Sam Mednick and Sally Abou Aljoud’s story was the first to expose that sexual exploitation associated with aid is happening during the war in Gaza.
Their reporting, with assistance from other staff in the region who are not being named for safety reasons, revealed that local men—some linked with aid groups including the United Nations—are being accused of soliciting sexual interactions from women in exchange for money, food, water or a job.
The reporting began with Mednick getting a tip from an aid worker who said they were receiving reports from Palestinian women who had been sexually exploited. Mednick began investigating from Israel with Abou Aljoud in Beirut.
Reporting on sexual exploitation is a challenge in any context, but the situation in Gaza made it even more difficult, and the story took months to do. Aid groups and advocacy organizations that work to protect women—and who usually would want this made public—didn’t want to speak, with many saying they didn’t want to divert attention away from the harm Israel was causing in Gaza. The nature of the war, especially the constant displacement, also made it hard to reach people, interview them and ask follow-up questions.
One of the biggest challenges was that Gaza is a very conservative culture where sexual abuse and sex outside of marriage are considered taboo and can have grave consequences. Women were terrified to speak and report abuse, even anonymously. Those who did often didn’t want to say too much about what happened. Most people told the AP that no one would speak about this issue.
Yet the team managed to break the story through strong source building to gain the women’s trust and perseverance. They spoke with dozens of aid and advocacy groups in and outside of Gaza, psychologists, human rights experts and Palestinian women and managed to find the few people willing to talk.
Given the sensitive nature of the story, we weren’t able to photograph or film the women. The team got creative by asking Peter Hamlin to create illustrations. Hamlin was briefed on the story and, together with reporters, came up with illustrations to depict what the women had gone through. The story was accompanied by an explainer and digital video.
Janelle Cogan edited the complex story and was pivotal to the outcome.
Judges noted the difficulty in pursuing the reporting on the story, along with the team’s creativity in illustrating the text.
For an exclusive that required deep sourcing and resourcefulness, Mednick, Abou Aljoud and Cogan win this week’s first Best of the Week.
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