The Gaza conflict seen through a window damaged by a bullet in the Associated Press Office in Gaza City. Photo:AP/Khalil Hamra.

As a ceasefire was reached over the weekend calming down the armed conflict in Gaza, IMS and several other international media organisations are addressing pressing issues concerning the situation for media operating inside Gaza

During the armed conflict in Gaza, which was the largest military operation by Israeli forces against the Palestinians since 1967, the space for reporting from the conflict gradually became a crucial issue on the international agenda.

The situation saw its immediate culmination on Thursday 15 January, when a media centre housing several media operators in Gaza City was hit by a bomb. No one was killed but two media workers were injured and taken to hospital. According to the Journalist Syndicate in Gaza, four media workers were killed and between 12-15 injured during the conflict.

In an immediate response to the ongoing conflict, IMS last week pledged its support to a shipment of safety equipment organized by the International Federation of Journalists.

Parallel to this, IMS has been investigating the situation in order to assess the needs among media practitioners on the ground in terms of safety equipment and other means of support to enable them to continue reporting the conflict. The ceasefire may offer a window of opportunity for IMS to get direct access to media practitioners and media institutions inside Gaza.

Detrimental consequences for Palestinian journalists

The conflict was not only life-threathening to journalists. In the aftermath, it may also show to have more far-reaching consequences, explains Omeyma Abu Khair, a 44 year old freelancer for Al-Jazeera and the sole provider for her sick mother. Fearing for her and her family's safety, she fled her home in the north of Gaza, when the fighting turned her neighbourhood into one of the hot spots of the conflict and took refuge with her extended family in an apartment in the south of Gaza City. There she has lived throughout the conflict side by side with 14 other members of the family cramped together in the kitchen, which they believed to be the safest place in the apartment.

- I am unable to work.  My channel called me and wanted me to do a piece, but I was unable to leave the apartment to do those stories of the blast at the UN school. I am afraid I shall lose my job, she said over the phone to IMS in the last days of the conflict.

Typically freelancers in Gaza own 400-500 USD monthly which barely cover the costs for housing according to Omeyma. She claims that unemployment among media workers is as high as 85 percent, wherefore the consequences of her losing her job due to the conflict may have detrimental consequences.

International media denied access

Throughout the conflict, international media were denied access to the Gaza strip, despite a ruling by the Israeli Supreme Court on 28 December which backed the request by the Foreign Press Association in Israel to allow journalists into the Gaza strip.

This forced international media to hiring freelance media workers living inside Gaza, like Omeyma Abu Khair and by the look of the images and stories sweeping the world of media, they did a fine job.

The downside was, however, that most Palestinian freelancers have only little or no equipment or training to protect themselves when working in the streets of Gaza. Adding to this, the siege of Gaza blocked any incoming shipments of equipment to the Palestinian media workers. Consequently, the overall situation raised the odds of losses and injuries among media workers to this conflict.

In a telephone interview with IMS, Sakher Abou El Oun, President of Journalist Syndicate in Gaza and a journalist with the international news agency AFP explained that there are around 800 journalists working in the Gaza strip. About 100 of them as permant staff, the rest of them work as freelancers.

- Of my 22 years with AFP, this is the worst war, I have ever covered. Media is being targeted – there is no difference being made any longer between civilians, armed people or media workers. Most of the media workers have no experience in covering a war. And the hundreds of freelancers do not even have the most basic training or equipment - no flak jackets or helmets, no armored car, no satellite phone and no insurance, he said days before the ceasefire.

IMS and other international media organisations take action 

Though the gunfire has died down, for IMS and other international media organisations work is just beginning. IMS is focused on supporting media and media practitioners in Gaza in various ways to alleviate the traumas and consequences they have suffered during the armed conflict. You can follow IMS' further action on this site. below you may also find links to other acting organisations:

The International Federation of Journalists is planning an investigation into alleged violations of press rights after the blast at the Ash-Ash-Shuruq Tower in Gaza City, a building housing several news corporations such as Reuters, Fox news, Sky news, Al-Arabiya and Abu Dhabi TV.

Several international media organisations have followed the situation closely. On 15 January, Reporters Without Borders asked the Israeli military to explain how Gaza media building came to be hit by an explosion. a journalist and a cameraman were injured in the blast.

On 15 January, the International News Safety Institute (INSI) launched a safety advice service for Gaza to provide news media with running updates on safety-related information during the Gaza conflict.

Just before the ceasefire, the Committee to Protect Journalists called the Israeli government to ensure that media facilities in Gaza were not targeted in the conflict.