Al Manassa joins more than 250 media outlets from 50 countries in blacking out their front pages, websites, and live broadcasts for 24 hours. The action is both an urgent plea and solemn outcry to stop Israel’s killing of journalists in Gaza and open the besieged strip to the international press.
It is a symbolic cloth of defiance stretched across the digital world, uniting newsrooms in a shared gesture of grief and defiance. The campaign, coordinated by Avaaz and Reporters Without Borders, is “the first time in modern history, newsrooms across every continent will coordinate a large-scale editorial protest,” describes the campaign's joint statement.
“At the rate journalists are being killed in Gaza by the Israeli army, there will soon be no one left to keep you informed. This isn’t just a war against Gaza, it’s a war against journalism,” Thibault Bruttin, director general of RSF, cautions.
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“Journalists are being targeted, killed and defamed. Without them, who will alert us to the famine? Who will expose war crimes? Who will show us the genocides?” he added.
The protest unfolds in powerful imagery. Newspapers roll off the press with front pages mourning in black ink, carrying only a stark message. Radio and television stations fall into silence before airing a joint declaration.
Online outlets dim their banners and homepages, an echo of grief and solidarity across screens worldwide. Editors, correspondents, and reporters attach their own names to this blackout, staking their voices on the line.
The action comes as the toll of journalists killed in Gaza reaches 247 since October 7, 2023. Organizers characterize it as “the deadliest war on journalists in modern times.” Israel bars foreign media from entering Gaza for nearly two years, forcing Palestinian journalists to report under siege and bombardment.
“The whole world is witnessing the erosion of guarantees of international law for the protection of journalists,” remarked director general of RSF, Thibaut Bruttin on Israel's flagrant violation of UN Security Council Resolution 2222, adopted in 2015.
The resolution requires the protection of journalists and media workers as civilians in armed conflict. It also makes clear that media offices and equipment are civilian assets, not military targets, and must not be attacked.
“Solidarity from newsrooms and journalists around the world is essential. They should be thanked — this fraternity between reporters is what will save press freedom. Solidarity will save all freedoms,” Bruttin asserts.
Andrew Legon, Campaign Director at Avaaz, said: “It is very clear that Gaza is being turned into a graveyard for journalists for a reason. Israel’s far-right government is trying to finish the job in the dark, without the scrutiny of the press. If the last witnesses are silenced, the killing won't stop—it will simply go unseen. That’s why we’re united with newsrooms around the world today to say: 'We cannot, we will not, let that happen!'”
Anthony Bellanger, secretary general of the International Federation of Journalists also underlines that “every journalist killed in Gaza was someone’s colleague, friend, or family. They risked everything to tell the world the truth, and they paid with their lives. The public's right to know has been deeply damaged as a result of this war. We demand justice and a UN International Convention on the safety and independence of journalists.”
In its own editorial, Al Manassa explains its decision to join the blackout: “This is not mourning. Mourning would come after justice and accountability. This is rage at the fact that those who murdered our colleagues continue to get away with it. Rage at the impunity and the silence. As much as it is a demand for accountability, for prosecution, for justice. We declare our full, unwavering solidarity with the journalists who remain in Palestine. We call for their protection.”
The most recent victim is Palestinian journalist Islam Abed, a correspondent for Al Quds Al Yawm television. She was killed on Sunday evening when Israeli occupation forces shelled her apartment in Gaza City’s Al-Rimal neighborhood.
The Israeli occupation army’s strike on Islam’s home wiped out an entire household. She, her husband, two of their children, and a child from a neighboring family were all killed in the blast. A single shell tore through a family, through a neighborhood, and through the fragile threads of Gaza’s press community, leaving a moment of silence heavy with mourning.
For them—for every one of them—Al Manassa is blacking out its homepage for 24 hours.
