Palestinian Researcher Dismantles Israel’s List of So-Called ‘Terrorist’ Journalists Slain in Gaza

Researcher Muhammad Shehada reviewed all 170 names on the IDF’s list of supposed militants posing as journalists and found it to be “the most sloppy shameless fraud possible.”


Palestinian journalists work with cameras, laptops and limited equipment from makeshift press areas as they continue reporting from Gaza City on International Day of Solidarity with Palestinian Journalists, in Gaza City, Palestine, on September 26, 2026.
(Photo by Saeed M. M. T. Jaras/Anadolu via Getty Images)

Stephen Prager
Oct 04, 2026
COMMON DREAMS

Seeking to discredit reports of its unprecedented killing of journalists in Gaza, the Israel Defense Forces last week published a list of 170 slain Palestinians it claimed were not legitimate media workers but members of “terrorist groups.”

Palestinian political analyst Muhammad Shehada, a visiting fellow at the European Council on Foreign Relations, reviewed every single entry on the list. He called it “the most sloppy shameless fraud possible.”

Israeli officials and Western supporters have trumpeted the IDF’s list as a counter to findings by groups like International Federation of Journalists, which has described Israel’s nearly-three-year-old-war in Gaza as “the deadliest period in the history of journalism” and cataloged at least 240 journalists and media workers killed.

Reporters Without Borders (RSF) has found dozens of cases in which it concluded journalists were targeted deliberately because of their reporting and filed multiple complaints with the International Criminal Court (ICC) alleging war crimes against the press.

The database, which the IDF refers to as the “Press Files,” says “that claim does not tell the full story” and states that “individuals presented as innocent journalists were, in fact, militants in the military wings of Hamas, Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ) and other terrorist organizations.”

The IDF claims the list was the product of an “in-depth investigation” consisting of open-source information, documents recovered by Israeli forces in Gaza, interrogations of alleged Palestinian militants, and intelligence gathered during military operations.

But as Shehada explained in a thread posted to social media on Sunday, “In the overwhelming majority of those listed, the IDF presents ZERO credible evidence. In most of them, their pages are literally blank.”



In 59 cases, Shehada found that the IDF did not provide any evidence for its claim that a journalist was a member of Hamas or PIJ other than that the claim was “based on multiple intelligence sources.”

Shehada said this amounted to essentially saying “trust me, bro,” which is especially insufficient given the numerous instances in which the IDF has been found to have misled the public about its responsibility for certain attacks, like the killing of 5-year-old Hind Rajab in 2024.

In another 42 cases, Shehada found, the IDF provided only decontextualized “snippets” of files, which were “undated and unspecified.” Without more information, Shehada said, this is “not... evidence of anything.”

“Those snippets could be taken from random files; they could be outdated or fabricated,” Shehada said, pointing to previous cases in which purported Hamas intelligence circulated by Israeli sources was later revealed to be misleadingly presented as fabricated.



Shehada pointed to specific cases in which Israel’s allegations against specific journalists have been undermined by the underlying evidence.

Israel claimed that Al Jazeera reporter Ismail al-Ghoul, whom the IDF killed in July 2024, was an operative with Hamas’ elite Nukhba wing and released a supposed Hamas personnel document as proof.

But as Reporters Without Borders has previously explained, the document says al-Ghoul, born in 1997, received a military rank in 2007, when he was 10, while elsewhere saying he joined in 2014. It also identifies him as an engineer, contradicting the IDF’s description of him as a Nukhba fighter. Israeli troops also detained al-Ghoul at al-Shifa hospital months before he was killed but released him after 12 hours.

The case of Anas al-Sharif, another Al Jazeera journalist killed in 2025, is similar. As Shehada documented for +972 magazine last year, al-Sharif was seriously injured in 2017, listed in a military context in 2019, but described as “suspended” and “unassigned” by 2023—while another document nevertheless portrays him as an elite Nukhba fighter. He was also reportedly detained and released by Israeli forces during the 2024 al-Shifa raid.

In other cases, the IDF’s evidence outright debunks the military’s own claims. For instance, Israel labeled photojournalist Hassan Aslih—killed by an airstrike at Nasser Hospital in Khan Yunis in May 2025—as a “military operative.” But the 2019 Hamas document provided as evidence for this lists him as a “photographer” involved with “media services.”


While the document, if authentic, does establish a relationship between Aslih and Hamas’ Qassam Brigades at least six years before his death, this does not make him a legitimate target under international humanitarian law, which distinguishes between those who have a “continuous combat function” and those who provide political or other indirect forms of support, like media coverage.

Shehada found at least seven cases in which the only evidence provided by the IDF was photos of slain journalists holding guns. In another 12 cases, the IDF provided undated photos of journalists allegedly taking part in Hamas or PIJ military activities.

Shehada noted that many prominent Israeli journalists also have past military service, such as Axios correspondent Barak Ravid, who was an IDF reservist until 2023. “Does that make him a ‘legitimate target’? or a non-civilian forever?” Shehada asked.

