Reporters Without Borders (RSF) issued a stark warning Tuesday, releasing a sweeping annual assessment that shows 2025 has become a catastrophic year for media safety, with Israel’s military responsible for nearly half of all journalists killed worldwide.
The findings underscore a global crisis marked by targeted killings, repression and the steady erosion of press freedom across some of the world’s most volatile regions.
RSF documented 67 media workers killed over the past 12 months.
While the total is only slightly higher than last year, the pattern behind the deaths is far more troubling: four out of five were “deliberately eliminated” by armed forces, paramilitaries or criminal groups.
And nearly every journalist – 65 out of 67 – died in their home country, a reminder that local reporters continue to absorb the most direct blows from the conflicts they cover.
The report identifies Gaza as the single deadliest assignment on Earth.
RSF says 43% of journalists killed worldwide in 2025 died under Israeli fire – roughly 29 individuals, most of them Palestinian reporters documenting bombardments, mass displacement and humanitarian collapse.
This continues a devastating trend that began with the outbreak of war on Oct. 7, 2023.
Since then, the Israeli army has killed nearly 220 journalists, according to RSF, including at least 65 targeted because of their profession or killed while performing their duties.
Figures from Gaza’s Government Media Office place the number even higher – 257 Palestinian journalists, many crushed in strikes on homes, schools, hospitals and media office towers.
Beyond the media-specific toll, the wider death count remains staggering.
Gaza’s Health Ministry reports more than 70,000 people killed and 171,000 injured since 2023, most of them women and children.
Independent assessments warn that indirect deaths from disease, hunger and infrastructure collapse could push the real toll beyond 100,000.
Israel also continues to detain journalists at a rate RSF describes as “systemic.” Twenty Palestinian journalists were imprisoned in 2025 alone. At least 16 more have been arrested over the last two years across Gaza and the West Bank, many held without formal charges.
RSF says Gaza has become a “black hole for information,” as foreign reporters remain largely barred from entering and local journalists are being killed or detained at unprecedented levels.
Mexico remains the world’s second deadliest country for journalists, with nine killed in 2025 – numbers driven largely by organized crime networks operating with near-total impunity.
Many of this year’s victims were targeted for reporting on cartel operations, municipal corruption or disappearances, issues that continue to define Mexico’s deadly landscape for the press.
Latin America as a whole accounted for 24% of global journalist murders, reflecting a rise in intimidation campaigns, assassinations and threats from criminal groups in Brazil, Honduras and Colombia.
RSF notes that killings in the region surpassed last year’s total by mid-2025.
In Sudan, where war between the Sudanese Armed Forces and the Rapid Support Forces has devastated entire cities, four journalists were killed this year.
RSF highlights the December killing of Taj al-Sir Ahmed Suleiman in El Fasher, allegedly executed by RSF fighters controlling parts of Darfur.
IFJ data suggests at least six media workers have been killed since January as journalists face arrest, torture and forced displacement. Many have fled to neighboring countries as Sudan slides deeper into fragmentation.
China continues to hold the world’s largest population of imprisoned journalists – 121 media workers, including whistleblowers, local reporters, online commentators and citizen journalists.
RSF says the figure includes 113 detainees on the mainland and eight in Hong Kong, where the National Security Law continues to reshape the territory’s media environment.
High-profile cases, such as the renewed imprisonment of COVID-19 whistleblower Zhang Zhan, have drawn global criticism but no policy shifts from Beijing.
RSF details 37 currently missing journalists in Syria, most of whom disappeared during Bashar al-Assad’s 24-year rule or were kidnapped by Daesh.
These unresolved cases make Syria one of the world’s largest zones of media disappearances before Assad’s December 2024 flight to Russia and the end of decades of Baathist rule.
A transitional administration under Ahmed al-Sharaa took power in early 2025, but RSF notes that even under the new leadership, many families remain without answers about those abducted or imprisoned over the last decade.
RSF Secretary-General Christophe Deloire warned that the combination of impunity, political extremism and militarized violence has driven press freedom to its most fragile point in years.
The report lists 503 journalists detained in 47 countries – the highest total in a decade.
Russia leads with 48 imprisoned reporters, while Myanmar continues its harsh post-coup crackdown with 47 journalists behind bars.
Deloire said governments must enforce international protections, pressure armed forces to cease targeting journalists and investigate killings that have become routine in conflict zones.
“This report isn’t just a record of loss,” Deloire said. “It’s a measure of how close the world is to losing its essential witnesses.”
