‘Let Us Into Gaza’: 55 UK And US Foreign Reporters Urge Israel And Egypt To Lift News Blockade

‘Let us into Gaza’: 55 UK and US foreign reporters urge Israel and Egypt to lift news blockade

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More than 55 foreign correspondents have issued a plea for access to Gaza through Israel and Egypt, saying it would help them bolster the efforts of local journalists whose safety is at risk.

The 55 correspondents represent all the main broadcasters with bases in the UK including BBC News, Sky News, ITV News, Channel 4 News, CNN, NBC, CBS and ABC.

Scroll down for the full letter and list of signatories

They collectively signed an open letter sent both to the Israeli and Egyptian embassies in London urging “free and unfettered access to Gaza for all foreign media”.

They added that it is “vital that local journalists’ safety is respected and that their efforts are bolstered by the journalism of members of the international media” and noted that their media organisations have decades of experience in dealing with the risks of conflict reporting.

Sky News special correspondent Alex Crawford said that like many other journalists, she and her crew have “spent the bulk of the past nearly five months busting a gut to get into Gaza” but they had never managed to get past the Rafah border crossing from Egypt.

In an article for Sky News she highlighted the fact that around 90 journalists are believed to have been killed since the war began on 7 October – 20 killed per month or one every other day. “Can you take that in? Because I am finding that hard to.”

She said that usually media organisations usually rotate staff in and out of a warzone “to allow for recharging, recovering and allowing fresh eyes and minds on events which are physically and mentally exhausting and debilitating” but local journalists in Gaza have been stuck inside and only a few have been able to leave.

CNN chief international correspondent Clarissa Ward, who has signed the letter, is believed to have been the only journalist who had not been residing in Gaza who has been able to gain access without being embedded with the IDF since 7 October, after travelling with a UAE medical team.

Ward said the trip “provided a window into the war zone, but only a small one”.

Crawford wrote that embedding with the IDF “offers only limited insight” as the army “chooses the route, area to head to, how long you are in situ and basically what the journalist gets access to and who they talk to or if they can talk to anyone at all”. Journalists on these trips have not been able to talk to any Palestinians.

The journalists’ full Gaza access letter says:

“Almost five months into the war in Gaza, foreign reporters are still being denied access to the territory, outside of the rare and escorted trips with the Israeli military.

“We urge the Governments of Israel and Egypt to allow free and unfettered access to Gaza for all foreign media. We call on the government of Israel to openly state its permission for international journalists to operate in Gaza and for the Egyptian authorities to allow international journalists access to the Rafah Crossing.

“There is intense global interest in the events in Gaza and for now the only reporting has come from journalists who were already based there.

“It’s vital that local journalists’ safety is respected and that their efforts are bolstered by the journalism of members of the international media. The need for comprehensive on the ground reporting of the conflict is imperative.

“The risks of conflict reporting are well understood by our organisations who have decades of experience of reporting in warzones around the world and in previous wars in Gaza.”