'Shame' Israel still denying media access to Gaza: watchdog

The Foreign Press Association condemned Israel on Thursday for continuing to deny independent access to foreign journalists nearly two years into the war in Gaza.

"Israel must stop killing journalists in Gaza and give the foreign press free and independent access to the territory," said the association, which has more than 350 members working for foreign media outlets in Israel and the Palestinian Territories.

"This continued and institutionalised delay in the process is a mark of shame on Israel and its allies, who have too often chosen not to speak up in defence of basic press freedoms," the board of the association said in a statement.

An AFP journalist sits on the FPA's board of directors.

The association pointed out that Israel's supreme court had repeatedly postponed hearings on its petition demanding access to Gaza.

The association "notes with dismay that it has been a full year since it submitted its second petition to the Israeli Supreme Court for free and independent access to Gaza", the statement said.

"Despite the urgency, the court has repeatedly agreed to the government's request for delays and postponed one hearing after another."

The association also slammed Israel for targeting Palestinian journalists operating inside Gaza.

"Palestinian journalists have been directly targeted. Places where they habitually gathered have been bombed," it said, adding that at least 200 of them have been killed by Israeli fire.

"Despite all of these dangers, they continue to inform the world while facing not only violence, but also hunger and repeated displacement."

Last month, Israeli strikes on a hospital in Gaza killed more than 20 people, including five journalists, according to local authorities.

The FPA also criticised Israeli leaders and the military for going to "extreme lengths to discredit the work of our Palestinian colleagues, and to a great extent, the work of the foreign press as a whole".

"This campaign of delegitimisation has created and amplified hazardous working conditions for journalists, leading to the normalisation of incitement, harassment and attacks on foreign press both from Israeli civilians and members of Israel's security forces."

Israel's military has accused many of the journalists killed in its strikes of being "terrorists", members of the Palestinian militant groups Hamas or Islamic Jihad.

The Gaza war, which has devastated the Palestinian territory, was triggered by an unprecedented Hamas attack on Israel on October 7, 2023.

During this period, the Israeli military has taken only a handful of foreign journalists into Gaza, which remains under Israeli blockade.