Palestinian hospital staff inspect the destruction inside Nasser hospital in Khan Yunis in the southern Gaza Strip, following an Israeli strike early on May 13, 2025 in which Palestinian journalist Hassan Aslih was killed along with several others. (Photo by Eyad Baba/AFP)


The distinction between past military affiliation and active combatant status has been a repeated source of dispute for press freedom groups that have attempted to tally the number of journalists killed.

Last month, the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) completed a sweeping review of 229 deaths after Hamas and PIJ published obituaries identifying some people listed as journalists as members of armed groups.

CPJ ultimately removed 22 people from its list, including some it found had participated in combat—but retained others despite militant obituaries, gun photos, or past organizational ties when the evidence did not establish active combatant status.

The “Press Files” database contains 49 cases in which the main piece of evidence is one of these obituaries. Among them are people who CPJ examined and concluded were not active combatants, such as photojournalist Amr Abu Odeh—a 26-year-old freelance photographer for the Anadolu Agency and Reuters—whom the IDF database labels a Hamas “squad commander.”

CPJ examined photos of Odeh wearing a military uniform, which came from a 2021 military training course with Gaza’s Ministry of the Interior. The group noted that “No armed factions in Gaza have claimed Abu Odeh as being affiliated with them, and the IDF has not alleged he was involved in combat.”

“In multiple cases, despite obituaries by Hamas/PIJ, the Committee to Protect Journalists investigated thoroughly and concluded those journalists were NOT engaged in any militant activity during the genocide,” Shehada wrote. “They may have in the past. That doesn’t make them combatants forever.”

He added that the flimsiness of the IDF’s evidence was more striking given the sophistication of the intelligence unit it uses to “dig up dirt” on journalists to provide post hoc justification for their killings, which has been referred to internally as the “Legitimization Cell,” which was revealed in a +972 investigation.

“If that’s all they can provide as ”evidence“ (e.g. blank pages, random snippets, outdated docs) despite having formidable resources,” Shehada wrote, “then it’s a vindication of Gaza’s journalists!”

Student protests erupt at Cornell over mishandling of gang-rape allegations

Sam Levin, Keely Aouga and Edward Helmore
Mon, October 5, 2026 
THE GUARDIAN

Thousands of students and faculty gathered for a demonstration at Cornell.Photograph: Olga Fedorova/EPA

Mass protests erupted at Cornell University on Monday, with students criticizing officials' handling of gang-rape allegations, demanding the president's resignation and painting "SMASH THE PATRIARCHY" on an administration building.

Thousands of students and faculty gathered for a demonstration, sparked by the high-profile case of a former student known as Jane Doe, who said in a recent lawsuit that she was plied with drugs and raped at a fraternity house in 2024. The case has prompted international outrage and intense scrutiny of college fraternities and sexual violence on US campuses.

Protesters shouted, "Ban the frats" and held signs saying, "At Cornell, rapists are safer than women" and "Stop rape culture." Some demonstrators directed their anger at Michael Kotlikoff, Cornell's president, arguing he had failed to keep students safe and chanting, "Kotlikoff, resign!"

The demonstration took place after some students had smashed a glass door at the entrance of Day Hall, a building that houses the president's office, and painted messages on the facade at approximately 3am on Monday, the Cornell Daily Sun reported.

The messages in red paint read "SMASH THE PATRIARCHY" and "AT CORNELL RAPISTS ARE PROTECTED PROTESTORS ARE EXPELLED". The security camera above one of the messages was also painted over.

The students who graffitied the building said in a statement to the student newspaper that they were protesting "the global systems of power that allowed this to happen in the first place".

Related: Before Cornell turmoil, successive US administrations seesawed in attitudes towards campus assaults

"We wanted to ensure that Day Hall, the center of Cornell's administrative function, was not able to continue business as usual," the statement added. The students' painted message was a reference to arguments that campus officials had treated pro-Palestine protesters more harshly than students accused of sexual misconduct, with four student demonstrators suspended in 2024, according to the Cornell Daily Sun.

Kyle Kimball, a Cornell spokesperson, condemned vandalism in a statement on Monday.

"We understand the frustration and strong emotions being expressed across our community. Those concerns deserve to be heard, but damaging property is not the answer," Kimball said. "We are investigating the vandalism at Day Hall and will address it in accordance with University policy and applicable law."

The student activists defended their actions in a manifesto obtained by the student publication. "We reject the dogma that would condemn our actions this morning as violent while excusing rape," they wrote. "Property damage is not violent; condoning rape is."

The demonstrations escalated as Cornell faces widespread backlash for its handling of Jane Doe's case, with critics saying the university had been too lenient with the accused men and had failed the victim.

According to lawyers for Jane Doe, who filed a civil lawsuit against the university and her alleged attackers earlier in September, only two members of the Chi Phi fraternity were expelled after the October 2024 incident, in which she said she was repeatedly raped over the course of seven hours. Jane Doe dropped out of Cornell after the incident.

A third fraternity member, who had already graduated, was barred from the Cornell campus, the New York Times reported on Saturday. Two more were reportedly given suspensions and disciplinary probation.

Two other men, the outlet said, were ordered not to contact the sophomore and required to study sexual harassment, social media use and bystander intervention, and to write "reflection papers".

