‘We Will Not Bend the Knee.’ Watch Mehdi’s Powerful Award Acceptance Speech

Zeteo’s editor-in-chief denounced the mainstream media’s coverage of Gaza while accepting the DAWN Integrity award in Washington DC.

Democracy and human rights organization DAWN honored Mehdi Hasan with the 2024 Integrity Award at their annual gala on Wednesday, October 2, at the National Press Club in Washington DC. Mehdi received the award alongside renowned British-Palestinian surgeon Dr Ghassan Abu-Sittah, who joined the gala remotely from Lebanon. 

Mehdi’s award was presented by none other than his former colleague and MSNBC host Ayman Mohyeldin, who took the trouble of calculating how many tweets Mehdi had tweeted since joining Twitter in 2010 (it turns out that Mehdi has posted an average of 1.5 tweets per hour, every single hour of every single day for 15 years!), but also praised Mehdi and Zeteo’s bold and much-needed accountability journalism. 

Mehdi himself gave a moving acceptance speech that we wanted to share first, and in full, with Zeteo subscribers. You can watch the video of it above. 

“Those of us who take great pride in our editorial independence, and in our true freedom of speech, will not allow our voices to be silenced… we will not bend the knee to those that say a Palestinian life, or a Lebanese life, is somehow less worthy, or less equal, to an Israeli life or an American life,” said Mehdi, in his acceptance speech, which he concluded by reading an excerpt from a powerful poem written exclusively for Zeteo by acclaimed Gazan poet Mosab Abu Toha. 

Photos courtesy of DAWN

There were a series of other compelling speeches on the genocide in Gaza that night, including from DAWN's Executive Director, Sarah Leah Whitson, former State Department official Josh Paul (who resigned over the Biden administration’s stance on the war in Gaza), and DAWN board member and Nobel Prize Laureate Tawakkol Karman.  

Illustrations of Palestinian journalists killed over the past year during the war in Gaza, created by artist Gianluca Costantini, were featured at every table during the special gala.

DAWN is a non-profit organization, founded by the late Saudi journalist and activist Jamal Khashoggi, that aims to uncover  anti-democratic practices and human rights violations of governments in the Middle East and North Africa, with a special focus on the role that the United States plays in the region, including supporting Israel and autocratic Arab governments.

DAWN’s gala also marked the six-year anniversary of Khashoggi’s brutal killing by the government of Saudi Arabia in Turkey, and all of the speakers spoke of his vital work and legacy.

An award like this, at a time like this, holds immense significance for all of us at Zeteo, especially as we mark one year since the Oct 7 attacks on Israel and the start of the genocide in Gaza. And we could not do any of what we do, achieve any of what we have achieved so far, without your support, our subscribers and supporters. 

Thank you.