A freelance photojournalist, Ali Mahmud, contributed to the Associated Press winning first place for the Team Picture Story of the Year last week for taking a photo of Shani Louk's half-naked corpse as it was being driven away by Hamas terrorists on October 7.

According to the Pictures of the Year program's website, the category "recognizes the collaborative effort of a photography staff covering a single topic or news story. It is a narrative picture story that consists of images taken as part of a team effort to cover a single issue or news story."

Other photos, mostly attributed to other photographers on behalf of the Press, took photos of destroyed or damaged buildings in Gaza, injured or dead Palestinians, Israeli mourning at funerals or fleeing from rockets attacks.

The program posted news about the Press's victory, alongside Mahmoud's photo of Louk on Instagram, where they came under immense criticism from users. Louk's name is not mentioned anywhere in the program's Instagram post.

Social media reaction

"There is a dead body of a partially unclothed human being, a young woman who was brutally murdered and probably raped. This cannot be real. Please remove this photo," one user wrote, while another said "She has a name. Shani Louk. Her family specifically requested that we remember her laughing and living. Take this down and show some respect. If you want to post our Shani, find a photo she consented to."

Mahmud, who took the photo of Louk, had his name mentioned in an earlier report when parents of Louk and other Nova massacre victims sued the Press and Reuters last month for their employment of photo-journalists who accompanied the terrorists on their pogrom, and contends that AP ignored close connections the photographers had to terrorist organizations, to which they said they nor have we seen any evidence – including in the lawsuit – that the freelance journalists who contributed to our coverage did."

Michael Starr contributed to this report.