The lawsuit claimed that the seven fraternity members allegedly involved in the incident were "afforded the opportunity to mitigate their conduct by submitting essays to Cornell".

Related: Cornell University to take 'serious look' at fraternities after rape allegations

The university has said that claim does not accurately reflect what occurred. The accused men have denied all wrongdoing.

One student protester who addressed the crowd on Monday said: "Too often, we are met with silence, we are met with statements, we are met with procedures, but not enough support. How much does it take for our university to stand with survivors?"

And a professor, according to the AP, said to applause: "Rape should not be inevitable."

Matthew Van Houten, the Tompkins county district attorney, who is also under fire for his office's handling of the original allegations, announced last week he was reopening the case. Van Houten said Jane Doe, who was 20 at the time of the alleged assault, presented allegations in her lawsuit that were "dramatically different" from the statement she gave to police two years ago. Jane Doe's attorney has pushed back on those claims and accused the DA of failing to do a thorough investigation after the incident.

Kathy Hochul, the New York governor, said on Thursday she was appointing Letitia James, the state's attorney general, as special prosecutor to investigate the alleged gang rape at Cornell University.

Kotlikoff, the university president under fire, addressed the case in a video message on Saturday, saying the school would take steps to prevent a similar situation in the ⁠future. That included "a serious look at the role of fraternities and sororities in campus life", Kotlikoff said.

The Associated Press contributed reporting

• Information and support for anyone affected by rape or sexual abuse issues is available from the following organizations. In the US, Rainn offers support on 800-656-4673. In the UK, Rape Crisis offers support on 0808 500 2222. In Australia, support is available at 1800Respect (1800 737 732). Other international helplines can be found at ibiblio.org/rcip/internl.html

A crowd of students protests Cornell’s response to gang rape complaint


BY LEAH WILLINGHAM AND TASSANEE VEJPONGSA

AP
October 5, 2026

ITHACA, New York (AP) — Cornell students thronged a campus plaza to protest the university’s response to allegations of sexual assault at a fraternity house, and the school’s main administration building was splashed with graffiti and damaged overnight.

At a demonstration that overflowed the large space in front of the school’s student center, students, faculty members and others wore purple ribbons and held signs with such messages as “support survivors, expel rapists” and “Justice 4 every Jane Doe” — the name by which the woman who reported the assault is known in court papers. Other people watched from pathways, windows and a nearby hill.

“Too often, we are met with silence, we are met with statements, we are met with procedures, but not enough support,” student Athena Holloway told the crowd. “How much does it take for our university to stand with survivors?”

Hispanic studies professor Julia Chang added to applause: “Rape should not be inevitable.”

Calls for Cornell president’s resignation

Speakers faulted fraternities, the university trustees and Cornell President Michael Kotlikoff, saying he and his administration have prioritized protecting the university’s reputation over students’ safety.

“Kotlikoff, resign!” demonstrators chanted, among other slogans, as they marched to the damaged administration building to present a list of demands. They included changes to how the student code of conduct defines sexual consent, an overhaul of the student discipline system and expulsions or degree revocations for all students involved in the alleged 2024 assault of the woman known as Jane Doe, among other things.

The woman’s account of being sexually assaulted by several fraternity brothers has made clear, on and beyond campus, that “for all the strong feelings about sexual assault, .... we do not do enough to prevent it, nor to support survivors after it happens,” student Madeline Gage said.

The group began disbanding with chants including “ban the frats!”

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Graffiti and broken glass at an administration building

The Ivy League school has been trying to quell a firestorm over its handling of the alleged 2024 gang rape. Early Monday, the university found signs of the anger on the very walls of its administrative headquarters.

Holes were knocked into one of the building’s glass doors, and the walls beside them were marked with red-painted messages condemning patriarchy and the Ivy League school’s handling of sexual assaults, news media photos showed. Later Monday, the graffiti was removed and the door was boarded up.

Cornell spokesperson Kyle Kimball said in a statement that the university was investigating and that “damaging property is not the answer” to Cornellians’ “frustration and strong emotions.” Campus police referred questions to his office, which declined to provide more detail on the incident.

Jane Doe alleges that she was sexually assaulted by multiple Chi Phi fraternity members in October 2024 after being pressured into drinking and taking drugs. She was a Cornell student at the time.

The woman recently sued the university, seven former students, the fraternity and others. Her lawsuit said that she became fully incapacitated as fraternity members assaulted her, and that one man sent others a message inviting them to participate

“I felt like bait. I felt like lions around me. It just was a totally debilitating place to be in,” she told Cornell investigators last year, according to records reviewed by The Associated Press.

Lawyers for two of the former students denied they participated in a sexual assault. Attempts by The Associated Press to reach the other men or their representatives have been unsuccessful. Court records show that some of the accused students, when interviewed by Cornell investigators, described the sexual activity as consensual.

Shortly before she went to Cornell police in November 2024, Jane Doe recorded a phone call with one of the men she says raped her. ABC News broadcast portions of that call Monday, containing only what it said was his voice, and recounted other parts of the conversation in writing.

