Al Jazeera | Small Jewish communities emerge in Ivory Coast

For Al Jazeera English, I photographed a small but growing Jewish community in Côte d’Ivoire. Inside the country’s first synagogue, the Kol-Yehuda, the community has learned the prayers in Hebrew and adopted Orthodox Jewish practices.

With only 34 registered Jews in Côte d’Ivoire 20 years ago, there are now at least four different independent Jewish communities in Abidjan, each with their respective synagogues and between 20 and 300 members. Most Ivorians who have adopted Jewish practices still haven’t been officially converted to Judaism and are not recognized by Israel.

An Ivorian Jew reads the prayers in Hebrew during Shabbat services at the Kol Yehuda Synagogue and Kabbalah Centre on Friday evening. [Isabel Bonnet/Al Jazeera]

Graduation: MS Data Visualization at Parsons School of Design

In May, I obtained a master’s degree in Data Visualization from Parsons School of Design - The New School, one of the world’s leading schools of design.

During a keynote presentation, I showcased my thesis on the slow but steady return of tourists in Venezuela after years of isolation. Using different methods such as web scraping and archive research, I analyzed over 8,000 flight arrivals to Venezuela since 2013 and combined the results with interviews and maps created with QGIS.

Coda Story | In Nicaragua, there are no more newspapers

Journalists are either in jail or in exile, as Daniel Ortega sets about destroying the country’s independent media. And the rest of Central America is following in line.

The facilities of the newspaper La Prensa were raided on August 13, 2021 by order of the Daniel Ortega regime. Juan Lorenzo Holmann, editor-in-chief, was arrested a few hours later. Courtesy of Juan Lorenzo Holmann’s family / La Prensa Archive

NBC | Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega goes after the Catholic Church in his latest effort to stop criticism of the government

While Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega makes much of his own relationship with Christianity, the former leftist revolutionary's government has precipitated an unprecedented crackdown on the country's Catholic leadership.

On national television last month, Vice President Rosario Murillo, who is Ortega's wife, touted her love for and faith in God during celebrations of the 43rd anniversary of the Sandinista revolution. “Our Christian faith will stand,” she said.

At the same time, Nicaragua’s repression of the Catholic Church has intensified.

Courtesy of Padre Rafael

Euronews | Incarcerated people use mail-in voting for first time in a presidential election

As high abstention rates are expected in this year’s French elections, participation rates have significantly increased inside prisons in the first round. This is the first time that incarcerated people were able to vote in a presidential election from inside a prison.

Credit: AFP

El Pais | El trauma del aislamiento en las cárceles permanece años después de la liberación

Cada vez que llega a casa, Warren Ovalle se lava las manos siete veces. No le tiene miedo a la covid-19, pero aún puede sentir la suciedad de los años que pasó en su celda de aislamiento. “Cuando no te sientes bien por dentro, no te sientes bien por fuera”, dice. “La prisión está tan sucia que siento que tengo acumulación de suciedad en mi”. Ovalle solo tenía permitido darse una ducha de 10 minutos una vez por semana. Tres años más tarde, su higiene se volvió excesiva y ahora dice tenerle fobia a los gérmenes.

Cada día, alrededor del 9% de las 48.000 personas en las 54 prisiones del estado de Nueva York están encerradas solas en una celda de aislamiento. Pueden pasar meses o incluso años sin ninguna interacción social. Múltiples estudios muestran que este tipo de castigo puede provocar ataques de pánico, ansiedad, depresión, psicosis, aislamiento social, estallidos de violencia y suicidio, incluso años después de haber sido liberados.

Articles written at Columbia Journalism School

As part of my master’s degree, I wrote several local news articles in New York City. You can read some of the articles here:

• Nearly a year after owner’s death, Harlem iconic jazz club Paris Blues remains close (Feb. 2021)

• As the city reopens, NY barber shops struggle to get back to normal (March 2021)

• Virtual learning prioritizes English education, jeopardizes bilingual education (March 2021)

• He was persecuted by Maduro’s regime. He is now an asylum seeker in New York (April 2021)

• Burmese immigrants in NYC protest abuses happening back home (April 2021)

Graduation: MS in Journalism at Columbia Journalism School.

Despite the challenges of moving to New York City and studying a full degree during a pandemic, I was able to acquire new skills in Journalism. I learned how to tell stories using different tools and software, and got to meet so many talented young journalists in class.

At Columbia, I worked on written and video projects on immigration, the US criminal justice system, the impact of the pandemic on funeral homes, the foster care system and local businesses in Harlem. I also did a 10-minute video on Venezuelan political asylum seekers in the US.

As part of my master’s thesis, I spent five months photographing and interviewing people who were formerly incarcerated to document the long-term effects of solitary confinement.

It still feels surreal that this chapter is over. I spent nine years of my life dreaming about this program at Columbia.

Today, I am grateful to everyone who helped me get here, from my friends in Amsterdam helped me write my application for months to my family who supported me every step of the way.

Thank you and congrats to the Columbia University - Graduate School of Journalism Class of 2021!

Vice | The Ivory Coast's Government Has Forced Thousands Into Homelessness

© Isabel Bonnet

Côte d'Ivoire is one of Africa's fastest growing economies.

