Israeli attacks against journalists, media freedom decried at UNSC

Maldives President Mohamed Muizzu says attacks are meant to prevent the world from knowing what is happening in Gaza.

The United Nations Security Council has been urged to not turn a blind eye to Israel’s attacks on press freedom, including the targeting of journalists and closure of Al Jazeera’s bureaus, during its war on Gaza.

“[There are] journalists from Palestine, Lebanon and Al Jazeera who Israel has killed or closed their offices while they risk everything to ensure we don’t all return to a world where children and babies die in silence, perish in darkness,” Maldives President Mohamed Muizzu told the 15-member body on Wednesday.

More than 110 journalists and media workers – including four Al Jazeera reporters – have been killed in Israeli attacks since the war began in October last year, according to the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ), while authorities in Gaza have put the figure at 173. Israel denies targeting journalists.

In addition to destroying Gaza’s media infrastructure, Israeli authorities in recent months have also shut down Al Jazeera’s bureaus in Israel and the occupied West Bank.

The closures have drawn condemnation from press freedom groups and rights activists, with the CPJ saying “Israel’s efforts to censor Al Jazeera severely undermine the public’s right to information on a war that has upended so many lives in the region”.

In his speech at the UN Security Council, Muizzu decried the attacks against journalists as he reminded members that it was this body that had established the architecture of a “world order based on justice”.

“That architecture is now crumbling under the rubble of destroyed homes, hospitals and schools, disintegrating under the weight of the bodies of innocent