In armed conflicts, free expression is more vital than ever

Welcome to a snippet of our October edition of Inside Expression! This month, we’re discussing the importance of free expression in armed conflicts worldwide.

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Lessons from the battlefield of history

ARTICLE 19 has defended free expression in armed conflicts for nearly 40 years.?

During that time, we’ve witnessed drastic changes in the technology used to censor, surveil, and silence.

In 1992, we documented Israel jailing a West Bank journalist for owning a fax machine. Today, we raise the alarm about AI-powered warfare (as in Gaza) and the harmful effects of digital disinformation (as in Sudan and Ukraine).

Yet some things haven’t changed.?

In today’s armed conflicts, governments and armed groups may deploy new technologies, but they still follow the same old playbook:

• Control the narrative: Conflict parties have always used propaganda and disinformation to shore up support, mislead the public, and whip up hate. This can limit accountability, undermine peace efforts, and lead to more violence against civilians.
• Silence the media: The importance of journalists in conflicts can’t be overestimated: they disseminate crucial information and bring war crimes to light. For precisely these reasons, they are attacked, murdered, and prevented from reporting the reality on the ground
• Shut down communications: The internet enables civilians trapped amid violence to communicate with loved ones, document atrocities, and access food, water, and safety. Yet from fax machines to social media, communication blackouts have always been weaponised during war.?

Being aware of these deep, lasting problems is vital for creating deep, lasting solutions.

In these harrowing times, we must stand together, learn from history, and refuse to let corrupt leaders control what we see, hear, and say.?

Israel and Palestine: A year on, the assault on free expression continues

On 7 October, the world marked 1 year since Hamas’s horrific attack on Israel, in which 1,200 people were killed and 251 taken hostage.?

Israel’s brutal and disproportionate response has so far claimed over 42,000 Palestinian lives, displaced 90% of Gaza’s population, and left 96% facing high levels of acute food insecurity. Meanwhile, 10,000 people remain trapped beneath the rubble, and Israel has devastated Gaza’s economy so completely that it would take 350 years to rebuild.?

Israel’s retaliation has also extended to Lebanon, resulting in 2,593 deaths and an estimated 1.2 million displacements at the time of writing. On 25 October 2024, an Israeli air strike killed 3 media workers in Lebanon in what looks to be a targeted attack.?

A year into this conflict, there is no resolution in sight, geopolitical posturing is failing people on the ground, and we are now on the brink of the abyss: an all-out regional war.?

Amid this senseless death, displacement, and hunger, freedom of expression has been caught in the crossfire.??

Israel’s censorship has prevented human rights violations from being documented and the truth from circulating freely – and disinformation has rushed in to fill the vacuum. Israel has baselessly accused journalists, humanitarian organisations, and the UN of supporting terrorism; Hamas has spread fear, shared propaganda, and stoked violence online.?

Meanwhile, social media platforms have fallen drastically short of their responsibilities, removing vital evidence of human rights violations while failing to stem the tide of hate speech.?

Israel’s war on Gaza has threatened free expression worldwide, as a 2024 report by the UN Special Rapporteur, Irene Khan shows.?

‘The conflict in Gaza has unleashed a global crisis of freedom of expression. Rarely has a conflict challenged freedom of opinion and expression so broadly and so far beyond its borders.’                                                                                                                                                         

– Irene Khan
(UN Special Rapporteur on freedom of expression)          

The report, to which ARTICLE 19 contributed, documents restrictions on protests, online content, academia, and the arts relating to the Israel–Palestine conflict globally. We urge governments, social media companies, universities, and cultural institutions to implement its recommendations.

ARTICLE 19 stands with the communities affected by the conflict and calls for an immediate ceasefire. Read more

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