A lawsuit against Israel on charges of obstructing the work of French journalists in Gaza news

The International Federation of Journalists and the National Syndicate of Journalists in France announced on Tuesday that they had filed a lawsuit in Paris against the Israeli authorities on charges of “obstructing the freedom of the press,” for preventing French media professionals from covering the war on Gaza.

They explained that the actions of which they accuse the Israeli authorities may constitute “war crimes” that the Anti-Terrorism Public Prosecution in Paris has the right to investigate, given that they affected French citizens.

They added that this is the first case they have filed “in support of the crime of obstructing the freedom to practice the press,” and also the first in which they ask the French Public Prosecution to “apply this charge in an international context,” according to the text submitted to the judiciary and published on the “France Info” electronic news website.

Lawyer Louise Al-Yafi, who participated in filing the lawsuit, explained that it refers to “a deliberate, and sometimes violent, obstruction that prevents French journalists from working in the Palestinian territories and harms the freedom of the press.”

As for her colleague Ines Dafoe, she pointed out that the lawsuit “also relates to the growing insecurity targeting French journalists in the occupied West Bank.”

War crimes

It considered that “these abuses, which violate international humanitarian law, also constitute war crimes.”

A French journalist working for several news outlets, who requested that his name not be published, also filed a lawsuit accusing settlers of assaulting him while he was covering events in the occupied territories.

Reporters Without Borders counted the killing of at least more than 210 journalists since the start of the Israeli war on Gaza on October 7, 2023, while other statistics confirm that the number exceeds 250 journalists.

Since the beginning of the war, the Israeli authorities have prevented foreign journalists from entering Gaza independently, and have allowed only a small number of reporters to accompany their forces.

Several lawsuits were filed in France related to the war on Gaza, most notably targeting French-Israeli soldiers from the elite unit of the Israeli army, and the French arms company Eurolinks, in addition to French-Israeli citizens on charges of complicity in the crime of settlement.

It is noteworthy that the Anti-Terrorism Public Prosecution requested a Parisian investigating judge to open an investigation into “war crimes” in the case of the killing of two French children in an Israeli bombing of Gaza in October 2023.