5 attacks on journalists in Palestine

Since October 7, the Israeli army’s attacks on press infrastructures and journalists have reached an unprecedented level. At least 122 journalists have been killed, many more have been injured, and buildings housing press organizations, perhaps the only refuge for journalists in the Gaza Strip, have been destroyed. These actions have had devastating consequences, hampering the flow of information and preventing the reality of the war from being disseminated worldwide. Only journalists from Gaza are able to provide first-hand reports on the situation within the Gaza Strip. In doing so, they face daily challenges to survive and find safe places to stay, often finding that their workplaces have been wiped out. According to the Palestinian Journalists’ Syndicate (PJS), around 70 press organizations, including local radio stations, news agencies, transmission towers, and journalist training institutes, have been partially or completely destroyed since the start of the war. This pattern, however, is not solely confined to the Gaza Strip. A recent case has also been identified in the West Bank, where the Israeli army is applying the same strategies, as shown in one of the cases we investigated below.

The international network of journalists, Forbidden Stories, has carried out an investigation in collaboration with Agence France-Presse (AFP), Arab Reporters for Investigative Journalism (ARIJ), Le Monde, Radio France, Paper Trail Media and other international media outlets as part of the Gaza Project. For this project, Earshot has analysed the audio of five cases where journalists or media infrastructure were targeted. Our findings, supported by witness testimonies and visual and spatial analysis, reveal a pattern of behavior by the Israeli army to knowingly conflate press with military targets.

Attack on Al Hajji tower , Gaza:

The tower housing French news agency AFP in Gaza was the target of at least two direct strikes on November 2, 2023 – despite assurances from the Israeli army that it had classified AFP premises as “not to be targeted”. Earshot’s analysis confirms that the server room of AFP located on the 11th floor of the Hajji tower in the Gaza Strip was struck between two to four times. A live feed camera on the balcony of the floor directly below captures all four of these strikes. Earshot analysed the sound of the footage and could conclude that all four of these strikes were caused by tank shells fired from an Israeli tank positioned approximately 3 kilometers northeast and that at least two of these strikes hit the server room. Audio analysis also shows that it is likely that the building was hit with weapons armed with delay detonation fuses designed to detonate after they have penetrated a space rather than upon impact.

The maming of journalists in Nuseirat, Gaza:

On April 12, 2024, journalists Sami Barhoum and Sami Shehadeh were the target of an Israeli attack in Nuseirat, in the Gaza Strip. They were wearing press armour and helmets, and had arrived at the scene in a car marked "TV". Sami Barhoum, who works with TRT (Turkish Radio and Television Corporation), was seriously injured and had his leg amputated. Two videos capture the moment a projectile hit their location. Working at the request of Radio France, Earshot analyzed the sound of the two videos and confirmed witness testimony that the journalists were highly likely hit by a tank shell fired by an Israeli tank stationed about 1.1km (±100 metres) northeast of the journalists, up Omar Ben Al-khatab 9 street, near the bridge on Gaza valley.

Journalists exposed to drone attacks:

On February 18, Basel Kheireddine and his brother Moumen, both employees of Al Jazeera, were working on a report on the famine affecting the northern Gaza Strip, an area isolated from the rest of Palestinian territory by the Israeli army. At 11:04 AM, while they were filming a child scavenging for food, an explosion shook the area.

Earshot analysed the audio of the video for this investigation, and identified that an Unmanned Aeriel Vehicle, likely the IAI Eitan, was flying directly over the journalists at the time of the strike. The position of the UAV could be determined by examining the stereophonic information and the relative intensity across the left and right audio channels. In the 7 seconds preceding the blast the sound of the UAV clearly crosses the stereophonic field of the camera from left to right and back to the left a total of 4 times. Should the UAV not be directly above the camera, such distinct and rapid transitions across the stereo field would not have been audible (Figure 1). Audio evidence strongly suggests that the UAV was directly above the journalists' position and that the Israeli army would therefore have had sufficient information to know that it was firing at journalists and children.

Shooting at Journalists and destroying equipment in Deir al-Ghusun, West Bank, May 4th, 2024:

On May 4, 2024, two journalists from Al Araby TV were filming an Israeli raid in the West Bank when they came under fire. For Forbidden Stories and its partners, Earshot analysed the sound of two gunshots that they captured on video, one of which struck the camera. Both of the gunshots were aimed towards the journalists, with the second of the two gunshots highly likely to have been fired from the location of Israeli army vehicles identified by the journalists about 62 meter from the camera. Analysis of both gunshots also confirms witness statements that the journalists were fired at from more than one location and shooter.

When an intermediate calibre gun is fired towards a recording device two sounds are typically audible. First, the sound created by the bullet either making impact or creating a supersonic shockwave as it moves through air. The second is the sound of the muzzle blast which propagates from the muzzle of the gun towards the recording device. While both the bullet and the blast have the same point of origin, the bullet travels at a supersonic velocity and the muzzle blast reaches the camera at the speed of sound. Both the supersonic sound of the bullet and the muzzle blast are audible in the recording in both gunshotsFrom the relatively long interval between these sounds, 78 milliseconds for the first gunshot (at 01.460s) and 110 millisecond for the second gunshot (at 33.618s), we can determine that the weapon was an intermediate calibre rifle with bullet speeds in excess of 800 m/s such as the standard Israeli army issued M4 Carbine assault rifle.

Earshot simulated ammunition fired by an Israeli M4 assault rifle (typically a 5.56x45mm NATO bullet which travels at speeds of about 900m/s) directly at the camera and found that to produce an interval of 78 milliseconds between supersonic shockwave and muzzle blast as observed in the first gunshot, the shooter must be positioned about 44 metres away from the camera, whereas to produce an interval of 110 milliseconds as observed in the second gunshot, the shooter must be positioned about 62 metres from the camera. This difference in the interval in time indicates two different shooting positions, and therefore two different shooters.

Witness testimonies identified Israeli army vehicles about 62 metres from the camera on the road below the hill from where the journalists were filming, and identified the vehicles as a source of gunfire. Earshot’s analysis confirms these testimonies as this location is consistent with the distance required to produce the interval in time between a supersonic bullet and a muzzle blast arriving at the camera as observed in the second gunshot.

In December 2023, Earshot published an investigation with Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International which revealed that the Israeli army had targeted journalists in southern Lebanon. The full report is available here.