I often think of the faces I would connect to journalism as a child. Lois Lane following a hot lead to crime lords in Metropolis or the fish from SpongeBob reporting the breaking news in Bikini Bottom.
As I got older, fictional figures like Carrie Bradshaw, Andie from How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days, Rory Gilmore (for some part) and Gale Weathers from Scream moulded my impressionable mind. These characters shaped my understanding of journalism’s purpose and the profession’s integrity.
In my formative years, I looked to journalists as agents of justice. They followed a moral code — a sense of duty to the truth, but as the common saying goes, welcome to the real world. To my surprise, the components I thought made a good reporter equally make them a liability for news organizations.
The insatiable desire to uproot the truth holds those in power accountable, serves the disenfranchised, and most of all, is unwavering in the pursuit of telling the story despite the threat of backlash.
The profession I chose to devote to suddenly didn’t look so familiar since the genocide began in Gaza. I felt like I saw the spark die down in Western newsrooms and rekindled like a forest fire in the East. The profession I chose to devote to suddenly didn’t look so familiar.
Hiding behind the cloak of “being unbiased,” headlines and articles from major news organizations confused me. The first thing we learn in journalism is that clear and correct writing is paramount. For coverage of Palestinian deaths, headlines wouldn’t include the cause of death or the parties involved — written as if Palestinians were miraculously found dead out of the blue.
Renowned American newspapers like the New York Times and the Washington Post limited their mention of Palestinian deaths despite the rapid increase in the death toll. In addition, the violence against the martyrs in Gaza was heavily sanitized.
One particular passage from The Guardian said that Palestinian prisoners to be released are women and people “aged 18 and younger.” If only there was a word to describe someone aged 18 and younger. The article was later revised and changed to prisoners to be released as women and “children.”
While reporters in the West are tiptoeing around wording, journalists in Palestine work tirelessly to document the horrors plaguing their homeland. Amidst hunger, raids, gunfire, bombing, the collapse of infrastructure, and the weight of death looming around them, they persist.
Overcoming the obstacles of censorship, journalists in Gaza presented first-hand footage to people around the globe using social media. The raw footage brought to light the atrocities the Israeli military is committing in Gaza, many of which people were oblivious to before.
Despite donning the blue press vest and being protected under humanitarian law, at least 175 media personnel have been killed in Gaza as of April 2025, according to the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ). The vest even makes them a bigger target, yet they continue to champion the notion of journalistic integrity until the very end.
Journalists weren’t just beginning to become endangered following October 7, 2023; Shireen Abu Akleh was killed in 2022 while reporting on an Israeli raid in the West Bank. Yasser Murtaja was killed in 2018 by an Israeli sniper while covering a protest in Gaza. Imad Abu Zahra and his colleague were shot by the Israel Defence Forces (IDF) in 2002 when they went to photograph a tank that slammed into an electricity pole. All these journalists wore clear identification that they were press and were killed in broad daylight.
Here is an article published by Al Jazeera honouring the journalists killed in Gaza.
This is not to say that death and danger are requirements to be a remarkable journalist, but it shows that, regardless of the vulnerability of the profession, individuals continue to enter the field.
I see videos from journalists in Gaza, and it’s obvious they are beloved, respected, and honoured, like on the social media pages of Bisan Owda, Plestia Alaqad and Motaz Azaiza, who are an inspiration to me and the people around them. People put their faith and absolute trust in the work these journalists are doing.
I think about Lama Abu Jamous, a nine-year-old who was inspired by Al Jazeera’s correspondent Wael al-Dahdouh and began reporting herself, inspired by the resilience of her people and those working to make the world hear Gaza. She borrows her mother’s phone and makes short videos to update her followers on the latest things she’s seen.
“I like to post videos related to the war (in Gaza) on Instagram,” said Jamous. “I want the world to hear the voices of the children of Palestine.”
I see potential for the future of journalism. Maybe the relationship between the public and journalists can be salvaged here in the West. Perhaps this was a wake-up call in shattering the illusion of a truly free press, that “everything” can be said unless it challenges what your organization believes.
So long as the guiding light is toward accuracy, authenticity and transparency, there will be no fear of bias or misinformation.
I aspire to be even a fraction of the courage and sense of duty displayed by journalists in Palestine.