“What y’all did would be classified as gang rape,” she told him at one point, according to the network, which said she had provided the recording to the university.

Students are demanding transparency, accountability

The suit has drawn national attention to what Cornell, its police force and the local district attorney did after she told the campus police in November 2024 she “can say with 100% confidence I was raped.”

No criminal charges have been filed. The Chi Phi chapter at Cornell was shut down, and the Ivy League university has said it expelled some students and suspended others. In a statement last week, the administration bristled about the “false narrative that there were minimal consequences in this case.”

Students, however, have demanded more accountability and transparency, and New York Gov. Kathy Hochul has said Jane Doe was “failed by people and institutions” including the Cornell police and local District Attorney Matthew Van Houten.

Hochul appointed the state attorney general last week to take over a criminal investigation that Van Houten had reopened days earlier, and the governor called for an independent review of Cornell’s handling of the matter.

After the week’s developments, Kotlikoff released an apologetic video Saturday, saying that Jane Doe’s account “raises heartbreaking and troubling issues about sexual assault, dehumanization and aspects of party culture, alcohol and drug use.”

Kotlikoff reaffirmed his support for an independent review of the university’s actions and vowed more transparency and a commitment to “finding the answers our community deserves.”

___

Associated Press writer Jennifer Peltz contributed from New York.

TASSANEE VEJPONGSA
Vejpongsa is a video journalist for The Associated Press in Philadelphia. She was previously based in Taipei and Bangkok.

Cornell Frat Brothers Reportedly Did ‘Damage Control’ After Gang Rape Allegations

Katherine Schaffstall
Mon, October 5, 2026 

USWEEKLY


Spencer Platt/Getty Images

Key takeaways

Chi Phi fraternity brothers at Cornell University allegedly tried to contain gang rape allegations made against them by the victim, who went from believing the encounters were consensual to describing them as a "gang rape" on a phone call.


Several of the Chi Phi fraternity brothers involved in the Cornell University scandal allegedly tried to contain the gang rape allegations made against them, according to new phone calls released from the investigation.

After a student went to campus police to report that she had been gang raped by seven members of Chi Phi in October 2024, several of the fraternity brothers allegedly tried to do "damage control" to make sure the victim was "not upset about the situation," according to school records reviewed by ABC News.

The fraternity brothers' efforts came as the victim – identified as Jane Doe to protect her privacy – went from believing the sexual encounters were consensual to describing the situation as a "gang rape" on a phone call.

"The only way for me to heal is to know what happened," the woman, who was a junior at the time of the incident, told one of her alleged attackers during a phone call that took place before she reported the incident to police on November 8, 2024. "That's why I'm trying to just piece it together, you know, like I'm just like confused."

Cornell University Insists There Were 'Consequential Punishments' After Alleged Gang Rape of Student

He then invited Doe to the fraternity house, according to the police report. (The fraternity brothers denied any wrongdoing and hve not been criminally charged in the case.)

After Doe reported the incident to Cornell police, he claimed he was too intoxicated to consent and suggested that Doe assaulted him, per school records.

Campus police spoke to many witnesses to piece together what happened, with one person stating that the fraternity brothers tried to ease Doe's concerns.

"They tried to contact [Jane] almost every day after it happened to, I guess, keep them on her good side and keep her happy and not upset about the situation," the victim's friend told campus authorities in May 2025, according to records viewed by ABC News.

Despite their efforts to deescalate Doe's concerns, she still went forward and reported the incident. The fraternity members then allegedly started working on their plan to cover up the incident, according to records.

"F***," one brother wrote in a group chat on November 8, 2024, after Doe went to campus police. "Should I call [Jane]?"

"Wait a bit for me and [Executive Board] to figure out what we're doing cuz there are a couple of other things going on," the fraternity's president responded, per the outlet. "When was the last time you spoke to [Jane]?"

The records also revealed that Doe stayed in touch with some of the men who allegedly assaulted her, and she even expressed concerns about her reputation and physical health in the aftermath of the attack.

"I will also say this is f***ing RUINING my life temporarily. My reputation is destroyed and I'm utterly ashamed. I'm f***ing pissed cause this many people shouldn't know and I feel like I know who some of the rats in the room were," she wrote to the alleged attacked after he invited her to the fraternity.

Two days after she reported the incident, Doe reportedly contacted three of the alleged attackers involved in the incident so they could discuss what had happened. She told them that she had gone to the emergency room and was going through therapy.

The View's Sunny Hostin Defends DA for Not Prosecuting Alleged Cornell Gang Rapists: 'No Way'

"If I just know what happened, then I can feel a little bit better and move on and maybe be able to stay at this school," Doe told the alleged attacker in a phone call, which she recorded and gave to police.

Doe said she sustained physical harm during the incident, and said she was struggling to finish the semester and could not understand how the events transpired.

"You did tell me you were sober, by the way," he said, per the recording. "You did, you said you hadn't been anywhere."

However, Doe insisted that his claim was "not true" and she "never would have said that."

Doe then asked how so many people ended up in the bedroom, and he responded, "The door was just unlocked…the party was sort of like crowded…there was nowhere else to go."

