“As a result of US sanctions against Venezuela, ‘The Empire Files' has been forced to completely shut down operations,” read an ominous statement from the hit TV documentary series hosted by journalist Abby Martin on Wednesday.
Martin used “The Empire Files” to travel the world and report on major hotspots of political conflict, breaking through mainstream narratives and telling the complicated truth in a way that was easy to understand. The program, which ran on TeleSur, was mostly funded by the Venezuelan government and its allies.
The YouTube page boasts nearly 100,000 subscribers and more than 4.5 million views on its videos. In videos on the page, Martin interviewed teenage Palestinian icon Ahed Tamimi — before she was sentenced to eight months in prison for slapping an Israeli soldier who was on her property — and reported from the front lines of protests and environmental catastrophes.
But last Wednesday, Martin and her producer Mike Prysner had to cease production “just after we hired a stellar team of journalists in Gaza who sent us incredible, unseen footage & interviews from the Great March of Return,” Prysner tweeted. The Great March of Return protests have been met with grave repression from the Israeli military, which has killed more than 171 demonstrators and thousands injured, according to Gaza Health Ministry.
“We're living in a pretty abysmal state of journalism right now, where…
