Sale of goods to do good for Palestinian journalists

In its ongoing genocide against the Palestinian people, the Israeli military has taken the expression “don’t shoot the messenger” and turned it on its head — literally.  

Since October last year, the Israel Defense Forces have killed roughly 10% of Gaza’s journalists and media workers. As of 28 October, preliminary investigations by the Committee to Protect Journalists showed that at least 131 journalists were among the more than tens of thousands killed in Gaza, the West Bank, Israel and Lebanon, since the war began. 

This has been the deadliest period for journalists since the committee began gathering data in 1992.

Many of them were killed while bearing witness to Israeli attacks. 

Journalists have often been targeted, despite wearing protective gear identifying them as members of the press. 

Foreign news organisations are still being denied access to Gaza, except for rare and tightly escorted trips arranged by the Israeli military.

Now, Candice Breitz, a South African-born Jewish artist, public intellectual and academic, who is based in Berlin, Germany, has started a campaign to raise funds for the Palestinian Journalists Syndicate (PJS), an independent union that represents about 80% of Gaza’s journalists.

“It is crucial that we find ways to express our support for journalism on the ground,” said Breitz, “as it is crucial that we continue to receive information from, and about, those who are most directly and grotesquely impacted by the ongoing and widespread humanitarian catastrophe in the region.”

Breitz has created a collection of T-shirts, sweatshirts and a tote bag titled Never Again Means Never Again to raise funds for the PJS.  All profits generated from the sale of items will be donated to the PJS via the International Federation of Journalists. Production costs for each item account for roughly 15% of the item’s price — so, 85% of all income will go straight to PJS.

Breitz said all items in the collection are named after progressive Jewish thinkers “who have faced scorn in Germany over the last year — to put it mildly — in backlash for their public opinions vis-à-vis Israel-Palestine”. They include Masha Gessen, Eyal Weizman, Deborah Feldman and Nan Goldin.

“This is not to suggest, at all, that only Jewish thinkers have been impacted by Germany’s unhinged crackdown on solidarity with the Palestinian people,” she added. “[But] it certainly is not my place to speak on behalf of the Palestinian community in Germany or further afield.”

More information can be found on Breitz’s Instagram link-in-bio at @candicebreitz.