This week’s newsletter is sponsored by Press On.

This week, our top story looks at the continued Israeli targeting of journalists in Palestine in the wake of Al Jazeera correspondent Anas al-Sharif’s assassination, along with the double standard major newsrooms have displayed around both Palestinian coverage and press solidarity in the past 22 months.

In this issue:

And also: L.A. Times workers prepare for first-ever strike authorization vote, Marshall Project Guild to file unfair labor practice charges against management, PBS cuts budget over 20%, and Politico editors argue use of AI bypasses editorial standards. Plus, the resource of the week is Democracy Journalism Columnist Beatrice Forman’s passionate defense of counterprogramming.

—James Salanga

“I have lived through pain in all its details, tasted suffering and loss many times, yet I never once hesitated to convey the truth as it is, without distortion or falsification.”

Those were among Al Jazeera correspondent Anas al-Sharif’s last words, published posthumously on Aug. 10 after a targeted Israeli strike on a media tent outside Gaza City’s al-Shifa hospital killed al-Sharif. al-Sharif pre-wrote his obituary, like many other journalists in Gaza, knowing that there are few left who can report on the situation after Israel continues a blockade against food aid and international media entering Gaza without supervision.

Per Al Jazeera, Israel’s military confirmed the attack was deliberately meant to kill al-Sharif, who was targeted by a smear campaign launched by the Israeli government — a common tactic even before the Hamas attack on Oct. 7. The strike also killed fellow Al Jazeera correspondent Mohammed Qreiqeh, along with cameramen Ibrahim Zaher and Mohammed Noufal.

“Israel is murdering the messengers,” Sara Qudah, the Committee to Protect Journalists’ regional director, said in a recent story covering the murder of al-Sharif and his colleagues.

Over the past 22 months, Israel has mounted and escalated a devastating campaign against not just the Palestinian people — killing over 61,000 people according to the Palestinian Ministry of Health — but also media workers in Palestine.

Palestinian journalists have said the press vest has marked them as targets, and Sharif Abdel Kouddous, Drop Site News’ editor for the Middle East and Northern Africa, says many journalists in Gaza work under the assumption they’ll probably be killed.

“Many of them are in their 20s, and they're writing these letters knowing that they're going to be killed and it's going to be read after their death,” he said.

Read more in The Objective.

—James Salanga

Sponsored by Press On

As federal cuts under Trump target public libraries and archives, community-led models are a blueprint for how journalists can preserve community narratives often excised or misrepresented by mainstream news. Read the full story in The Objective.

Sponsored by Press On

You're invited to Press On's upcoming virtual workshop series: Raising Your Voice: Crafting a Powerful First-Person Narrative. Sign up by 8/21 here.

Marshall Project Guild plans to file unfair labor practice charges against management: Though management granted voluntary recognition of the guild last year, the union says it has “increasingly taken anti-worker stances that have eroded trust.” In a letter to management, the guild cites denial of steward representation at worker termination meetings, retaliatory actions against a local news employee, “strategic erosion of past practice”, and more.

📨 Read the letter on Bluesky.

Supermajority of L.A. Times union pledges “yes” votes in first-ever strike authorization vote: Negotiations for a new contract are reaching their third year, with “wages, layoff protections and guardrails to prevent Guild work from being outsourced” among the key issues on the table, per the newspaper’s union. The Times has presided over several rounds of layoffs and buyouts in the past year amid turmoil over owner Patrick Soon-Shiong’s stated direction for the paper.

🗳️ Read the story in TheWrap.

PBS cuts budget over 20% after Trump’s closure of Corporation for Public Broadcasting: Historically, PBS has relied more on CPB funding than NPR, leaving the corporation and its member stations disproportionately impacted. Another source of its funds — $23 million from the Department of Education — was also eliminated. “It’s hard to imagine they’ll [PBS] be able to avoid them [layoffs] with a budget reduction this large,” public media analyst Alex Curley said.

📺 Read the story in the New York Times via archive.ph.

POLITICO’s editors say AI experiments shouldn’t fall under purview of editorial standards: PEN Guild-represented workers allege the publication violated contractual AI use guidelines. In a July arbitration hearing, editors argued: “Politico has always been at the forefront of adopting new technology to better serve our audience. This is no different.” The binding decision on the case is expected by Sept. 12.

⚙️ Read the story in Nieman Lab.

Have a story you think we should include in this section of next week’s newsletter? Let us know here or by responding to this email.

This week’s resource is … a passionate defense of counterprogramming.

I spent over two years running a collaborative that helped newsrooms do the best reporting they could on democracy. But in my day job, I report on things that many people consider useless to democracy: celebrity look-a-like competitions, cake picnics, famous shop cats, and even festivals celebrating baldness.

In reality, covering those pockets of zany happiness is vital to democracy — especially at the local level. Why? Because they can help audiences feel better about connecting with and changing the most important civic space they exist in: their neighborhoods. 

As an engagement journalist (and nosy person), I spend a lot of time lurking in the comments underneath my stories. And while most of them are positive, the refrains that frustrate me the most have always been “Why is this news?” or “Who cares?” Most of the time, those comments are left by people who live in the suburbs — not Philadelphia proper — and who use our paper’s public safety reporting as further proof that Philly is some unsafe urban dystopia beyond rehabilitation.

The attitude that counterprogramming is besides the point also permeates the journalism industry: When I recently told a Boston news editor that I loved her team’s coverage of the Somerville bike path cat mayor election, she laughed. 

“That story?” she said. “It was so funny, because the world is burning and this reporter just wanted to write about cats.” 

Yes, the world is burning. But sometimes you need a salve to survive the flames. Reporting on the spaces people take solace in during times of deep economic and political woe is revealing: It shows what different communities value, what they miss, and — absent pre-existing spaces — where communities go to build a collective sense of belonging, or peace, or joy.

Read the full column on The Objective.

—Beatrice Forman, Democracy Journalism Columnist

Thanks for reading. We’ll have more for you next week.

— 30 —