The alleged attacker did not mention the Snapchat messages that were sent to the fraternity's group chat, in which the members advertised "free p***y" in the room. "Like you can walk in and whip it out," he wrote to the group, per ABC News. "Boys come whip it out."

Also during the phone call, Doe told the alleged attacker that what "y'all did would be classified as gang rape."

"It's possible that both of us like remember this and it's not true," he said later on in the call.

"I don't think that that's true. No, no, because I remember looking up and being like that is too many people," she responded.

Hours after Doe went to police, Cornell's Chi Phi fraternity was suspended and an investigation was launched. The school ultimately suspended two of the men that allegedly assaulted her. However, the five others that she claimed assaulted her were only suspended. No one has been pressed with criminal charges.

Nearly two years after the incident, Doe filed a civil complaint and Tompkins County District Attorney Matthew Van Houten announced his office was reopening an investigation into the allegations.

If you or someone you know has been sexually assaulted, contact the National Sexual Assault Hotline at 1-800-656-HOPE (4673).

Britain's Green Party votes to class Zionism as a form of racism

Issued on: 05/10/2026 -

Britain's Green Party voted on Sunday to class Zionism as a form of racism, drawing criticism from British Jews and from the Israeli government which said it now ​viewed the party ‌as "a body that gives legitimacy to terrorism".

Israel bars UK Green leader after party votes to define Zionism as racism

Copyright AP Photo

By Simon Ormiston

Published on 05/10/2026 -  EURONEWS

UK Jewish groups say the motion stokes hatred after a string of attacks on their community, while the government and other parties have condemned a policy that even at least three out of five Green MPs opposed.

Israel has barred the leader of Britain's Green Party Zack Polanski from entering the country after the party's members voted to define Zionism as racism.

Foreign Minister Gideon Sa'ar took the decision on Sunday evening, hours after the vote at the left-wing party's annual conference, Israel's foreign ministry said. It called the resolution "a clear antisemitic text" and described the ban on Polanski as a "first step".

"The Greens have adopted not only the green of Hamas, but also its ideology: the elimination of the State of Israel through armed struggle," the ministry said.

Israel's president, Isaac Herzog, called the party's decision "a disgrace".

"Zionism is the national liberation movement of the Jewish people, and it forms the basis for the Jewish people's right to a state and a national home in the Land of Israel," Herzog said on X.

The motion passed by 1,022 votes to 813. It states that Zionism will be "treated as any other form of racism" and commits the party to supporting a "single democratic Palestinian State in all of historic Palestine".

Jewish groups warn over safety

The vote comes at a time of heightened fear among British Jews. The Board of Deputies of British Jews said the motion stoked "anti-Jewish hatred after a year in which British Jews have been murdered attending their synagogue, stabbed in the streets, and seen their community buildings firebombed".

Two worshippers were killed in an attack on a Manchester synagogue on Yom Kippur last year. In March, ambulances run by a Jewish volunteer service were set alight in Golders Green, north London, the first in a string of arson attacks on synagogues and other Jewish sites in the capital. Two Jewish men were stabbed in the same neighbourhood in April.

Last week, two Iranian nationals were charged over an alleged plot to carry out an attack in Manchester around this year's Yom Kippur.

The Community Security Trust, which monitors antisemitism, recorded 1,926 incidents in the first half of 2026, its second-highest half-year total, including a record 135 assaults.

Ahead of the Green Party vote, the heads of the Board of Deputies, the Community Security Trust and the Jewish Leadership Council wrote to the party.

"This motion would make the Green Party the first electorally significant UK political party in living memory to adopt what appears to be an overtly antisemitic political platform," they said.

UK parties condemn vote

Bridget Phillipson, chair of the ruling Labour Party and minister for women and equalities, condemned the decision.

"It is shameful to vote against a two-state solution for Israel and Palestine and to condemn the vast majority of British Jews and Jews around the world as racist for supporting Israel's right to exist," she said in a party statement.

The opposition Conservatives described the Greens as "toxic to its core".

"British Jews should not have to disclaim a belief in Jewish self-determination and the existence of Israel in order to be accepted by a British political party," said Chris Philp, the party's shadow home secretary.

Divisions in the party

"This has been a serious and deeply felt debate within our membership," a Green spokesperson said.

In a joint statement, Polanski and the party's MPs said there was "no conflict between supporting the rights of Palestinians and the rights of Jewish people".

The motion exposed divisions in the party. At least three of its five MPs opposed it, and Polanski, who is running to become an MP in former prime minister Keir Starmer's London constituency, skipped the vote.

He said earlier this week that the "displacement and genocide of the Palestinian people" was "clearly racism".

United Nations investigators have accused Israel of committing "genocide" in the war in Gaza, a finding that Israel has rejected.

The Greens, who hold five of the 650 seats in Britain's parliament, have surged in popularity under Polanski, attracting voters dissatisfied with the centre-left Labour government's stance on the Israel-Hamas war. Polls show his popularity has taken a hit in recent months following several missteps.

 

Macklemore ‘blown away’ after Palestine tour sells out ‘immediately’

30.09.2026, dpa

Photo: Britta Pedersen/dpa

US rapper Macklemore said he is “blown away” after tickets for all three shows for his upcoming Free Palestine tour “sold out immediately.”

