Veteran Israeli Foreign Correspondent Gideon Kutz Dies at 78

Veteran Israeli foreign correspondent and professor Gideon Kutz has died in Paris at the age of 78. Kutz served for approximately four decades as a correspondent, initially for Kol Yisrael (Israel Radio) in Paris, and later as a envoy for Channel 1, Channel 2, and the Kan Public Broadcasting Corporation to Europe.

Born in Poland in 1948, Kutz immigrated to Israel in 1957. He settled in Paris in 1978, where he earned a doctorate in communication from the Sorbonne. He began broadcasting for Kol Yisrael in 1986 and subsequently became the European correspondent for Channel 1. From 2001 to 2007, he was the news envoy for Channel 2 in Europe.

Kutz covered numerous pivotal geopolitical events, including the fall of the Berlin Wall, the wars in Yugoslavia and Chechnya, the Middle East peace process, the Arab Spring, and Iran nuclear talks. He also reported on European terror attacks and the war in Ukraine. He notably interviewed Syrian President Bashar al-Assad in Paris in 2002, who stated his readiness for unconditional peace talks with then-Prime Minister Ariel Sharon. In the same year, Kutz was expelled from Beirut while covering a Francophone summit.

Beyond his reporting, Kutz was an academic researcher focusing on Hebrew and Jewish journalism in Europe. He was a full professor of communication and culture at Paris 8 University and edited the journal "Keser," dedicated to the history of Jewish and Israeli media. He also served as president and later honorary president of the Association of Foreign Press Correspondents in France and was among a select group of journalists accredited to cover the French presidency.