Christina Lamb

It’s hard to think of a more polarising conflict in recent times than the Israeli-Gaza war. This year Christina has covered this major story with great passion, courage and insight. Despite her ground-breaking work elsewhere - such as reporting from Ukraine on the children stolen by Putin, or covering the forgotten ten-year plight of the Yazidis in northern Iraq, we have decided to submit three stories from Israel and Palestine to show the depth of her work in bringing new insights to this most complicated and consequential of wars.

https://www.thetimes.com/world/israel-hamas-war/article/settlers-think-they-are-above-the-law-now-we-feel-like-we-are-just-waiting-for-them-to-take-over-wrhs8ntxn

While international focus has been on Gaza, an undeclared war is underway in the West Bank which Christina powerfully describes in this eye-opening and timely article, coming just as the IDF launched its biggest operation there in 20 years.

Christina travelled throughout the region talking to all sides from ancient shepherd communities in the South Hebron Hills driven out by settlers, to those currently under siege, to the northern village where settlers shot dead a computer whizz-kid and torched homes and cars.

Along the way she saw new settler outposts and overcame their hostility to persuade them to talk. She had unique access to an astonishing settler school for teenage girls, met a woman signing settlers up for Gaza, and talked to a brave female lawyer taking on the settlers.

Her article was one of the most read and commented pieces in the Sunday Times and prompted similar reports on BBC and ITN. https://www.thetimes.com/uk/article/ten-hamas-fighters-were-raping-the-woman-she-begged-for-death-6ldlmh8sp

Rarely can foreign journalists be said to have changed the narrative but this article, on an untold aspect of the October 7 attacks by Hamas, did. Christina managed to win the confidence of survivors and their counsellors and heard horrific stories of the sexual violence that took place that day. She spoke to eyewitnesses, first responders and a mother in what was the first detailed account of this horrendous attack and the unforgettable image of the girl with the face of an angel.

Christina’s ground-breaking reporting was followed up all over the world and substantiated in the report of the UN Special Representative on Sexual Violence, the ICC, which included rape in their charges against Hamas, and the UN independent Commission of Inquiry. https://www.thetimes.com/world/israel-hamas-war/article/icc-prosecutor-uk-didnt-blitz-the-ira-israel-needs-that-restraint-0sxjbvl2g

This is an interview the whole world’s media wanted – an exclusive with the Chief Prosecutor of the Criminal Court, Karim Khan, after his announcement that he was issuing arrest warrants against Israel’s Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu - the first time that a sitting western-backed leader had been targeted by the court – along with his Defence Minister Yoav Gallant and three Hamas leaders.

In this carefully balanced piece on this most polarising of conflicts, she discusses with Khan why he felt he had no choice but to act, the need for international law to step up in a fractured world, and the influence of his own background from a Muslim minority sect in Yorkshire. The story - and his comparison with Northern Ireland - was widely quoted all over the world.