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‘We returned from hell’
THE COMMITTEE to Protect Journalists (CPJ) in the US has compiled interviews with 59 Gazan journalists who have been released from Israeli jails. They are unutterably grim.
Journalist Rami Abu Zubaida told CPJ he lost 35 kilograms over his year held in Israeli detention facilities
On and since 7 October 2023 at least 264 journalists and media workers have been confirmed killed in Israel (4), Gaza (237), the West Bank (2), Lebanon (9), Syria (1), Iran (3) and Yemen (9). The Freelance has found a further 106 unconfirmed reports of killings in Gaza. In many cases there is evidence that the journalists were deliberately targeted as journalists.
The CPJ has documented 98 arrests of journalists and media workers in Israel and the occupied Palestinian territories between 7 October 2025 and 30 January 2026; 92 by Israel and 6 by Palestinian authorities. Most of the former were held in “administrative detention”, under a law dating from the British Mandate in Palestine (1920 to 1948) that allows people to be held without trial for six-month periods, renewable indefinitely.
Of these 65 have been released. Of the 59 interviewed, all but one reported what they described as torture, abuse, or other forms of violence. Ismail al-Ghoul was killed in an Israeli air strike after being released and five others declined to be interviewed. Threats of re-arrest or death if they spoke publicly were reported by 31.
The CPJ notes the difficulty of verifying the interviewees' accounts; and that what they recounted was “strikingly consistent”. That included physical assaults, forced stress positions, sensory deprivation, sexual violence and medical neglect.
“At least seven” detainees described what they called a “disco room” in which Hebrew and English songs played at an unrelenting volume. The CPJ highlights Ahmed Abdel Aal saying that every time he drifted into unconsciousness an electric shock or a blow jolted him awake.
Fifty-five of the 59 journalists interviewed reported extreme hunger or malnutrition.
Annual toll
Meanwhile the International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) on 25 February published its report of media professionals killed in 2025. It records 128, of them 11 women, and including nine accidental deaths.
IFJ President Dominique Pradalié said: “Year after year, journalists are killed for doing their jobs: publishing information in the public interest and exposing corruption and war crimes. We are campaigning for the adoption of a legal instrument designed to end this cycle of impunity: an international convention led by the IFJ that will ensure those who plan, order or carry out the murder of a journalist are held accountable. It is time for UN member states to adopt this convention once and for all in order to protect journalists, defend press freedom and safeguard our democracies. All democratic countries must publicly support it.”
On the same day the CPJ issued its own list of deaths inthe year.
Palestinian journalists recount torture in Israeli prisons cpj.org (content warning)
2025 killed list report ifj.org