One From the Archives: Sophie McNeill and We Can't Say We Didn't Know

About this episode

Sophie McNeill discusses her experiences as a journalist in conflict zones and the implications of her work on human rights advocacy.

As the war in Gaza continues — and journalists covering the conflict are being killed at unprecedented rates — we return to the Fourth Estate archives for a conversation that now feels more urgent than ever. In this 2020 interview, former ABC Middle East correspondent Sophie McNeill joins then-Fourth Estate host Sharon Davis to discuss McNeill’s book We Can’t Say We Didn’t Know: Dispatches From An Age Of Impunity and the years she spent reporting from Gaza, Yemen, Syria and Iraq. Together, Sophie and Sharon unpack the realities of frontline journalism: documenting war crimes, navigating questions of objectivity and advocacy, and bearing witness to immense human suffering in an era increasingly defined by impunity. The conversation also revisits the extraordinary case of Rahaf Mohammed, the young Saudi woman whose plea for asylum led Sophie to fly to Bangkok — sparking an international story that blurred the lines between reporting and intervention. Listening back now, the interview is striking not only for how sharply it anticipated many of today’s debates around war reporting and press freedom, but also for the insight it offers into the convictions that would later draw Sophie…

People in this episode

Host: Sharon Davis

Guest: Sophie McNeill

Topics covered

• journalism
• war reporting
• press freedom
• human rights
• Middle East
• impunity

Keywords

• Gaza
• journalism
• war crimes
• press freedom
• human rights
• Sophie McNeill
• Sharon Davis
• impunity
• Rahaf Mohammed
• Middle East

Mentioned in this episode

Organizations: ABC

Books & works: We Can't Say We Didn't Know: Dispatches From An Age Of Impunity

Places: Gaza, Yemen, Syria, Iraq, Bangkok

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