Foreign Press Association launches online petition demanding Israel allow journalists into Gaza

The Foreign Press Association has launched an online petition calling on Israel to lift its ban on journalists being allowed into Gaza to independently report.

“For more than two years, Israel has barred the foreign press from entering Gaza to report freely. This ban is unprecedented and an affront to press freedoms and the public’s right to information,” the petition states.

The Foreign Press Association has relentlessly lobbied Israeli officials, diplomats and international organizations to reverse this ban. They even petitioned Israel’s Supreme Court. At every turn, Israel has responded with stalling tactics and vague security arguments along with a refusal to engage in dialogue,” the petition continues. “This cannot go on.”

The IDF and the Defense Ministry have applied a blanket ban on independent press access to the Gaza Strip since the beginning of the war. It has, however, allowed Israeli journalists, and to a lesser extent foreign journalists, to enter specific areas of Gaza as embedded reporters with IDF forces.

Israel has argued that the entry of journalists into the Strip would pose security risks to IDF soldiers and to the journalists themselves.

Let us in.

For more than two years, we’ve been barred from entering Gaza to report freely. It’s long past time for Israel to lift this ban and #LetUsIn.

Join us. Share this post. And sign the FPA’s petition: https://t.co/Z7JMO4wu2K pic.twitter.com/7X4UZDPCMv

— Foreign Press Assoc. (@FPAIsPal) February 26, 2026