The 43-year-old, real name Benjamin Haggerty, announced the concerts in London, Paris and Dublin earlier this month after he was dropped from Ed Sheeran’s Loop tour over comments he made about Gaza.

Since then, all Sheeran’s Loop tour supporting acts, including Irish singer Aaron Rowe, Grammy award-winning musician Finneas, who is Billie Eilish’s brother, and Danish singer Lukas Graham, as well as his backing band Beoga, have dropped out of the remaining dates.

Macklemore took to Instagram on Wednesday, shortly after tickets went on sale for the upcoming gigs which will bring together artists and friends to help provide humanitarian aid and support for people in Palestine.

The Grammy-winner said: “All three shows sold out immediately. I’m honestly blown away.

“We put these shows together fast and in community, believing that musicians can stand in solidarity with Palestine, use the stage to raise funds and show what collective action can look like.

“When those in power try to silence our calls for liberation, art will always be a form of resistance.”

The singer, known for tracks including "Can’t Hold Us" and "Thrift Shop," added: “The response to these shows is another reminder of how many people across the world are standing together for a free Palestine.”

Haggerty also confirmed that the line-up for the concerts will be revealed soon, and told his 9.1 million followers he “can’t wait to be together.”

The post has since been flooded with support, including from TV presenter Laura Whitmore and singer Paloma Faith, who both commented with heart emojis.

Macklemore, who was an opener on Sheeran’s tour, sparked controversy earlier this month when he told an audience he wanted people in Gaza and the West Bank to know they had not been forgotten amid the conflict with Israel.

A petition was launched demanding he be removed from Sheeran’s remaining shows and Robert Kraft, whose Kraft Group owns the Gillette Stadium in Massachusetts, was among those who contacted the British singer saying he would not be able to play the venue unless Macklemore was removed from the tour.

Sheeran said it was the promoter’s decision to remove the US rapper from the tour and not his.

At his first gig since the row, he apologized for making “mistakes” amid the furore and described the conflict in Gaza as “catastrophic and unjustifiable and disproportionate.”

Macklemore’s upcoming tour will kick off in Dublin’s 3Arena on October 26 followed by Paris’s Accor Arena on October 29 and wrap up at London’s OVO Arena Wembley on October 30.

Artist announcements as well as additional cities will be made soon – including dates in the US.

All the proceeds from the concerts will go towards a number of organizations working in support of Palestinian people with medical care, humanitarian assistance, education, community support and advocacy.

Those organizations include Anera, Glia, Gaza Soup Kitchen, Taawon, Heal Palestine, Palestinian Youth Movement, Middle East Children’s Alliance, Jewish Voice for Peace, Medical Aid for Palestinians, Institute for Middle East Understanding, Palestine Children’s Relief Fund and UNRWA USA.

(c) 2026 dpa Deutsche Presse Agentur GmbH

Lebanon’s Environmental Defenders Say Israel Is Deliberately Targeting Them

Israel has decimated Lebanon’s land — and is also slaughtering the people who protect it.

By Alessandra Bergamin , 

Truthout

September 29, 2026

Green Southerners volunteer and environmental defender Oussama Farhat was killed in an Israeli drone strike in southern Lebanon on May 1, 2025. In the months leading to his death, he had helped document and verify Israeli white phosphorus strikes on his home region.

Oussama Farhat / Green Southerners


In late April 2025, after 41-year-old farmer Oussama Farhat was discharged from the hospital, two pieces of shrapnel still lodged in his body, he hurried to check on an injured red fox. In his southern Lebanon village of Meiss el-Jabal, Farhat, a volunteer with the environmental organization Green Southerners, had helped rescue the cub from beneath the rubble of ongoing Israeli air strikes — the same kind that has decimated southern Lebanon and its people for the past three years. Now, the young fox was curled atop a starry blanket, its outstretched leg wrapped in a blue bandage.

In a message to Hisham Younes, the founder and president of Green Southerners, Farhat wrote that the fox cub would soon be ready for release.

Concerned, Younes replied: “Oussama, where are you?”

A member of the Lebanese Civil Defense, Farhat had been injured on April 25, 2025, after he and a fellow volunteer went to check for casualties unknowingly halfway through an Israeli double-tap strike — a tactic where an attack is followed by a second in the same location. In the days following October 7, 2023, Hezbollah, an armed group and political party formed in response to Israel’s 1982 invasion of Lebanon, launched rockets and artillery into occupied Shebaa Farms as an act of solidarity with the Palestinian people. Since then, Israel has continued to attack southern Lebanon near-daily, making Farhat’s village — just 700 yards from the UN-demarcated “Blue Line” that separates the two states — a hotspot.

After Farhat was discharged from the hospital, Younes implored him to go to Nabatieh, about an hour north, and rest with his family, including his elderly mother. But, says Younes, steadfast in his commitment to the south, Farhat explained that he needed to stay in Meiss el-Jabal.


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By Shireen Akram-Boshar ,  Truthout  June 17, 2026

“Please Oussama, you need to leave,” Younes replied.

