SOFIA TRANCHINA
Sofia Tranchina is an Italian journalist and photographer with five years of experience covering crises and conflict zones, with a particular focus on the Middle East. Through an intimate perspective and a humanistic approach, her work explores the impact of conflict on the people and communities who experience it firsthand.
A member of the Italian Order of Journalists, she regularly contributes to Italian publications including Il Foglio and Linkiesta, working across journalism, photography, and field reporting.
Alongside her editorial work, she develops medium- and long-term projects combining photography, field research, and analysis. Her work seeks to convey the complexity of the places she documents, examining both the immediate consequences of conflict and the broader social transformations taking place within them.
Ultra-Orthodox Jews protest outside Café Basimta in Jerusalem, part of a growing divide between the Haredi community and secular Israelis over religion’s role in public life and exemptions from military service. The café, which opens on Shabbat, has become one of the flashpoints in a wider struggle over the character of the city.
Jerusalem, August 2026.
Lior Alon stands amid the ruins of his home in Kibbutz Be’eri, where 101 residents were killed and 32 abducted during the Hamas-led October 7 attack. Alon survived for 16 hours with his family inside their safe room, holding the door shut against attackers. When the house was set on fire, they peed on towels and placed them beneath the door to keep the smoke out.
Kibbutz Be’eri, November 2023.
The fire-blackened interior of a home in Kibbutz Be’eri, after the October 7 attack. Houses across the community were burned and destroyed during hours of fighting, leaving personal belongings and traces of everyday life among the ruins. Many surviving residents were displaced from the kibbutz in the aftermath.
Kibbutz Be’eri, November 2023.
An Israeli reservist recovers in an ice bath after days of fighting, six months into the war in Gaza. Many reservists, called back from civilian jobs and family life, faced prolonged deployments and mounting physical and psychological strain. Volunteer-run rest sites provided food, laundry and recovery between deployments.
Gilat Junction, April 2024.
Armed settlers from Evyatar, an outpost associated with the more violent fringes of the West Bank settlement movement, move among Israeli soldiers during a confrontation with Arab citizens of Israel stranded nearby. The settlers appear at ease alongside the soldiers, who intervened as tensions at the roadside escalated.
Evyatar, August 2026.
Muslim Arab citizens of Israel wait beside their broken-down bus while settlers from nearby Evyatar confront them. The passengers were travelling to Jordan for a holiday when they were ordered back onto the bus and, according to witnesses, threatened. Israeli activists stopped to protect them as soldiers positioned themselves between the groups.
Evyatar, August 2026.
Israeli settlers, some of them teenagers from the Hilltop Youth movement, enter the Palestinian village of Taybeh, where residents report near-daily incursions and damage to property and infrastructure. Despite the area being declared a closed military zone, settlers continue to enter. Young settlers are often used to herd livestock on Palestinian-owned land, part of a wider effort to establish control over territory around West Bank outposts.
Taybeh, August 2026.
A 12-year-old Palestinian Arab girl stands in her home in Ramla, a mixed Jewish-Arab city. Raised speaking Arabic and attending an Arabic-language school, she could neither speak nor read Hebrew, despite being born in Israel and holding Israeli citizenship. Her mother was born in Gaza.
Ramla, March 2024.
A Palestinian woman, born in Gaza and now living in Israel, stands in her home in Ramla. Despite living in Israel, she does not speak Hebrew.
Ramla, March 2024.
A father and son celebrate Syrian Liberation Day, marking one year since Bashar al-Assad fled Damascus, ending 24 years of his rule and over five decades of Assad-family control. The boy carries the former opposition flag, formally reinstated as Syria’s national flag in 2025 after the fall of the government.
Damascus, December 2025.
Ruins in Jobar, a Damascus neighbourhood that became an early centre of opposition to Bashar al-Assad’s government. From 2013, Jobar endured years of siege and bombardment before government forces retook it in 2018, after most residents had fled. Seven years later, large parts of the neighbourhood remain much as the war left them.
Jobar, December 2025.