In the battered streets and hospitals of Gaza, the work of journalism has become a daily act of courage—and, for many, a matter of life and death. On August 25, 2025, tragedy struck again as five journalists lost their lives in a second Israeli strike on Nasser Hospital while documenting the aftermath of an earlier attack. Ibrahim Qannan, a correspondent for the Cairo-based Al-Ghad TV, was broadcasting live when the explosion claimed the lives of his friends and colleagues. "We live side by side with death," Qannan reflected in an interview, his voice heavy with grief. "I still cannot believe that five of our colleagues were struck in front of me on camera and I try to hold up and look strong to carry the message. May no one feel such feelings. They are painful feelings."
This incident, which also killed 22 people in total, is just the latest in a relentless toll on Gaza’s press corps. Since the war erupted following the Hamas attack on Israel on October 7, 2023, at least 217 Palestinian journalists have been killed by Israeli forces in Gaza, according to the Press Emblem Campaign (PEC). The Committee to Protect Journalists puts the number at 195, but both figures underscore an unprecedented scale of loss. The PEC’s president, Blaise Lempen, called it "a massacre among media representatives in an armed conflict [that] is unprecedented since the end of World War II 80 years ago."
The grim statistics reveal the scale of the tragedy: 81 journalists killed in Gaza in 2023, 80 in 2024, and 56 so far in 2025, based on local sources cited by PEC. The global toll is staggering as well—between January and the end of September 2025, 138 journalists were killed worldwide, with Gaza accounting for a disproportionate share. The Brown University Costs of War project recently labeled Gaza a "news graveyard," noting that more journalists have perished there than in the U.S. Civil War, World Wars I and II, the Vietnam and Korean wars, the Yugoslav wars, and the Afghanistan War combined.
Behind these numbers are stories of resilience, sacrifice, and unimaginable hardship. For many Gaza journalists, the war is not just a professional assignment—it is a lived reality. Most have seen their homes destroyed or damaged, have been repeatedly displaced by evacuation orders, and have lost family members. A survey by Arab Reporters for Investigative Journalism found that nine out of ten Gaza news workers had lost their homes, about one in five had been injured, and a similar proportion had lost loved ones. And that was before the fighting resumed in March 2025 after a brief ceasefire.
Journalists like Nour Swirki have been forced to make impossible choices. Since her home was destroyed early in the war, Swirki and her husband—both journalists—have been displaced seven times. In 2024, they sent their son and daughter to Egypt to stay with family for safety, while they remained in Gaza to continue reporting. "I preferred their safety to my motherhood," Swirki, who works for Asharq News, told the Associated Press. "Death is there (in Gaza) every moment, every second and everywhere." She finds herself haunted by the faces and voices of friends and colleagues lost to the conflict, yet she presses on: "We get afraid and terrified and we work under the harshest conditions, but we still stand up and work."
The dangers are not just physical. The Israeli military has accused some journalists of being militants, including Al Jazeera correspondent Anas al-Sharif, who was killed in an early August 2025 strike on a media tent outside another Gaza hospital. The military claims, based on documents it says were found in Gaza and other intelligence, that al-Sharif was a member of Hamas. Press advocates, however, described his death as following a "smear campaign" that intensified after al-Sharif cried on air over the starvation in Gaza. The military has offered no public evidence to support its claims. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu insisted that the military was not deliberately targeting journalists, calling the Nasser Hospital killings a "tragic mishap." After a preliminary review, the military said it had been targeting what it believed to be a Hamas surveillance camera and claimed that six of the people killed were militants, but again, provided no evidence.
International news organizations such as the Associated Press and Reuters, which lost staff in the Nasser Hospital attack, have demanded a full account of what happened and called on Israel to "take every step to protect those who continue to cover this conflict." The lack of transparency and Israel’s refusal to allow foreign journalists into Gaza has only increased the pressure on local reporters. "You don’t have the luxury to break your soul away from what is happening on the ground," said Mohamed Salama, a former Egyptian reporter now researching the lives of Gaza news workers at the University of Maryland. "It’s about dying or living, escaping violence or not. It’s something we cannot compare (to other wartime journalism) at any level."
The daily grind is relentless. Qannan described working without a break since the start of the war, snatching moments of sleep between live broadcasts, while his family has been displaced seven times. Food is scarce and expensive—he recently posted on social media about cooking a kilogram of pasta that cost him the equivalent of $60, shared among fellow journalists. Yet, when he appears on camera, Qannan tries to project strength, hoping to reassure viewers. Inside, he admits, he is exhausted and scared. "The situation is terrifying more than the human brain can imagine," he said. "The fear that we are living and fear of being targeted are worse than is being described."
For some, the physical wounds are as real as the emotional ones. Mohammed Subeh, a reporter for the Saudi news channel Al-Ekhbariya, was injured by shrapnel in the same strike that killed the Al Jazeera correspondent. Overwhelmed hospitals have been unable to treat his injuries. "A journalist in Gaza lives between covering the war on the ground, following the news and at the same time trying to take care of his safety and the safety of his family," Subeh explained. Despite the danger, he cannot bring himself to leave. "I feel that my presence here is important and that the voice of Gaza should be sent to the world from its own residents. Journalism is not only a job for me, but a mission."
The international community has taken notice. The Press Emblem Campaign has called for an independent international commission to investigate crimes against journalists and to combat what it calls the "total impunity" with which these acts have been committed. The organization points to the UN Security Council Resolution 2222, adopted unanimously in 2015, which condemns violations against journalists in armed conflict and calls for their protection. The resolution emphasizes the responsibility of states to end impunity and to prosecute those responsible for serious violations of international humanitarian law.
As the world marks two years since the start of the war, the journalists of Gaza continue to risk—and too often lose—their lives to bring the story of their people to the world. Their courage, resilience, and sacrifice stand as a somber testament to the power and peril of reporting from the heart of conflict.
