“The communications blackout is one of the consequences of the daily attacks affecting journalists in Gaza as the blockade and horrible humanitarian crisis continue. More than 210 of Gaza’s journalists have been killed by the Israeli army. Bombardments on telecommunications infrastructure prevent the transmission of information about the strikes and massacres that follow these blackouts. By depriving journalists of ways to communicate, these attacks obstruct their work and deprive the public of vital information. Reporters must have the means to work and communicate in accordance with  international law, which the Israeli army keeps violating.”

“When they cut communications, we have no way of knowing what’s happening,” explained war reporter Rami Abou Jamous, winner of the Bayeux Calvados-Normandy War Correspondents Prize in 2024, and contributor to the French online media Orient XXI, speaking to RSF from northern Gaza. “When they impose this blackout, tragedy is never far,” he explains, as immediately afterwards, “an explosion rings out, the house shakes, but we don’t know what’s going on, who has been hit. We simply have no information.”

On 17 September, Rami Abou Jamous suddenly stopped communicating on the WhatsApp group “Gaza Vie”, which he administers to exchange with other journalists around the world. The infrastructure of local telecom provider Paltel had just been hit by Israeli strikes, cutting off internet access for residents of northern Gaza.

In the hours following the blackout, residential areas in Gaza city came under heavy bombardment, according to RSF information. Journalists were suddenly unable to report in real time, as they usually do.

“We rely on antennas and relay stations installed on top of high towers and rooftops,” explains Khodor al-Zaanoun, a contributor to the Palestinian news agency WAFA and the U.S. network CNN, in a phone call with RSF — patchy due to a partially restored but unstable connection since Thursday evening. “When these towers and buildings are hit, we lose all communication. This has a huge impact on journalists. We can no longer communicate with our colleagues and sources inside Gaza. We cannot send photos or videos to the outside world.”

Originally from Tel al-Hawa, a neighborhood in southern Gaza, the journalist had to leave his home with his family on September 18, after “successive strikes, car bombs, and targeted drone fire,” he told RSF.

A shortage of reliable information on Gaza

With Gaza under blockade, the foreign press depends entirely on exchanges with local reporters and correspondents. “For two days, I couldn’t get any information,” says Ola Al Zaanoun, RSF correspondent in Gaza, who was evacuated in March 2024 and now lives in Cairo, the capital of Egypt. “My source told me the army had bombed a location, but she didn’t know which one. She said she had heard an airstrike, but we only received the details much later and, of course, without images.”

Freelance journalist Marie Jo Sader, who covers Gaza from France, described the same difficulties: “It was hard to reach anyone through the usual channels. When I managed to get through to some people, they confirmed they didn’t know what was happening, even in their own neighbourhood.”

Since October 2023, Israel has imposed a blockade on the Gaza Strip, preventing foreign media from entering the Strip without being embedded in the Israeli army. According to RSF figures, over 210 journalists have been killed in Gaza by the Israeli army over the past two years. For at least 56 of those victims, RSF has gathered evidence strongly indicating that they were deliberately targeted or killed because of their work as journalists. The organisation has filed four war crimes complaints before the International Criminal Court (ICC) in the past two years.