Last summer, shortly after Ahmed Zakot, his wife and three young kids moved from the Gaza Strip to Calgary, the family piled into a car and headed straight for the Canadian Rockies.
Back home in Gaza City, Zakot’s children had few opportunities to play, the once-familiar playgrounds and parks now flattened.
But in their new lives in Alberta, the freedom to explore nature has been a way for his kids to start healing and “remove the nightmares that they went through during the ongoing war,” Zakot said.
This “paradise,” as Zakot calls it, is a far cry from where he stood just over a year ago.
Bombardments, funerals, and destruction were often the focus of Zakot’s photos on the ground in Gaza before, and especially after, Oct. 7, 2023.
“It’s a horrible thing … as a Palestinian journalist, covering the stories, the news, events, chasing bombs, funerals, humanitarian stories [and] at the same time caring about your family who have been displaced,” he said.
Zakot, a Gazan since he was seven years old, has worked as a photojournalist for more than two decades, mostly with the global news agency Reuters. And he was part of the Reuters team that won the 2024 Pulitzer Prize in Breaking News Photography for its war coverage.
Though Zakot was no stranger to covering the gruesome nature of war in the region, the recent escalation felt “different,” he said.
“We [needed] to be covering every single moment from the beginning to the end, documenting everything to show the truth.”
Since Oct. 7, 2023 Israel has banned foreign media members from independently entering the Gaza Strip, so local journalists have been sharing photos, videos and stories with the rest of the world.
For about 10 months, as Palestinians fled Israel’s military action in the Gaza Strip, Zakot ran toward the danger and destruction, capturing the war.
Equally on Zakot’s mind was the safety of his family, including three young kids, who were living in a tent.
“They need food. They need water. They need medical support. They need psychological support,” he recalled.
While balancing journalistic duty and his family’s safety in the months Zakot reported from the bloody conflict in Gaza, he lost — and continues to lose — cherished colleagues.
Recently, Israeli forces killed five Al Jazeera journalists, who had been operating out of a media tent in front of Al-Shifa Hospital in Gaza City.
LISTEN | Ahmed Zakot remembers Anas al-Sharif:
One of those journalists was 28-year-old Anas al-Sharif, whose reporting from the war zone had earned him a reputation as “the voice of Gaza.”
Israel said the strike successfully targeted Hamas militants, but human rights and press freedom advocates say it was meant to silence journalists reporting on the ground.
About seven years ago, Zakot remembers meeting a young al-Sharif at a press conference for the Ministry of Health where the early-career journalist walked around the room eagerly shaking hands and introducing himself to the other press members.
“He was brave and so excited,” Zakot said. “He began his career and [was] dreaming to improve it.”
LISTEN | The cost of reporting from Gaza:
As the more experienced journalist, Zakot said he gave him advice: “The most important thing [is] you have to keep yourself safe because nothing is worth your life.”
In 2024, as the conflict showed no signs of ceasing, Zakot took his own advice and turned his family’s sights to Canada.
After a challenging application process amidst the dangers of war, Zakot and his family finally arrived in Canada, staggered, in the summer of 2024 through a special visa program for Palestinians with family in Canada.
Zakot said, over the years, he had longed to capture more of the beauty of his home, like sunrises and sunsets over Gaza.
Now in Alberta, he’s getting the opportunity to focus on the beauty of his Canadian home, with the promise of safety and new experiences for his family, like seeing snow for the first time or feeling the chaotic Calgary weather.
“We don’t have snow in Gaza. Never. Our weather is good — beautiful in the summer and beautiful in the winter,” he said. “Here, it’s totally different and we felt [all] four seasons at the same day.
“The circumstances, the environment, the sightseeing, the beauty thing, the nature here in Calgary especially helped us to adjust [the kids] and to treat them.”
Professionally, the Pulitzer Prize winner is still taking pictures as a freelance photojournalist, most recently covering the G7 summit in Kananaskis and the federal election.
But Zakot’s aim now is to learn more about what matters locally, so he can share the stories of Calgarians, without forgetting his roots.
“Step by step, and day by day, we already adjusted — making friends, relationships with people, communities, charities.”
