Through the smoke and rubble, Carmen Joukhadar, an Al Jazeera correspondent, rushed to check on her colleague and cameraman, Elie Brakhya, whose face was covered in blood, her finger went missing, and her shoulder became dislocated.
“Carmen, I am in pain,” Elie muttered.
Scenes like this became all too familiar in Gaza for over a year. Then Israel repeated the same actions in southern Lebanon, launching airstrikes claimed to be aimed at Hezbollah but targeting mainly innocent civilians along the way.
Many respected journalists in Lebanon also bore the brunt of Israel’s aggression, targeted simply for doing their jobs — uncovering the truth.
As a ceasefire between Israel and Hezbollah takes effect on Wednesday after nearly 4,000 people have been killed in Lebanon, The New Arab takes a look at the dangers faced by Lebanese journalists and their experiences reporting during the war.
Days after Israel’s war on Gaza began, Amal Khalil, the only journalist covering southern Lebanon for Al-Akhbar newspaper, was targeted in Aalma El Chaeb while with a group of journalists.
This attack came after she had received death threats from an Israeli phone number in September, which included details about her location and even her home address. One message warned, “If you want to keep your head on your shoulders, you better leave the country.”
Months later, on 21 November 2023, Farah Omar and cameraman Rabih Maamari from the Al-Mayadeen television news channel died from injuries sustained during an Israeli attack.
Then, on 25 October 2024, as Israeli attacks in Lebanon escalated, cameramen Ghassan Najjar, engineer Mohamed Reda, and Wissam Qassim were killed in their sleep in Hasbaiyya, a town that had seen little exchange of fire until then.
Finally, on 14 November, Soukaina Mansour Kawtharani was killed in an airstrike on her apartment building.
As of Monday, November 25, Human Rights Watch stated that the Israeli airstrike that killed three journalists in Lebanon last month was an “apparent war crime” and involved a bomb equipped with a US-made guidance kit.
Impossible to mitigate all risks
According to press freedom advocates, most local newsrooms and TV stations in Lebanon lack the necessary safety equipment and training to report from conflict zones.
However, in recent years, in response to these challenges, Reporters Without Borders (RSF) established a regional press freedom centre in Beirut in March. The centre now offers services such as legal and psychological counselling and provides essential equipment, including press vests and helmets, to help ensure journalists can continue their work safely.
John Dagher, RSF’s MENA representative, noted that the organisation has also been actively preparing for worst-case scenarios, but the relentlessness of Israel’s attacks on Lebanon in recent months has made it almost impossible to mitigate all risks.
Since the beginning of Israel’s offensive, numerous media outlets were forced to withdraw their reporters from south Lebanon due to the extreme danger, with many journalists now displaced and seeking safety away from the conflict.
But not every reporter left after Israel began its attacks; Carmen was among the first to head south following the attacks on Gaza on 7 October, initially planning a short two- or three-day assignment, only to find herself caught in escalating violence and uncertainty.
“Usually, whenever there is an escalation or offensive against Palestinians, strikes are launched from southern Lebanon as an act of solidarity,” Carmen initially explained.
She went on to describe her first day of reporting on 13 October from the south, near the village of Aalma El Chaeb, stating that her first broadcast was at 4:55 PM, and by 5:00 PM, five more journalists from AFP and Reuters had joined her team.
At 5:24 PM, she delivered her second live segment, and shortly after, she began preparing for a third. As her supervisors signalled for a camera test, Carmen was chatting with late Reuters photojournalist Issam Abdallah when the first Israeli strike hit at 6:00 PM.
The attack struck the entire crew, leaving Carmen in a state of shock. She clearly remembers seeing Issam lying lifeless on the ground, while freelancer Christina Assi screamed, “I can’t feel my legs!”
In the 37 seconds that followed, Carmen’s survival instincts kicked in as she sought cover. Recalling a crucial lesson from her Hostile Environment and Emergency First Aid Training (HEFAT), which highlighted that vehicles are often targeted, she quickly moved away from the car.
Moments later, a second Israeli strike hit Al Jazeera’s marked press car, and the force of the explosion threw her backwards, with shrapnel fragments piercing her body through her press vest.
As of 7 December 2023, a forensic investigation of Al Jazeera’s footage revealed that the journalists under attack had been surveilled by both a helicopter and a propeller-driven aircraft for 40 minutes before the first strike.
Reflecting on the overall experience of this incident, Carmen said, “It’s the hardest moment. Everything is blurry, and you’re trying to figure out if you’re dead or still alive.”
Since Issam’s death, Carmen has visited his grave but has not been able to attend his funeral due to the injuries she sustained in the attack and the ongoing hostilities.
“They killed him right next to me,” she recalled. “I still remember his face… I still recall his last words: ‘And now what?’”
The struggle for accountability
With the risks to their safety that Lebanese journalists have faced, commentators on the war have urged the Lebanese authorities to take responsibility for protecting their journalists. This includes conducting investigations into the deaths of journalists and taking these cases to international courts.
However, as John sees it, the jurisdiction of international courts remains a grey area.
Although investigations by UNIFIL, Amnesty, RSF, HRW, and Reuters have revealed the deliberate nature of the 13 October attack on journalists, accountability still seems out of reach for journalists and their advocates.
Elsy Moufarrej, the coordinator of the Alternative Press Syndicate in Lebanon, a union established after the 2019 civil uprisings against sectarianism and corruption, fears that impunity and the lack of accountability in Lebanon will allow deliberate attacks to continue, potentially setting a dangerous precedent.
According to press freedom advocates, the foundation of justice lies in documentation, whether it involves conducting thorough investigations or issuing arrest warrants for all those involved — from the person who ordered the strike to the officer who pulled the trigger.
For press freedom advocates, arresting the perpetrators, they argue, would bring justice and closure to the journalists who were killed and to their surviving colleagues.
Yet, although activists are pushing for international prosecution, Sarah Al-Abd, a research assistant at Roskilde University and an expert on international law and security, explained that the current legal mechanisms may raise more questions than answers.
“There is very little hope that the International Criminal Court will ever accept a case against an Israeli national because doing so would essentially imply that the Israeli criminal justice system is inadequately equipped to handle such a case,” she said.
For Carmen, who has been fighting and waiting for accountability, “the only thing you can do is document what happened.”
‘And now what?’
As reported by Alternative Press Syndicate, 12 journalists have been killed since Israel began its attacks on Lebanon, while the Committee to Protect Journalists reported that at least 137 journalists and media workers have been among the tens of thousands killed in Gaza, the West Bank, Israel, and Lebanon since the war began.
Lebanese journalists, including Carmen, refuse to give up on reporting the truth. Despite the horrors she has faced, Carmen returned to live reporting in the south on 18 February 2024. She explained that this was only possible due to the support from her channel and bureau, adding that of the seven journalists targeted in the attack, she is the only one who has returned to work in the area.
Audrey Azzo is a Lebanese-American journalist and researcher based in Chicago, IL. An alumnus of the American University of Beirut and Northwestern’s Medill School of Journalism, she pursues data-driven approaches to report on unjust systemic practices such as police misconduct, homelessness and other human rights abuses
