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Photojournalist Fatma Hassona was killed in northern Gaza by an Israeli airstrike on April 16, 2025.
(Photo: Fatma Hassona/Instagram)
Photojournalist Fatma Hassona, Subject of Doc Headed to Cannes, Killed in Gaza
"Her smile was as magical as her tenacity: bearing witness, photographing Gaza, distributing food despite the bombs, mourning, and hunger," said ACID, a Cannes Festival parallel section.
Apr 18, 2025
The Palestinian photojournalist Fatma Hassona was killed alongside several other members of her family on Wednesday when an Israeli airstrike hit her home in northern Gaza, just 24 hours after it was announced that a documentary in which she is the main character was selected to premiere in May at ACID, a Cannes Festival parallel section.
"Yesterday another Palestinian reporter was killed in Gaza," wrote Francesca Albanese, the United Nations special rapporteur on the occupied Palestinian territories, on Thursday. "Her crime was to chronicle the genocide through powerful articles and photos. What a genocidal regime cannot allow."
Hassona, 25, was a multimedia graduate from the University College of Applied Sciences in Gaza, according to Le Monde, and was known for her photographs of life in the Gaza Strip and for documenting Israel's destruction of the enclave.
According to The Guardian, the strike that killed Hassona also killed 10 members of her family, including her pregnant sister. Hassona was also days away from getting married.
The documentary that is set to premier at Cannes is by the French-Iranian director Sepideh Farsi and is titled Put Your Soul On Your Hand And Walk.
"Her smile was as magical as her tenacity: bearing witness, photographing Gaza, distributing food despite the bombs, mourning, and hunger. We heard her story, rejoiced at each of her appearances to see her alive, we feared for her," the ACID said in statement on Thursday. "We had watched and programmed a film in which this young woman's life force seemed like a miracle. This is no longer the same film that we are going to support and present in all theaters, starting with Cannes. All of us, filmmakers and spectators alike, must be worthy of her light."
In an opinion piece for the French paper Libération that was originally published in French, Farsi said she got to know Hassona through a Palestinian friend located in Cairo.
"I was looking for an answer to a question that is both simple and complex. How do you stand under the siege? How do you live under the bombs?" she wrote.
In October 2023, Hamas militants attacked southern Israel, killing over 1,000 people and taking roughly 250 hostages—prompting Israel to carry out a fierce military campaign in the Gaza Strip that has killed over 50,000 people, according to local health officials there
Multiple human rights groups have said Israel is guilty of committing genocide or "acts of genocide."
"Preliminary investigations" by the press freedom group the Committee to Protect Journalists found that as of April 16, at least 175 journalists and media workers were among the more than tens of thousands killed in Gaza, the West Bank, Israel, and Lebanon since the start of the war. Palestinians account for 167 of those deaths. Other tallies put the figure at over 200 in Gaza alone.
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The Palestinian photojournalist Fatma Hassona was killed alongside several other members of her family on Wednesday when an Israeli airstrike hit her home in northern Gaza, just 24 hours after it was announced that a documentary in which she is the main character was selected to premiere in May at ACID, a Cannes Festival parallel section.
"Yesterday another Palestinian reporter was killed in Gaza," wrote Francesca Albanese, the United Nations special rapporteur on the occupied Palestinian territories, on Thursday. "Her crime was to chronicle the genocide through powerful articles and photos. What a genocidal regime cannot allow."
Hassona, 25, was a multimedia graduate from the University College of Applied Sciences in Gaza, according to Le Monde, and was known for her photographs of life in the Gaza Strip and for documenting Israel's destruction of the enclave.
According to The Guardian, the strike that killed Hassona also killed 10 members of her family, including her pregnant sister. Hassona was also days away from getting married.
The documentary that is set to premier at Cannes is by the French-Iranian director Sepideh Farsi and is titled Put Your Soul On Your Hand And Walk.
"Her smile was as magical as her tenacity: bearing witness, photographing Gaza, distributing food despite the bombs, mourning, and hunger. We heard her story, rejoiced at each of her appearances to see her alive, we feared for her," the ACID said in statement on Thursday. "We had watched and programmed a film in which this young woman's life force seemed like a miracle. This is no longer the same film that we are going to support and present in all theaters, starting with Cannes. All of us, filmmakers and spectators alike, must be worthy of her light."
In an opinion piece for the French paper Libération that was originally published in French, Farsi said she got to know Hassona through a Palestinian friend located in Cairo.
"I was looking for an answer to a question that is both simple and complex. How do you stand under the siege? How do you live under the bombs?" she wrote.
In October 2023, Hamas militants attacked southern Israel, killing over 1,000 people and taking roughly 250 hostages—prompting Israel to carry out a fierce military campaign in the Gaza Strip that has killed over 50,000 people, according to local health officials there
Multiple human rights groups have said Israel is guilty of committing genocide or "acts of genocide."
"Preliminary investigations" by the press freedom group the Committee to Protect Journalists found that as of April 16, at least 175 journalists and media workers were among the more than tens of thousands killed in Gaza, the West Bank, Israel, and Lebanon since the start of the war. Palestinians account for 167 of those deaths. Other tallies put the figure at over 200 in Gaza alone.
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The Palestinian photojournalist Fatma Hassona was killed alongside several other members of her family on Wednesday when an Israeli airstrike hit her home in northern Gaza, just 24 hours after it was announced that a documentary in which she is the main character was selected to premiere in May at ACID, a Cannes Festival parallel section.
"Yesterday another Palestinian reporter was killed in Gaza," wrote Francesca Albanese, the United Nations special rapporteur on the occupied Palestinian territories, on Thursday. "Her crime was to chronicle the genocide through powerful articles and photos. What a genocidal regime cannot allow."
Hassona, 25, was a multimedia graduate from the University College of Applied Sciences in Gaza, according to Le Monde, and was known for her photographs of life in the Gaza Strip and for documenting Israel's destruction of the enclave.
According to The Guardian, the strike that killed Hassona also killed 10 members of her family, including her pregnant sister. Hassona was also days away from getting married.
The documentary that is set to premier at Cannes is by the French-Iranian director Sepideh Farsi and is titled Put Your Soul On Your Hand And Walk.
"Her smile was as magical as her tenacity: bearing witness, photographing Gaza, distributing food despite the bombs, mourning, and hunger. We heard her story, rejoiced at each of her appearances to see her alive, we feared for her," the ACID said in statement on Thursday. "We had watched and programmed a film in which this young woman's life force seemed like a miracle. This is no longer the same film that we are going to support and present in all theaters, starting with Cannes. All of us, filmmakers and spectators alike, must be worthy of her light."
In an opinion piece for the French paper Libération that was originally published in French, Farsi said she got to know Hassona through a Palestinian friend located in Cairo.
"I was looking for an answer to a question that is both simple and complex. How do you stand under the siege? How do you live under the bombs?" she wrote.
In October 2023, Hamas militants attacked southern Israel, killing over 1,000 people and taking roughly 250 hostages—prompting Israel to carry out a fierce military campaign in the Gaza Strip that has killed over 50,000 people, according to local health officials there
Multiple human rights groups have said Israel is guilty of committing genocide or "acts of genocide."
"Preliminary investigations" by the press freedom group the Committee to Protect Journalists found that as of April 16, at least 175 journalists and media workers were among the more than tens of thousands killed in Gaza, the West Bank, Israel, and Lebanon since the start of the war. Palestinians account for 167 of those deaths. Other tallies put the figure at over 200 in Gaza alone.
From Your Site Articles
Related Articles Around the Web
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