VOICES FROM GAZA Naser Abu Baker: Please support us, respond to the genocide.

**Interviewed by: Jelena L. Petković**

The Palestinian Journalists' Syndicate (PJS) yesterday made a special appeal on social media to journalists in the field in Gaza to exercise maximum caution and prudence while reporting on current events, emphasizing the need to stay as far away as possible from facilities and residential buildings that may be targets of attacks.

The Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) ordered this morning for the first time that Palestinian civilians must immediately evacuate from the entire city of Gaza, ahead of a major ground offensive against Hamas in the area.

“Gaza is being destroyed, reduced to desolation. Gaza is emptying of its starving population forced to relocate to the so-called 'humanitarian' area of Mavasi,” stated Filip Lazarini, the Director of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA), emphasizing:

“There is no safe place in Gaza, let alone a humanitarian zone. It is a large and growing camp concentrated with starving Palestinians in despair. Warnings about hunger have fallen on deaf ears. Will warnings about this deepening catastrophe also fall on deaf ears? A ceasefire, before it is too late! End impunity before crimes become the new normal!”

Since this morning, footage from Gaza shows how evacuations are being conducted, with some citizens protesting against the evacuation while others attempt to evacuate.

We know all this thanks to journalists in the field, who have been particularly targeted since the beginning of this war. According to data from the International Federation of Journalists (IFJ), since the war in Gaza began when Hamas attacked Israel on October 7, 2023, 235 journalists and media workers have been killed.

“The Israeli military is intensively killing Palestinian journalists in Gaza and systematically targeting them. The Israeli army is preparing a major operation to occupy Gaza while simultaneously targeting and tracking journalists. It is our duty to warn colleagues to exercise special caution. Our colleagues are working in extremely dangerous situations, without food, without water, and without medicine. They are with their families and reporting from schoolyards and hospital courtyards. Civilians and journalists are being killed there too. Five journalists were killed at Naser Hospital in Khan Younis, and six journalists, including Anas al-Sharif, were killed in an attack on Al-Shifa Hospital,” Abu Baker recounts.

**The Largest Massacre of Journalists in the World**

“The situation is horrific. This is the largest massacre that has ever occurred in the world. And it will continue! They will not stop killing journalists! That is why we ask all our colleagues, journalists around the world, and unions and associations, to take some action soon. And to report extensively and thoroughly on this massacre,” warns Abu Baker, explaining:

“There are many things you can do. First of all, you can ask your government, your parliament to take action, to send letters to the Israeli government to stop killing and attacking journalists, to impose sanctions against the Israeli government because they are using their power and weapons to kill journalists. You can organize stands in your unions and associations, on the street, and seek solidarity with our colleagues, with Palestinian journalists. There is much that can be done.”

Baker also describes the threats that, as he says, Palestinian journalists receive from the Israeli army.

“‘We will kill you, we are watching you.’ They constantly threaten us. They want us to leave our country. We will stay in our country. And you cannot even imagine the situation. Our colleagues are working under fire, under rockets, bombs, facing tanks and a rain of bullets. They move through destroyed cities without food, without water. Some of them are in schoolyards, some in shelters, some in the streets, in very poor tents. When the sun is out, it is extremely hot, and in winter, it is very cold. But like lions, they are brave and continue to report on everything happening in Gaza, under threat, under fire, hungry, close to death. They have been without food and water for months. They drink seawater.”

The situation is very dire, emphasizes the president of PJS based in Ramallah.

**Hunger Strikes**

The Palestinian Journalists' Syndicate is doing everything it can to distribute aid to journalists in the field. Recently, they managed to distribute 1,000 packages for journalists at the Solidarity Media Centers in Khan Younis and the city of Gaza.

“We work every day. We must provide them with a minimum of food as much as we can. We are not always successful, but we do not stop trying to collect some money to send them to secure the basics like bread, flour, rice,” says Abu Baker.

Our colleagues, he continues, have been eating the same food for two years.

“There is no vegetable, there is nothing to cook. There is no meat, no chicken in Gaza. We are trying to collect and distribute milk for small children for our colleagues because their children are on the brink of death. There is no milk for small children,” Baker recounted, adding:

“Can you imagine? My colleague has a two-month-old baby. She gives her potatoes because there is no milk. And you know that nothing is good for newborns except milk. One potato costs three euros. One potato, not one kilogram, just one potato. They tell me that the children are constantly crying because they are hungry. Small children are starving. And then they say that it is not true? How is that not true?”

Baker, like previous interviewees from Voices from Gaza, spoke about the ruthless black market for food.

“The prices are so high that you cannot even imagine. One kilogram of sugar is 100 euros. And it was one euro or less than one euro. Because there is nothing in Gaza.”

**23 Months Under Fire**

“We are all human beings. Can you imagine 23 months, 670 days under fire? This is a very big and very terrible war. And they kill every day. And then they say – no, Palestinians are lying. When we report about hunger, is that not true? And they forbid anyone to enter and bring food, water, and milk for children. How is that lying? At the same time, the Israeli government has banned international journalists from entering Gaza,” our interlocutor emphasizes.

He publicly asks the question, “Why don’t they allow foreign journalists to enter Gaza, to report the truth, if this is not true?”

“This is our situation,” Abu Baker explains, “but we will continue and we will not stop reporting in Gaza. The Israeli army targets us because they want to continue the genocide, but we bravely and professionally face these situations and we will not stop.”

He sends a message to colleagues in Europe – there must be extensive reporting on Palestine.

“There must be a focus on the targeting of Palestinian journalists, on hunger, on the killing of civilians, children. I know that colleagues in Europe are in solidarity with us, that they donate and help. We are very, very grateful. But there must be extensive coverage of the situation on the ground, and we urge them to organize more events in solidarity. Such genocide has not happened anywhere else in the world, and the world must know the facts,” Baker emphasizes, concluding:

“We have two million hostages in Gaza. At the same time, there are 20 Israeli hostages. And I hope that they will be released soon, right away. But there are also two million Palestinians; they are hostages in Gaza. Hungry and under fire.”