Need for protection of civilians underscored

Cease-fire urged amid raging violence as journalists, aid workers killed in Gaza

The Israel-Palestine conflict has become the deadliest period for journalists and aid workers, with experts calling for a return to respecting international humanitarian laws and for an immediate cease-fire amid the worsening security situation and lack of protection for civilians.

According to the New York-based Committee to Protect Journalists, or CPJ, which has been investigating all reports of journalists and media workers killed, injured, or missing, the flare-up in the Middle East violence since Oct 7 "has led to the deadliest month for journalists" since the nongovernmental organization began gathering data in 1992.

In the CPJ update on Tuesday, 39 journalists and media workers have so far been confirmed dead. Of these, 34 are Palestinians, four are Israelis and one is Lebanese. Meanwhile, eight journalists have been reported injured, and three missing. Nine have been arrested.

The Palestinian death toll has surpassed 10,569, according to the Palestinian health ministry in Gaza. About 1,400 people in Israel have died.

In a statement posted on its website, the CPJ emphasized that journalists "are civilians doing important work during times of crisis and must not be targeted by warring parties".

It said those in Gaza in particular "have paid, and continue to pay, an unprecedented toll" and face exponential threats with many having lost colleagues, families, and media facilities and are seeking safety "when there is no safe haven or exit".

"Many of the journalists move to places where they think it's safe, like hospitals and United Nations-run schools," Mohammad Abualrob, assistant professor and chairperson of the Department of Media at Birzeit University in the West Bank, said.

"But lately, hospitals as well as United Nations-run schools have also been targeted," he added.

Abualrob also said Israel's total blockade of Gaza was preventing foreign journalists from covering the conflict adequately, and many civilians have turned to social media platforms like TikTok to share their stories on the ground.

Abualrob believes that given the death toll of Palestinian journalists, there may be a deliberate intent to target them, along with the healthcare workers and teams who have been serving the civilians and injured people.

Ambulances attacked

"Several doctors and ambulances (are also) being targeted by Israelis," said Abualrob, noting that such targeting is a violation of international law.

At a news briefing on Monday, UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said the nightmare in Gaza "is more than a humanitarian crisis" and that it "is a crisis of humanity".

In Tokyo, G7 foreign ministers on Wednesday issued a "unified message" on the conflict, including a call for humanitarian pauses in the fighting, and for a "peace process", Japan's top diplomat said.

Winding up a two-day meeting, the nations said in a joint statement that Israel has "the right to defend itself". They noted that the G7 is "working intensively to prevent the conflict from escalating further and spreading more widely" and also using sanctions or other measures "to deny Hamas the ability to raise and use funds to carry out atrocities".

"We support humanitarian pauses and corridors to facilitate urgently needed assistance, civilian movement, and the release of hostages," the statement noted.

Hussein Hassan, an international aid worker who is an advocate of humanitarian access in crisis-hit countries, told China Daily that it is very unfortunate that a significant number of humanitarian workers have been killed in Gaza.

"These aid workers have risked their lives to provide vital aid to civilians and they are exposing themselves to aggressive airstrikes, bullets, and rockets. Killing them would jeopardize the continuity of critical humanitarian assistance," said Hassan.

Media reports said recently that around 100 Israeli doctors had signed a petition calling for the destruction of Al-Shifa Hospital in the Gaza Strip. Their petition alleged that Al-Shifa, Gaza's largest hospital, served as a base for "Palestinian armed groups".

"For a doctor to call for bombing a hospital is unprecedented and I am not sure if we have ever heard such a call from medical specialists or service providers," said Hassan.

Jiang Xueqing in Tokyo and agencies contributed to this story.