'I Want A Death That The World Will Hear'—Journalist Assassinated By 'Israel' For Telling The Truth

Listen to a reading of this article (reading by Tim Foley):

“Israel” assassinated a photojournalist in Gaza in an airstrike targeting her family’s home on Wednesday, the day after it was announced that a documentary she appears in would premier in Cannes next month.

Her name was Fatima Hassouna. Nine members of her family were also reportedly killed in the bombing. She was going to get married in a few days.

The documentary is titled “Put Your Soul on Your Hand and Walk,” and it’s about “Israel”’s crimes in Gaza.

In an Instagram post from August of last year, Hassouna wrote the following:

“If I die, I want a loud death. I don’t want to be just breaking news, or a number in a group; I want a death that the world will hear, an impact that will remain through time, and a timeless image that cannot be buried by time or place.”

Palestinian photographer Fatima Hassouna was killed, along with nine members of her family, in an Israeli airstrike that targeted their home in Gaza on Wednesday.
Hassouna, who had gained international recognition for her photojournalism documenting the impact of Israel’s… pic.twitter.com/y0FEJ60emH
— Middle East Eye (@MiddleEastEye) April 17, 2025

Hassouna said she viewed her camera as a weapon to change the world and defend her family, making the following statements in a video shared by Middle East Eye:

“As Fatima, I believe that the image and the camera are weapons. So I consider my camera to be my rifle. So many times, in so many situations, I tell my friends, ‘Come and see, it’s not bullets that we load into a rifle. Okay, I’m going to put a memory card into the camera. This is the camera’s bullet, the memory card.’ It changes the world and defends me. It shows the world what is happening to me and what’s happening to others. So I used to consider this my weapon, that I defend myself with it. And so that my family won’t be forgotten. And so I can document people’s stories, so that my family’s stories too don’t just vanish into thin air.”

“Israel” saw Hassouna’s camera as a weapon too, apparently.

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As Ryan Grim observed on Twitter:

“For this to have been a deliberate act — which it plainly was — consider what that means. A person within the IDF saw the news that Fatma’s film was accepted into Cannes. He/she/they then proposed assassinating her. Other people reviewed the suggestion and approved it. Then other people carried it out.”

“Israel” has been murdering a record-shattering number of journalists in Gaza while simultaneously blocking any foreign press from accessing the enclave because “Israel” views journalists as its enemy. And “Israel” views journalists as its enemy because “Israel” is the enemy of truth.

“Israel” and its western backers understand that truth and support for “Israel” are mutually exclusive. Those who support “Israel” are not interested in the truth, and those who are interested in the truth don’t support “Israel.”

That’s why the light of journalism is being aggressively snuffed out in Gaza while Israel massively increases its propaganda budget to sway public opinion.

It’s why journalists like Fatima Hassouna are being assassinated while the western propaganda services known as the mainstream press commit journalistic malpractice to hide the truth of “Israel”’s crimes.

It’s why western journalists are banned from Gaza while western institutions are silencing, deporting, firing and marginalizing those who speak out about “Israel”’s criminality.

“Israel” and truth cannot coexist. “Israel”’s enemies know this, and “Israel” knows this. That’s why “Israel”’s primary weapons are bombs, bullets, propaganda, censorship, and obstruction, while the main weapon of “Israel”’s enemies is the camera.

Fatima Hassouna’s death has indeed been heard. All these loud noises are snapping more and more eyes open from their slumber.

(Caitlin Johnstone)