Ari Rath Prize for Critical Journalism 2021

The „Ari Rath Prize for Critical Journalism“ was established on the basis of a private initiative to honour journalists, in the spirit of the renowned former editor-in-chief of The Jerusalem Post who passed away in January 2017, who have earned distinction in their work for reporting on flight, displacement, and asylum in a critical manner committed to upholding human rights.
A jury of experts chaired by Gertraud Auer Borea d'Olmo, Secretary General of the Bruno Kreisky Forum for International Dialogue and close confidant of Ari Rath, unanimously selected Thomas Seifert for the „Ari Rath Prize for Critical Journalism“ 2021.
The „Ari Rath Honour Award“ was unanimously Gideon Levy recognised.
The award ceremony took place on 21 June 2021 at the Bruno Kreisky Forum.

Thomas Seifert is known to many readers as a foreign policy expert and economics specialist. The current deputy editor-in-chief of the Wiener Zeitung previously travelled to numerous crisis regions of the world as a reporter for News, but also for Welt am Sonntag and the Sunday Telegraph and has written impressive reports: whether from the Ebola ward of the hospital in Gulu, Uganda, in 2000, or from Sierra Leone about child soldiers or the war in Chechnya. He reported courageously and with commitment from Afghanistan and in 2003 from the Iraq war in the midst of the US bombardment.
In addition to the overall assessment of the crisis situation, Seifert always places the fate of the people affected at the centre of his articles, reports and commentaries. It should also be added that he always emphasises the human perspective of the individuals plagued by wars, flight, displacement and natural disasters, thus giving a voice to the persecuted in this world.
The laudatory speech for the award winner was given by Oliver Rathkolb, Professor at the Institute for Contemporary History at the University of Vienna and member of the jury.

Gideon Levy is a columnist for Haaretz and a member of the newspaper's editorial board. Levy joined Haaretz in 1982 and was deputy editor of the newspaper for four years. He is the author of the weekly Twilight Zone feature, which covers the Israeli occupation of the West Bank and Gaza Strip over the past 25 years, and writes political editorials for the paper.Levy received the Euro-Med Journalism Prize in 2008 and the Leipzig Freedom Prize in 2001; the Israeli Union of Journalists Prize in 1997; and the Association of Human Rights in Israel Prize for 1996; in 2016, together with Bethlehem Lutheran pastor Mitri Raheb, the Olof Palme Prize for „his struggle against occupation and violence“. His new book „The Punishment of Gaza“ has just been published by Verso Publishing House in London and New York.
The laudatory speech for the award winner was given by Alexandra Föderl-Schmid, deputy editor-in-chief of the Süddeutsche Zeitung and herself an Ar Rath Award winner.

The musical framework was provided by Isabel Frey // Revolutionary Yiddish Music // Vienna

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