Whistleblowers accuse CPJ of 'shielding' Israel to appease donors

The organization's annual fundraiser drew $250,000 from Rupert Murdoch-owned media outlets last year  

News Desk  -  The Cradle 

Current and former staff at the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) have accused the organization of deliberately downplaying Israel's war crimes in Gaza to placate pro-Israel donors, according to a report by Electronic Intifada published on 18 December.

The whistleblowers claim CPJ CEO Jodie Ginsberg personally controls all Gaza-related research, blocking work that would reveal that the Israeli army deliberately targets journalists. 

One research piece backed by military experts reportedly concluded Israel knowingly kills journalists, but Ginsberg shelved it. 

An employee was reportedly fired after disputing Ginsberg's refusal to classify journalist killings as targeted murders—a war crime under international law.

Despite an internal memo stating CPJ should call Israel's actions "genocide," whistleblowers say this is misleading. 

The memo instructs staff to use qualified language like "what human rights groups deem a genocide" to talk about the mass murder of tens of thousands of Palestinians.

A website review found that in only two of 15 Gaza-related items does CPJ use "genocide" without attribution, with the first appearing in October 2025, two years into Israel’s genocidal war.

The CPJ denied the allegations, saying staff were never told to avoid "genocide" and could use any language on personal social media, citing examples of Ginsberg publicly using the term and accusing Israel of war crimes.

The annual CPJ fundraising dinner draws major media donors, including five Rupert Murdoch-owned outlets, which contributed $250,000 total. 

Rupert Murdoch is a longtime supporter of Israel who has routinely advanced pro-Israel positions via his platforms. 

He previously described Israel as a front-line defender of “western democratic civilization” at the peak of Israel's ethnic cleansing campaign.

This year's awards honored journalists from China, Ecuador, Kyrgyzstan, and Tunisia, with no Palestinian nominees. 

Ginsberg explained CPJ doesn't award journalists from the same country consecutively, noting last year's recipient was Palestinian journalist Shrouq Al Aila. 

Whistleblowers called Al Aila a "safe choice" whose background was extensively vetted, and said proposals to honor slain Al Jazeera journalist Anas Al-Sharif were ignored.

Since the genocide began over two years ago, nearly 300 journalists have been killed by Israeli forces.

Reporters Without Borders (RSF) has declared Israel the world's leading cause of death of journalists for three years in a row. Forty-three percent of the 67 journalists killed globally between December 2024 and December 2025 were killed by Israeli forces in Gaza. 

The organization condemned the murders and designated them as targeted killings by state militaries. 

Israeli journalist Yuval Abraham recently revealed that military intelligence created a "Legitimization Cell" to justify killing Palestinian journalists by falsely portraying them as Hamas operatives.