The next day, Farhat was killed.

In addition to volunteering with Green Southerners, Oussama Farhat was a member of the Lebanese Civil Defense. About a week before he was killed, Farhat was injured while checking for casualties halfway through an Israeli double-tap strike.Oussama Farhat / Green Southerners

For the past three years and over two ceasefire agreements, Israel has systematically and violently erased life from southern Lebanon, committing what many, including Lebanon’s environment minister, have deemed an ecocide. An agricultural borderland in the heart of the historic fertile crescent, Israel has transformed southern Lebanon from small-scale and subsistence farms of tobacco, olives, and goats to a landscape set ablaze by white phosphorus munitions, littered with unexploded ordnance, and poisoned by the pesticide glyphosate. In a region where around 70 percent of families rely on farming, explained Ghassan Makarem, an organizer with the Lebanese food sovereignty organization AgriMovement, Israel has used airstrikes, shelling, and the steady roar of bulldozers to destroy around a quarter of the country’s cultivated land, burning olive groves to ash, slaughtering flocks of livestock, and flattening entire villages.


“Nothing that lives has been spared … It’s all part of the genocide that’s occurring.”

“Nothing that lives has been spared,” said Makarem. “It’s all part of the genocide that’s occurring.”

Since 2023, that genocidal violence, as described by multiple outlets, has displaced more than 1 million people, killing nearly 9,000 and injuring more than 30,500, mostly in the south. Included within that figure, alongside a high number of emergency services workers, are southern Lebanon’s land and environmental defenders — displaced, disappeared, injured, and killed, because of their commitment to steward and protect the land.

As Julia Choucair Vizoso, a senior fellow at the Arab Reform Initiative and researcher for The Public Source who has written about environmental struggle and food sovereignty in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA), explained, Israel has long had a policy, stretching from occupied Palestine to southern Lebanon, of attacking those who resist occupation by refusing to leave. Because of that, farmers, shepherds, fishers, and beekeepers have not only suffered as Israel destroys their livelihoods and land, but have been marked as a threat because of their very connection to it in the first place.

Among those environmental defenders is Farhat.

Six years ago, explained Younes, the farmer reached out to Green Southerners asking how best he could help local animals, especially those that were injured or sick. Farhat soon became part of the all-volunteer team, helping map bird habitats in the eastern Mediterranean flyway, documenting illegal logging, and photographing the region’s flora and fauna, including the iridescent Palestine sunbird. But shortly after Israel started bombing southern Lebanon, Farhat’s role changed.

Oussama Farhat often photographed southern Lebanon’s flora and fauna, including red foxes, golden jackals, and, as pictured, the iridescent Palestine sunbird.Oussama Farhat / Green Southerners

As a field coordinator with Green Southerners, he began documenting the frequency and impact of Israeli white phosphorus strikes, some of which have since been deemed potential war crimes. Alongside two other volunteers, Farhat photographed the white, tentacled clouds caused by the munitions, geolocated and dated the strikes, and, whenever possible, helped quell the phosphorus fires that burned hot and long — often sustaining injuries that landed him in the hospital. From October 2023 to November 2024, volunteers with Green Southerners verified some 285 attacks, many in residential areas and above agricultural land.

While Farhat’s story, much like that of slain sea turtle conservationist Mona Khalil and former Green Southerner volunteer Mohammad Skaff, who was killed in the residential town of Abbasiya in May 2026, fits a more Western idea of activism, those who tend the land of southern Lebanon without an “activist” title, said Younes, are no less environmental defenders — and no less impacted

.

Former Green Southerners volunteer Mohammad Skaff was killed in an Israeli airstrike in Abbassiyeh, Lebanon, in May 2026. Skaff has been remembered for his passion for nature, hiking, and protecting the environment — and encouraging others to do the same.Green Southerners

“In every village, the community has environmental defenders for whom it is their culture to take care of livestock, wild animals, pets, and abundant beehives,” said Younes. “It’s not just Mona or Oussama — there are thousands of casualties that go unseen.”

On July 2, 2024, farmer Muhyiddin Abu Dalla was killed in an Israeli airstrike on his home in Zalloutieh shortly after he finished harvesting wheat. “The land was more important than his life,” Dalla’s brother told journalist Amal Khalil, who herself was later killed in an Israeli strike in 2026.

On November 25, 2024, 91-year-old Ali Kdouh, known locally as Abou Hussein, was killed after remaining with his herd and enduring two months of attacks on the region. He was considered the last shepherd of Nabatieh.

On February 2, 2025, fisher Mohammad Juhair was abducted by Israeli soldiers while fishing with his cousin near the southern Lebanese port of Naqoura. According to the most recent reporting, he has not been seen since.

On June 17, 2025, Mohamed Abdel Salam Nasrallah, a dedicated beekeeper, was killed in an airstrike while in the fields of his home in Houla. “I am the type of person who gives from his heart to what he loves,” Nasrallah told Reuters in 2022.


“In Lebanon, a lot of the people who are on the front lines of genocidal violence are just trying to stay on the land and keep living off the land.”

