Dan Eldon was a British-American photojournalist who worked for Reuters. He was born in London before moving to Nairobi, Kenya, at 7 years old. His mother, Kathy Eldon, was a reporter, and Dan Eldon often accompanied her on journalistic assignments as a child. These experiences were formative in developing his life philosophy and interest in journalism, according to his younger sister, Amy Eldon.
“He sort of lived his life as a safari, as a journey and kind of like an art piece. It’s almost like he knew he didn’t have a lot of time here, so he was really in it,” Amy Eldon said. “I think he lived more than most people live in a hundred years.”
In the summer of 1992, Dan Eldon travelled to Somalia to document the ongoing war and famine. According to Amy Eldon, some of the pictures he shot helped bring about Operation Restore Hope, a humanitarian and peacekeeping project led by the United States. However, on July 12, 1993, the US Marine Corps bombed a warlord’s command post in Mogadishu. Upon arriving to cover the story, Dan Eldon and three other journalists were killed by a crowd angered by the death of over 70 Somalis in the bombing.
In 1998, Amy Eldon narrated and co-produced the documentary “Dying to Tell the Story,” in which she interviewed war correspondents about their experiences. She said that working on the film changed her perspective on Dan’s death.
“I was so devastated, and I couldn’t believe that this bright spark … this light could be crushed by such a force of darkness,” Amy Eldon said. “Interviewing these extraordinary people … who were literally dying to tell the story, I think it shifted my perspective because I realized that … wherever you see a crisis, there are always, if you pan over slightly, there are always the helpers.”
Written by Hollyn Alpert (’29).
Fatima Hassouna was a photojournalist who documented life in Gaza under Israeli attacks throughout the Israel-Hamas war. She was born in Gaza City and later attended the University College of Applied Sciences in Gaza, where she earned a multimedia degree. Following the Oct. 7 Hamas attacks in Israel, Hassouna began posting photos and videos of daily life in Gaza to her 48,000 followers on her Instagram account.
She had been documenting life in Gaza for 18 months when an Israeli airstrike hit her house in northern Gaza, killing her. Hassouna was the subject of a documentary, “Put Your Soul on Your Hand and Walk,” by director Sepideh Farsi. The film included interviews with Hassouna over 200 days and the aftermath of her death. The Israeli military said the airstrike was supposed to target a member of Hamas. However, the Palestinian Journalists’ Protection Center said that Hassouna’s family’s home had been targeted. According to the United Nations, Gaza has been the deadliest location for journalists in recent history. Her work is available to be viewed here.
Written by Nika Honarpour (’29).
Don Lemon is a journalist and former CNN anchor who, over his career, has worked for MS NOW, NBC News and Today. Born in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, he attended Brooklyn College and earned a bachelor’s degree in broadcast journalism. At the beginning of his career, he worked as a news anchor in both Birmingham, Alabama, and Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. In 2006, he began working at CNN, and in 2014, he started to host prime time shows, such as “The Eleventh Hour” and “The Don Lemon Show.” That same year, he started hosting the 10 p.m. hourlong news report titled “Don Lemon Tonight,” until his firing from CNN in 2023 following his use of sexist language on air.
On Jan. 18, Lemon was livestreaming an anti-ICE protest in Minnesota at a Baptist church service where the pastor was an alleged Immigration and Customs Enforcement official. During the livestream, he interviewed and filmed protestors and church attendees. On Jan. 29, he was arrested and charged with conspiracy to deprive rights and interfering with religious freedoms but was released from custody the next day. Following his arrest, Lemon said he would “not be silenced” for “committing journalism” and said he attended the protest as a journalist reporting on a group’s response to ICE activity. Almost two weeks later on Feb. 13, he pleaded not guilty to the charges.
Daniel Pearl was a journalist for the Wall Street Journal, covering the United States’ war on terror following the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks in the US. Pearl was born in Princeton, New Jersey, and attended Stanford University, where he graduated with a degree in communication. Following his graduation, he worked as a reporter in Massachusetts before moving to Atlanta in 1990 to work for the Wall Street Journal. He moved to multiple bureaus of the WSJ over the course of 11 years, until he settled in Mumbai, India, where he was the Southeast Asia bureau chief of the newspaper.
On Jan. 23, 2002, Pearl believed he was going to an interview with an Islamic scholar in Pakistan to discuss a recent terrorist attack on an airplane. However, on his way to the interview, he was kidnapped by members of several Islamic jihadist groups. Following his kidnapping, his captors gave the US a list of demands to be met in exchange for Pearl. Nine days later, when the US did not meet the abductor’s demands, Pearl was killed by his captors.
Evan Gershkovich is an American journalist who has worked in both Europe and the United States spanning his 10-year career. Gershkovich was born in Princeton, New Jersey, following his parents’ immigration to the US from the Soviet Union. He attended Bowdoin College, where he wrote for the Bowdoin Orient, and graduated with a degree in English and philosophy. After his graduation, Gershkovich worked for the New York Times for a year, before he moved to Moscow, Russia, in 2017. In Moscow, he worked for both The Moscow Times and Agence France-Presse“before being hired by the Wall Street Journal in 2022.
While covering the Russo-Ukranian war, Gershkovich was working in Yekaterinburg, Russia, and investigating the Russian military. On March 29, 2023, he was detained by the Russian Federal Security Service before being formally charged with espionage on April 7, 2023. The FSS accused Gershkovich of collecting information about a Russian battle tank manufacturer on behalf of the United States. During his trial in Yekaterinburg during the summer of 2024, he was sentenced to 16 years in prison. However, after being detained for 491 days in Russia, he was released on Aug. 1, 2024, in a 26-person prisoner swap between the United States and Russia. Since his release, Gershkovich has been writing a memoir about his experience in detention.
