A Chilling Dismissal of Journalist Murder
US President Donald Trump reached what many are calling a new low in his relationship with the truth and the press when he casually dismissed the brutal murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi with the words "things happen". This shocking comment came during a press conference with Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, the very man the CIA concluded had orchestrated the kidnapping and killing of the Washington Post columnist.
The Gruesome Facts of the Case
The murder occurred in 2018 at the Saudi consulate in Istanbul, where the 59-year-old Khashoggi was drugged and dismembered. A 2021 CIA report definitively found that Prince Mohammed had orchestrated the operation, a conclusion supported by a separate United Nations investigation led by special rapporteur Agnès Callamard.
Initially, the killing prompted international condemnation and US sanctions against Saudi Arabia, though these stopped short of targeting the crown prince directly. The royal's recent visit to Washington appeared to signal Saudi Arabia's successful rehabilitation on the world stage, despite widespread criticism from human rights advocates.
Creating a Culture of Impunity
Trump's behaviour went beyond merely hosting the Saudi leader. He directly contradicted his own intelligence agencies by asserting Prince Mohammed knew nothing about the killing. Worse still, he effectively blamed the victim by noting "a lot of people didn't like that gentleman."
This incident represents the culmination of Trump's longstanding hostility toward the press, which has included:
- Publicly smearing journalists as "fake news"
- Filing vexatious lawsuits against news organisations
- Calling for media outlets he dislikes to lose their licenses
- Gutting funding for public and independent media
The consequences of such rhetoric are deadly serious. The Committee to Protect Journalists recorded 2024 as the deadliest year in its over three decades of monitoring journalist killings. This culture of impunity is particularly evident in conflicts like Gaza, where more than 200 journalists have been killed in the past two years.
Attacks on journalists represent attacks on truth itself and our fundamental right to information. As the world faces increasing threats to press freedom, the responsibility falls on all of us to ensure that journalist killings cannot be dismissed with a casual "things happen."
