“Journalism is very necessary, useful and really works”: how correspondents document reality in times of war

Journalism is a profession associated with significant challenges. Regardless of country or region, journalists face similar challenges, but when covering conflicts, the price of truth increases and information also becomes a weapon. In Ukraine, Journalist’s Day is celebrated on June 6 TSN.ua prepared an overview of the conversation from the series “Free Press Talking” between the military correspondent Ilya Ponomarenko and Maya Gebeili – the head of the Reuters Bureau in Lebanon, Syria and Jordan.

Curiosity is a tendency that makes an observer a journalist

Often, the profession of a military correspondent is not a choice, but a necessity. This is what happened in the life of Ilya Ponomarenko, who met the 2014 war as a student, and a full-scale invasion – in the cohort of journalists of the English-language mass media The Kyiv Independent. His hometown, Volnovakha, Donetsk region, was destroyed by the Russians as a result of a full-scale invasion.

“Now we have a full-fledged tough war. Then everything was different. I was essentially a civilian living in a chaotic city. The city was not controlled by the Ukrainian government for several months. No one controlled it from the inside, except Russian militants. And, of course, we were the center of attention. And since I was a student of the Faculty of International Relations, there was no particular hope that you would be something more than a student,” he recalls the beginning of the war in 2014 and his life at that time.

According to him, fellow students were also very excited when there was a chance to meet one of the foreigners who came to the university. “Then I started talking to the BBC. You could simply leave your email address on the site so they could contact you if you witnessed the events described in the articles. And they contacted me and talked about what I saw in Mariupol in those days. They convinced me to go live in the middle of the night on BBC radio. They kept calling me over and over, especially the Scottish Service. Yes, step by step, I got into this special English-speaking media world,” the journalist said.

Ilya Ponomarenko also thought about the army, but due to health problems, he abandoned this idea. Journalism fascinated him, and he became interested in other international events as well – for example, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, the situation in the Middle East and Africa.

His story somewhat overlaps with the experience of Maya Gebeili, who covers events in Lebanon, Syria and Jordan at Reuters and follows the post-conflict dynamics in Yemen and Iraq.

“I think the thing that really makes you a journalist is curiosity. So we always hear about somebody’s experience and think, ‘Oh, I’m interested in that because it’s something I’ve never seen before.’ Or “I don’t know about that. So I want to do it.” I’ve wanted to become a diplomat for a long time and thought it would be a really great way to see the world. And then, having Lebanese roots, I spent every summer in Lebanon and was going to work a little as a correspondent. It was the summer of 2013, that is, 10 years ago. And then in Beirut there was the largest concentration of explosions that have ever occurred,” the international journalist shared.

It was then that a decisive event took place in her profession – she felt that she should highlight what she sees “here and now”.

“I remember the first time I went to cover the consequences of one of these explosions, it was a double attack by suicide bombers on two mosques in Tripoli, in the north of Lebanon. I remember that was the first time I saw body parts. I smelled it in a place where there were so many deaths. And I remember that I was very surprised that it did not scare me. Rather, I wanted to understand as much as possible about what brought us to this point. And this was the point when I realized that it is much more interesting for me to be as close to the events as possible. And diplomats, let’s say, do not have such an opportunity,” noted Maya Gebeili.

PTSD and emotional burnout

Correspondents in the war reveal the truth, telling about the lives of people on the front lines, about human rights violations, and about the humanitarian crisis. They become the voice of those who cannot tell their story on their own. But they face the same challenges as representatives of other professions: the need to constantly develop, sharpen their skills, progress along with the development of technology.

“The more you work, the further you advance, the more demands you have on yourself. Because the profession requires knowledge about everything: about weapons, important events, about every important thing. New information keeps coming in and out. New weapons, new tactics appear. You should at least have a general understanding of all these things. That’s why training never stops,” admits Ilya Ponomarenko.

But professionalism is only part of the story. In times of great upheaval, documenting reality becomes another challenge.

“Who would want to be, for example, in the front line with the Ukrainian military, who are breaking through Bucha? Absolutely no one. But in Ukraine, reporters from all over the world fought for the opportunity to join the army, to see it. This is a very special nature of the profession and it requires a lot of mental strength,” the Ukrainian journalist admits.

Many journalists have experienced stressful situations, seek the help of psychotherapists, or even talk about the symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder. “If you work in your own country, which is in a state of war, of course you put 150% of yourself into it and, of course, inevitably burn out,” says Ilya Ponomarenko.

By the way, he now lives in Buch, Kyiv region, where the Russians nursed the genocide before the deoccupation on March 31, 2022, so the very name of the city has become a symbol of the suffering of Ukrainians.

“There is a limit to the ability to work in this mode. So for me, the biggest challenge now is simply not to be extremely tired, but we are still very far from the end of the war,” the journalist recalled.

Women in War and Responsibility

Despite the difficulties, Maya Gebeili believes that as a woman she had many opportunities to get the necessary information and reveal people’s stories. For example, describing her work with women who were victims of the Islamic State (an international Sunni terrorist organization), she mentioned that the women were not ready to talk to a male foreign reporter after they had just been rescued. “So the fact that I was a woman and, in my opinion, more importantly, that I spoke Arabic and had the opportunity to communicate with them directly, played a role,” she recalls.

Also, young age did not stand in the way, on the contrary, it helped to communicate more openly and create trust. “In Iraq and Syria, we talked to a lot of quite young fighters who were not yet 20 years old, or a little over 20. I felt that maybe I reminded them of a sister, a friend, someone who is waiting at home, who they are with can talk, and therefore they could open up, or simply were more interested in talking to me,” the Reuters journalist explained.

But personal security, working with sources and heroes is only part of her profession. Maya Gebeili manages a group of reporters, so she thinks not only about herself, but also about other reporters working in Lebanon, Syria and other countries.

Ilya Ponomarenko agrees with her, recalling an interesting aspect from his experience. “You know, conventional thinking might tell you that it would be easier for a male reporter to get into combat units or go to the front. But in practice, it often happens that soldiers can be a little more emotionally interested in having a very stubborn girl around. So the girls at the front also do a lot of work,” he admitted.

Both reporters recognized the influence of another feature of the profession – responsibility to the audience. After all, many journalists become very famous not only in foreign media, but also in social networks.

“One should think twice or thrice before saying something, before tweeting, because since February of last year, many people in Ukraine have been in the center of attention. After all, journalism is very necessary, useful and really works. Bucha, where I live, is also an example. What Ukrainians saw, thanks to the mass media and all the enthusiasm, all the presence of people, was covered on a global scale. I hope that journalism will never die, but there is still a lot of work ahead,” concluded Ilya Ponomarenko.

Author: Olga Konsevich

We will remind you that Russia issued yet another batch of delusions about Ukraine’s use of the “combat locust”.

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