Freelance photojournalist Ali Mahmud, who contributed to the Associated Press and accompanied the Hamas terrorists during the 7 October attack in Israel, has won the Team Picture Story of the Year awarded by the Donald W. Reynolds Journalism Institute in the US. Ali Mahmud has won the award for the photograph of Shani Louk, who was paraded naked by the Hamas terrorists before killing her.
According to the website of the award, the Team Picture Story of the Year award category recognizes the collaborative effort of a photography staff covering a single topic or news story. “It is a narrative picture story that consists of images taken as part of a team effort to cover a single issue or news story,” it states. Shani Louk photograph is the first photograph in the gallery, and it states in the caption “Palestinian militants drive back to the Gaza Strip with the body of Shani Louk, a German-Israeli dual citizen, during their cross-border attack on Israel, Saturday, Oct. 7, 2023.”
Several other photographs showing the aftermath of the Hamas terror attack and Israel’s military action in Gaza, mostly taken by AP Photojournalists, have been selected for the award.
The award is handed out annually by the Missouri School of Journalism at the University of Missouri in the United States.
Ali Mahmud is one of the journalists who travelled with the terrorists into Israel and extensively covered the attack. Media watchdog Honest Reporting had identified six freelance photographers, who had contributed to Associated Press and Reuters. The six photographers were identified as Hassan Eslaiah, Yousef Masoud, Ali Mahmud, Hatem Ali, Mohammed Fayq Abu Mostafa and Yasser Qudih. It is believed that they were aware of the Hamas terror attack before it took place.
The freelancers snapped photos of a burning Israeli tank and of Hamas terrorists kidnapping people, including the German-Israeli woman Shani Louk, who was later found dead. The photojournalists had posted the photos on social media in real time, when the attack was going on. In some posts, the photographers had posted their own photographs from the Israeli territory during the attack. They later deleted those posts, but Honest Reporting had already taken screenshots of those posts.