Tuesday, December 9, 2025

Special Feature: Selected Poems for Reflections on Reporters Without Borders' Report: "The Israeli Army Is the Worst Enemy of Journalists"

The first casualty, when war comes, is truth.

-- Hiram Johnson (1866-1945)


"Israel's oldest dailyHaaretz," which was was sanctioned by the Israeli government on Nov. 24, 2024

(FYI: Ranked 101st in 2024's World Press Freedom Index, Israel fell to 112 (score: 51. 055) during 2025, sandwiched between Haiti and Madagascar

Against the Drowning Noise of Other Words, XLIII: "covering the war"

Covering the War

you, a reporter
hide behind the headlines
of deaths and famine ...
I mourn this Dead-Sea-wide chasm 
bombed out by your contextless words 

beware, beware
of my hunger and anger
as airstrikes rage 
I drop fake-news-busting wordbombs
on the spokesmen for Israel



Dec. 9, 2025: IDF Strikes Responsible for Nearly Half of Journalists Killed Over the Past Year, Report Finds

The Gaza Strip remained the world's most dangerous region for reporters in the past 12 months...

The Paris-based organization's annual report covers the period of December 1, 2024 through December 1, 2025. Its report found that 67 journalists were killed around the world during that time – 29 of them, or 43 percent, in Gaza.

"The Israeli army is the worst enemy of journalists," the report states, adding that a total of 220 journalists have been killed in Gaza since Hamas' attack on October 7, 2023, and the subsequent two-year war waged in the Strip...

(FYI: Reporters Without Borders' report, December 9: 

2025 ROUND-UP: of journalists killed, detained, missing and held hostage worldwide)


written in response to Democracy Now, DECEMBER. 20, 2023: [NewYork-based, American NGO] Committee to Protect Journalists: Israel Is Killing Media Workers at Unprecedented Pace

smoky rubble
a bullet-riddled helmet
marked PRESS



Against the Drowning Noise of Other Words, CL: "first casualty of war"

              the
           bloodied
             man
nailed to a wooden cross
               in
               a
             press
              vest



To conclude today's "Special Feature" post, I would like to share wth you the latest entry of Against the Drowning Noise of Other Words, CCLVI: "blood libel"

Gaza famine!?
It's blood libel, blood libel ...
flanked by Flags of Zion
the P/Crime Minister rumbles
to cameras' rapid fire


FYI: The Times of Israel, August 23 2025: Netanyahu’s office calls Gaza famine declaration a ‘modern blood libel’

After a UN hunger monitor on Friday, August 22 declared for the first time that famine had struck northern Gaza, Israel vehemently denied the reports as “lies” and “modern blood libel.” 

No comments:

Post a Comment