Antoinette Lattouf Instagram – ‘Gaza has unleashed a global crisis for free speech’. Listen to the excellent Jen Robinson.
Silencing storytellers—whether through violence, sackings, lawsuits, or propaganda—seeks to crush the truth. Fair, factual and free speech is being targeted.
Pianist @jaysongillham and I know this firsthand when we dared to share facts from reputable sources @humanrightswatch and @committeetoprotectjournalists about the unfolding genocide in Gaza. Both of us felt compelled to take legal action against attempts to intimidate and silence us because of the dangerous precedent it sets for our industry peers and for the victims of this ongoing violence.
Those seeking to cover up or distract people from war crimes being committed by Israel just so happen to have picked the wrong musician and journalist to target. Our voices grew louder and moral clarity sharpened.
But while we face bullying, and loss of work— other storytellers pay the ultimate price: their lives.
At @sxswsydney in October this year, the brilliant human rights and international law barrister Jen Robinson delivered a powerful keynote that connected our experiences to a much graver reality—the targeting and killing of journalists by the IDF and its supporters . Jen’s ICC complaint on behalf of Shireen Abu Akleh, the Palestinian-American Al Jazeera journalist killed by Israeli forces in 2022 while wearing a blue press vest, remains unresolved. Shireen’s family still fights for justice. Since her death, over 140 Palestinian journalists have been killed in Gaza.
Yet in Australia, these stories are buried. The relentless killing of Palestinian journalists barely make headlines—our front pages instead demonise peaceful protests calling for freedom, justice, human rights, an end to violence and the release of hostages and those unlawfully detained without charges.
Because: Objectivity. Impartiality. Independence. Etc etc.
But we cannot stay silent. If we have a voice, we have a duty to use it for those robbed of theirs.
@suigenerisjen | Posted on 15/Dec/2024 12:21:32