“In Lebanon, a lot of the people who are on the front lines of genocidal violence are just trying to stay on the land and keep living off the land,” Vizoso said. “These are communities at large that are threatened but kind of invisibilized globally.”

Because of this, the term environmental defender can often be an imperfect one. With origins that are more institutional and individualistic, explained Vizoso, it fails to capture the collective struggle of communities operating outside of international, nongovernmental organizations. But patterns of violence and repression against those protecting the environment, the land, and the sea are often repeated around the world, from one government, one corporation, and one paramilitary to the next.

The attacks in southern Lebanon are part of that global context.

From 2012 to 2025, some 2,375 land and environmental defenders were killed or disappeared, according to data from the human rights organization Global Witness. This figure includes well-known defenders such as Indigenous Lenca leader Berta Cáceres, who was killed in her home in Honduras, to farmers, community activists, peasants, and Indigenous peoples targeted for protecting the land from extraction and development projects including mining, logging, agribusiness, renewable energy, and even tourism.

Over the years, both Israel’s public and private sectors have played a role in these attacks, too.


Both Israel’s public and private sectors have played a role in these attacks.

In 2014, private security guards from Israel’s Golan Group were hired to “protect” a Canadian mine in Guatemala. During a demonstration against the mine, the guards shot at Indigenous protesters, injuring seven people. In Indonesia, including in occupied West Papua, the country’s police and military forces use a cellphone hacking system sold by Cellebrite, an Israeli digital intelligence company. Since 2018, seven environmental defenders, including four Indigenous West Papuans, have likely been killed by state forces.

In 2018, as former Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte faced a preliminary examination into war crimes from the International Criminal Court, he publicly committed to solely purchasing weapons from Israel, given the country’s complete lack of human rights restrictions. An investigation I conducted in 2024 found evidence that between 2014 and 2024, the Philippine state was potentially involved in 109 out of 210 killings of environmental defenders recorded in the country.

But while killings and repression by governments, corporations, and paramilitary groups have been consistently documented globally for more than a decade, violence leveled against environmental and land defenders in the Middle East and North Africa is often underreported, in part because of ongoing conflict. Global Witness noted in its 2024 report that a lack of capacity and the challenges of research amid conflict have meant that many victims, including Farhat, are omitted from official tallies. The organization acknowledged, however, that this doesn’t diminish the importance of the victims’ work, the extent of violence and repression they face, or the fact that, in many instances, they have more than likely been targeted for their work.

“I believe the targeting is not secondary — it’s deliberate,” said Ghassan, with a reference to the killing of Khalil. “[The Israelis] say they have information about everyone which means they are saying they know who they’re targeting — they have already admitted it.”

Younes, too, believes Khalil, Skaff, and Farhat were targeted.

In the months before Farhat was injured while volunteering with the Civil Defense, he told Younes that he had appeared in a documentary. While Green Southerners volunteers regularly in coordinated interviews with journalists, the extent and destruction of Israeli aggression had made Younes more cautious. Since 2023, he has preferred that volunteers don’t show their faces on camera as he feared they might become targets. Then, on May 1, 2025, as Farhat drove in his pickup truck through Meiss el-Jabal, he narrowly escaped an Israeli airstrike, according to Younes. Within half an hour, as the farmer and environmental defender neared his home, a drone struck again. This time, before Farhat was even out of the car or in the house, he was killed.


“I think this is part of the policy to push the people out — threaten them, kill them. This is the easiest way, and the Israelis are professionals.”

“I think this is part of the policy to push the people out — threaten them, kill them,” said Younes. “This is the easiest way, and the Israelis are professionals.”

In a video from July 2018, Farhat filmed a golden jackal close to the village of Bint Jbeil. As it wanders through long, yellowed grass, the wolf-like animal notices Farhat and pauses, watching him as he watches back. Farhat’s caring relationship with wild animals is among his qualities Younes remembers best. In particular, he says, the time a female golden jackal, normally extremely protective, allowed Farhat to approach her pups.

“This was something really rare,” said Younes. “It was extraordinary.”

Since Farhat was killed, few Green Southerners volunteers have remained in the south and, for now, Younes has continued to encourage everyone to leave. But as the destruction continues, so, too, does the documentation. This year alone, the organization has recorded Israeli airstrikes near UNESCO World Heritage sites, nature reserves set ablaze, and multiple white phosphorus strikes, including several across the densely populated town of Nabatieh in June. While Younes acknowledges that, for now, Israel — supported by the U.S. — operates with impunity, he is optimistic that one day there may be a path for justice and accountability.

“The documents are there, the images are there, the faces of those who were killed — Mona, Mohammad, Oussama — are there, looking at you,” he said. “We hope that through documentation we are keeping the truth alive, we are keeping the collective memory of our land alive.”

“And we hope, one day, this world will wake up.”


This article is licensed under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0), and you are free to share and republish under the terms of the license.

Alessandra Bergamin

Alessandra Bergamin is a freelance investigative journalist whose work focuses on environmental violence and human rights around the world. She most recently investigated how U.S. security assistance fuels violence against environmental defenders. She can be found on Instagram, Bluesky, and LinkedIn.