From New York, this is Democracy Now.

For the first time, the state of press freedom in more than half of all countries is now

classified as difficult or very serious.

Journalist work has never been more complicated or more dangerous, and our collective

right to be informed has never been more under threat.

13 journalists have been killed this year.

More than 500 reporters and media workers are currently detained worldwide.

Reporters Without Borders has just released its annual press freedom index.

The U.S. has fallen to 64.

We'll speak to RSF's Clayton Weimers. Then, as the world's attentions focused

on negotiations between the U.S. and Iran, 12 more villages and towns in the south of Lebanon

have been told to evacuate by the Israeli army. Demolitions and fighting continues despite a ceasefire.

In the same way that the Israeli military flattened vast swaths of Gaza's cultural heritage,

universities, mosques, archives, the same thing is happening in southern Lebanon.

It's this exact same playbook.

We'll speak to Beirut-based independent journalist Lely Yunus. She's here in New York.

Then Backtalker, an American memoir. We'll talk to the acclaimed constitutional law scholar

Kimberly Crenshaw, known for her work on critical race theory and intersectionality.

All that and more coming up.

Welcome to Democracy Now, Democracy Now.org, the War and Peace Report.

I'm Amy Goodman. President Trump has announced

he's pausing the so-called Project Freedom operation in the Strait of Hormuz, saying there's,

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