When we encouraged NZFOI members to watch the Inside Gaza documentary at the 2026 DocEdge Festival, it wasn’t because we expected them to agree with its framing. We recommended it because it is important to understand how narratives about Gaza are constructed, and how the global public absorbs them. The film relies heavily on footage, narration, and “on‑the‑ground” reporting from inside a territory where Hamas controls access, messaging, and the entire information environment.
Watching the trailer alone raises an obvious question:
What does “journalism” actually mean in Gaza?
This matters because most people do not consume news through careful investigation. They encounter it in passing — a TV in a hotel lobby, a bar, a waiting room, a social‑media clip. They see a PRESS vest, a microphone, rubble in the background, and a confident voiceover. Their brain fills in the rest.
The appearance of journalism becomes the credibility of journalism.
And in Gaza, that appearance is easy to manufacture.
What Journalism Looks Like in Gaza — and Why It Misleads the Public
In democratic societies, “journalist” is a profession with clear standards: independence, verification, editorial oversight, and separation from political or military actors. Gaza is not such an environment. Hamas controls:
- press passes and media unions
- access to locations
- what can be filmed
- what can be published
- who receives a PRESS vest
- who is allowed to work with foreign media
This means that anyone appearing on screen — whether a freelancer, a propagandist, a political activist, or a dual‑role militant — can present themselves as a journalist. And to the outside world, they all look the same.
The public cannot distinguish:
- a genuine independent reporter
- a freelancer selling footage
- a Hamas media‑wing employee
- a political activist with a camera
- a militant who films during the day and fights at night
Yet all of them may be credited by mainstream media as “journalists” or “local reporters.”
This is how credibility is laundered through the visual language of journalism.
How This Led to the ITIC Study report on Gaza Journalists
It is in this context that the Meir Amit Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center published its 2025 report, “Profiles of Journalists and Media Personnel Killed in the Gaza Strip During the War.” The study examined 266 individuals publicly described as journalists or media workers killed in Gaza and concluded that a significant proportion had some form of affiliation with Hamas or Palestinian Islamic Jihad.
The report has been widely discussed and often criticised — but mostly for definitional reasons. Press‑freedom organisations use a de jure definition of “journalist”: accredited, independent, civilian, working for a recognised outlet. The ITIC study instead used a de facto definition:
Anyone who functioned as a journalist in practice — producing footage, reports, or content that shaped global narratives.
This included:
- freelancers
- cameramen
- fixers
- social‑media reporters
- people wearing PRESS vests
- individuals whose footage was purchased by mainstream media
- media workers for Hamas‑run channels
Critics argue that this definition is too broad. But in Gaza, the de facto approach is the only realistic one, because the de jure categories break down in a territory where a militant organisation controls the media environment.
The study’s approach is therefore not “flawed” so much as addressing a different question:
Who is actually producing the content that shapes global perceptions of the war?
Why the investigation’s De Facto Approach Has Legitimacy
The investigation’s core insight remains relevant:
In Gaza, the line between journalist, activist, propagandist, and militant is blurred — sometimes deliberately — and the global public cannot tell the difference.
This is not a theoretical concern. It is a structural feature of the information environment. Hamas controls access, messaging, and the risks faced by anyone who deviates from approved narratives. In such a setting, the appearance of journalism is easy to manufacture, and the public is easily influenced by it.
This is why NZFOI members were encouraged to watch Inside Gaza with informed scepticism. Not because all Gaza reporting is false, but because the environment itself makes independent verification impossible, and because the public is highly susceptible to the signals of journalism — the vest, the microphone, the tone, the format — regardless of the source.
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