Renowned Palestinian Journalist Wael Al Dahdouh Nominated for Egyptian Press Freedom Award

The Board of Trustees of the Egyptian Press Awards nominated Palestinian journalist Wael Al Dahdouh for the 2023 Press Freedom Award, acknowledging his professional contributions and sacrifices during weeks of covering the ongoing war on Gaza, according to a statement by Egyptian Journalists’ Syndicate head Khaled El-Balshy on Sunday, 17 December. 

The award is being reinstated for the first time after several years of absence.

The Egyptian Journalists’ Syndicate, the rewarding body, considers this year’s award as a symbol of the resilience of Palestinian journalists against Israeli aggression and its “brutal war machine,” El-Balshy said.

The Syndicate paid tribute to the martyrs of Palestinian journalism and their role in exposing the “crimes of genocide against the Palestinian people.”. 

Al Dahdouh’s nomination is a recognition of his exceptional professionalism amid the destruction of his home and killing of those closest to him.

He continued to work despite losing his family in an Israeli airstrike on Gaza in October.

Additionally, Al-Azhar Voice magazine chose Al Dahdouh as the Person of the Year,  describing Palestinian journalists as soldiers of truth. 

This recognition reflects the role played by Palestinian journalists in documenting the reality in Gaza and the West Bank and countering biased narratives in mainstream media. 

The war on Gaza marked the highest number of journalist deaths in a single conflict recorded by the International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) since 1990, with 68 journalists killed since the Hamas attack on 7 October. Notably, 72 percent of journalists killed worldwide this year occurred in the Gaza conflict. Sixty-one Palestinian journalists and four Israeli journalists were among the casualties, along with three Lebanese journalists killed in Israeli shootings on the border between the two countries.