Wednesday, May 28th, 2025 | 10am ET / 5pm Palestine Time
Join Al-Shabaka's latest Policy Lab: Israel’s War on Palestinian Journalists
Over the last 18 months, Israeli forces have killed more than 230 journalists, primarily in Gaza but also in Lebanon and Syria. To put this in perspective, more journalists have been killed during Israel’s ongoing genocide than in both world wars, the US invasions of Vietnam and Afghanistan, and the war in Ukraine combined.
All of this is by design. These journalists are not being killed in crossfire—they are being deliberately targeted in a mass assassination campaign intended to prevent news of Israel’s war crimes from reaching an international audience. Despite the scale of this assault, Western journalists and media outlets have remained silent, allowing Israel's unprecedented attacks on press freedom—and on the Palestinian people—to continue unchecked.
In this policy lab, Mariam Barghouti and Sharif Abdel Kouddous join host Tariq Kenney-Shawa to discuss Israel’s targeted assassination campaign against Palestinian journalists, the complicity of Western media in normalizing these crimes, and how this silence allows Israel to get away with genocide.
Mariam Barghouti is a member of Al-Shabaka and a writer and journalist based in the West Bank. She has been covering the region as a reporter and analyst for over ten years. She served as the senior Palestine correspondent for Mondoweiss, and her reporting and analysis have been featured in Al-Jazeera English, the Guardian, BBC, and Middle East Eye among others.
Sharif Abdel Kouddous is a journalist and the Middle East/North Africa editor at Drop Site News, based in New York City and Cairo. He has reported from across the Arab world and internationally for various TV and print outlets. He won a Peabody award for his documentary, "The Night Won't End: Biden's War on Gaza;" a George Polk award for his investigation into the killing of Palestinian journalist Shireen Abu Akleh; and an Emmy award for his coverage of the Trump administration's Muslim ban.
Tariq Kenney-Shawa is Al-Shabaka's US Policy Fellow and co-host of Al-Shabaka's Policy Lab series. He holds a master's degree in international affairs from Columbia University. Tariq's research and writing have covered a range of topics, from the role of open-source intelligence in exposing Israel's war crimes to analysis of Palestinian liberation tactics.
Note: This discussion will take place in English. Our policy labs are supported through the generosity of donors. They are free to attend, though we accept contributions on a sliding scale upon registration to help sustain the program.