Thursday.
Steady decline
We have to go back more than 20 years to find a total lower than this year (33 in 2002), where more than a third of the losses are linked to the conflict in the Middle East, including 13 in Gaza alone. “This in no way reduces the tragedy in Gaza but we are seeing a regular decline, far from the more than 140 journalists killed in 2012, then in 2013”, mainly due to the wars in Syria and Iraq, explains to AFP the secretary general of RSF, Christophe Deloire.
Fight against impunity, “work of intergovernmental organizations, NGOs, the media themselves” or “greater caution”… The causes are multiple and “are up for discussion”, according to him. The global count, stopped on December 1, “does not include journalists killed outside their duties, those who were not killed as such, nor those whose circumstances of death remain unknown”, specifies Reporters without borders.
“War crimes”
The organization lists a total of “63 journalists killed” in the Middle East since the start of the Israel-Hamas conflict on October 7, whether or not related to their profession. In detail, in addition to the 13 journalists who died “under Israeli fire” in Gaza, according to RSF, this war caused the death of three working journalists in Lebanon and another in Israel, killed by Hamas. In November, RSF filed a complaint with the International Criminal Court for “war crimes” committed against journalists in Gaza and against the Israeli journalist.
An AFP investigation, published last week, into the bombing which killed a Reuters video journalist, Issam Abdallah, in southern Lebanon on October 13 and injured six others, including the Reuters photographer. ‘AFP Christina Assi, seriously injured, points to an Israeli tank shell. Questioned on this subject, an Israeli army spokesperson stressed that the place where the journalists were located was “an active combat zone”.
“Not satisfactory” explanations, according to Christophe Deloire, who believes that “there are many elements for Israel to be faced with its responsibilities”. The conflict in Ukraine, for its part, cost the lives of two journalists in 2023, including AFP reporter Arman Soldin, “the only journalist to have lost his life in a country other than his own” this year, on a total of 11 since the Russian invasion of February 2022.
“Self-censorship” in Mexico
The overall 2023 toll stands out for the “notable drop” in deaths in Latin America with six journalists killed, compared to 26 in 2022. Mexico, the deadliest area for the profession behind Gaza, has four in 2023, compared to 11 in 2023. last year. But this does not mean that security is improving for the press, “as demonstrated by the three kidnappings of reporters and the armed attacks against four journalists at the end of 2023”, notes the report.
“Given the record number of violence recorded in 2022, a certain number of journalists are more systematically calculating the risks to which they are exposed, which implies more self-censorship and the proliferation, in the area, of information black holes” , adds RSF. Moreover, out of a total of 84 journalists missing, almost one in three is Mexican, notes the NGO.
The number of journalists detained worldwide rises to 521, compared to 569 in 2022, with Belarus becoming “one of the three largest prisons in the world with China and Burma”, while Turkey and Iran practices repeated imprisonments. Finally, 54 journalists are held hostage, compared to 65 in 2022.