In a bombshell revelation shared on social media platform X Monday, Nika Soon-Shiong, publisher of independent outlet Drop Site News, announced she has been ousted from the board of the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) — a move that comes directly after she publicly challenged the organization’s controversial decision to strip dozens of Palestinian journalists from its official count of media workers killed in Gaza.
Soon-Shiong posted the announcement alongside the full text of the internal email she sent to fellow board members outlining her concerns, writing simply: “I have been informed that I’m no longer a member of the Committee to Protect Journalists board.”
When contacted for comment by Middle East Eye, CPJ offered a vague response in an emailed statement, claiming only that Soon-Shiong’s five-year board term was not set to expire until June 2026, declining to address whether her removal was tied to the ongoing internal review of its Gaza casualty database that she opposed.
The conflict stems from CPJ’s announcement last week that it would launch a full review of its Gaza casualty list, after the militant groups Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad published obituaries identifying 20 people previously listed by CPJ as journalists as combatants. Those 20 names were immediately removed from CPJ’s count, dropping its official total of journalists killed in Gaza to 209, far below the 270+ confirmed by the Palestinian Journalists’ Syndicate. The full review is expected to conclude next month.
In her internal email, Soon-Shiong questioned the entire premise of the review, noting CPJ had failed to establish clear objectives, a defined scope of work, or a public assessment of the institutional risks of revisiting the fundamental question of who qualifies as a journalist for protection. At the core of her criticism is the organization’s decision to single out Palestinian journalists for removal based on affiliations, while applying a double standard to journalists with links to the Israeli military.
Soon-Shiong explicitly tied the push for the review to a hit piece published May 27 by the right-wing U.S. outlet Washington Free Beacon by reporter Adam Kredo, who has a long track record of targeting pro-Palestinian and pro-Muslim voices. Kredo’s article attacked the CPJ board for what it claimed was widespread anti-Israel sentiment, calling out Soon-Shiong and Nobel Prize-winning Filipino journalist Maria Ressa by name as “virulent anti-Israel voices” for publicly labeling Israel’s military campaign in Gaza a genocide and comparing its actions to those of Nazi Germany. Soon-Shiong wrote that the proposal to exclude journalists based on “behaviors and activities” or affiliation with “state-backed propaganda outlets, militant- and designated terror-affiliated organizations” emerged directly from the criticisms Kredo leveled in that article.
“Accusations of terrorism are widespread and politically motivated to discredit journalists and political opponents,” Soon-Shiong wrote in the email. “I appreciated the Board’s dismissal of the article… [but] because baseless accusations will become more common, not less, CPJ must strive to rise above the fray. Reopening the question of ‘who is a journalist’ carries profound implications for the individuals CPJ protects and for the organizations with which they are affiliated. It’s a betrayal to our colleagues in Gaza who have faced the deadliest conflict for journalists ever recorded.”
Weeks before Soon-Shiong’s removal, prominent Palestinian journalist Mohammed el-Kurd, Palestine correspondent for *The Nation*, warned of CPJ’s plans in a post on X. Citing anonymous sources inside the organization, el-Kurd said CPJ planned to formally revise its definition of a journalist to exclude Palestinian and Lebanese journalists working for state-funded outlets — while explicitly allowing Israeli, American, and Ukrainian journalists employed by state-funded outlets or embedded with national militaries to keep their recognized status.
For mainstream U.S. and Canadian media outlets, CPJ’s casualty count has long been the default source for the number of journalists killed in Gaza, with most outlets declining to cite local Palestinian organizations or the Gaza Health Ministry’s official totals. That reliance makes CPJ’s review all the more consequential for public understanding of the unprecedented danger Gaza journalists face.
In her criticisms of the review, Soon-Shiong pushed back on the organization’s unequal application of its new standards, asking why only Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad affiliations were being targeted for scrutiny. She noted that Israeli forces have been widely accused of war crimes in Gaza, and multiple U.S. journalists working for major mainstream outlets employ reporters who serve in the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF).
“What should happen to outlets like The Atlantic, LA Times, or BBC where editors served in the IDF directly?” Soon-Shiong asked. “CPJ cannot credibly position itself as an objective judge of who is a legitimate journalist and what merits protection.”
In its response to Middle East Eye, CPJ denied changing its longstanding methodology, which it says applies uniformly across all global conflict zones, and claimed it has not altered how it classifies journalists. “Our long-standing policy is to include journalists working for state-backed media and those working with media organizations affiliated with militant groups provided they are not engaging in combat or inciting violence in a manner likely to have imminent effect. This is consistent with international humanitarian law,” the organization said. “If we determine an individual was an active combatant or incited imminent violence then they would be removed from our list regardless of their outlet’s affiliation.”
Soon-Shiong, who is the daughter of Los Angeles Times billionaire owner Patrick Soon-Shiong, joined the CPJ board in 2021 and took over leadership of Drop Site News last year. Founded by veteran investigative journalists Jeremy Scahill and Ryan Grim, Drop Site News has gained recognition for its in-depth, on-the-ground coverage of Israel’s military campaign in Gaza and Palestinian politics that is largely missing from mainstream U.S. media, including rare wide-ranging interviews with Hamas and Islamic Jihad officials.