Much of the country’s success has been credited to President Ouattara, whose curriculum of new infrastructure seems to inspire dreams of a modern, emergent and growing economy. It is, realistically, only the wealthy who have benefited from this.

I went to six different districts in the country's economic capital, Abidjan, and wrote about the human cost of such emergence.

Graduation: Bachelor's degree from the University of Amsterdam

My journey in Amsterdam has ended. I am glad to share that I have successfully graduated from the University of Amsterdam in Communication Science, with an 8/10 in my thesis "The Role of the Media During the COVID-19 Pandemic".

In the past three years, I joined several student associations (Study Association Mercurius, ISN Amsterdam - Erasmus Student Network, UNICEF Nederland), but more importantly, I founded the independent student-run newspaper The Amsterdammer.

I also did a Summer internship at La Silla Vacia in Bogota, and two internships at the photo agency NOOR Images. On top of that, I was able to volunteer at the UNSEEN festival, the International Journalism Festival and at the World Press Photo festival.

I was able to grow both in an individual and professional way. I will be forever grateful for the opportunities that living in Amsterdam brought me and the people I was able to meet during my bachelor's.

Due to the pandemic, I will be moving in January 2021 to New York City instead of in Fall to continue my studies at the Columbia Journalism School.

If you are interested in reading about my research project as part of my graduation thesis, you can visit its dedicated website:

Rostra | Controlling Forced Evictions to Fight Extreme Poverty in Sub-Saharan Africa

Earlier this year, the Human Rights Watch published a report revealing that over 20,000 people would have been forcibly evicted in Conakry between February and May 2019. Bulldozers and other heavy machinery demolished the buildings to free the land for government ministries, foreign embassies, businesses, and other public works. “The Guinean government hasn’t just demolished homes, it has damaged peoples’ lives and livelihoods,” said Corinne Dufka, West Africa director at Human Rights Watch in a press release.

Forced evictions are, however, not exclusive to Guinea. Demolitions and evictions throughout the national territory, without guarantee of rehousing to all those concerned, have become an ongoing issue in Sub-Saharan Africa. In Ghana, vendors were evicted from downtown Accra in 2010 and a project to redevelop the rail system around the country with the support of the Chinese government in 2013, led to more evictions. In Cameroon, 300 indigenous people were evicted using bulldozers to expand the Catholic University in Bamenda in 2014.

 In August 2013, President Alassane Ouattara’s plan to build the Abidjan-Grand-Bassam highway and the plan to embellish the littoral led the economic capital Abidjan to massive evictions. Ever since then, there has been an increase in the speed and frequency of residence destruction. Their main targets are local markets and marginalized neighbourhoods.

Workshop: Photo Project Review and Strategy Session

I had the chance to participate in the LensCulture "Photo Project Review and Strategy Session" workshop hosted by Jim Casper, editor in chief, alongside 4 other photographers.

The Amsterdammer | Participation in Pitch Competition

Thank you ASIF Ventures and Study Association Sefa for selecting The Amsterdammer as part of the P!TCH x SEFA event. I feel humbled to have had the opportunity to present my newspaper to the audience. All the start-ups were inspiring and definitely showed us the power of ideas, motivation and dedication.

© P!TCH x SEFA

The Amsterdammer | Activist Rudolf Valhoff Arrested After Protest Participation

He was allegedly mocked by several police officers and sexually harassed.

Rudolf Valkhoff, 65, worked as a History and Philosophy teacher at the University of Amsterdam for 30 years. In 2015, he participated in the Bungehuis and Maagdenhuis occupation during the student protest against the lack of democracy and spending cuts at the university. He was fired a year later, based on “substantive grounds,” according to the university.

The end of his working contract at UvA marked the beginning of his involvement in the rallies to reach, as he describes it, academic freedom. Valkhoff is an active participant of Humanities Rally UvA. Last Friday, he joined “Outraved,” the dance demonstration march around the city alongside the DJs and about 100 students, which ended with his arrest.

Isabel Joins the #SaveStudentNewsrooms Campaign

Study USA Interview Isabel about the English Language Institute at UF

Medium Magazine | Hidden Stories: a barber from Abidjan

Charly Parker, also known as “Chal,” is a barber living in the economic capital of the Ivory Coast, Abidjan. Whether you go in the morning or in the evening, you will always find him with a client, accompanied by a dozen of children outside the barber shop.

Exposición: La Adolescencia

18 de Diciembre, 2014

18 de Diciembre, se inauguró la exposición de fotografía del curso de Retrato 2 dictado por Ricardo Peña, entre esas fotos se encontraban las mías: una búsqueda fotográfica que realicé acerca de la adolescencia.

‹‹Cuando empecé mi proyecto, el tema me llamaba la atención porque yo misma estoy pasando por esta etapa. Por esa misma razón me pareció importante incluir un autorretrato. Pensé que por eso sería más "fácil" tratarlo, pero con el tiempo cambie de opinión: fotografiar a las personas que me rodean diariamente, expresando algo que ni yo soy capaz de explicar o entender correctamente fue difícil.

Mis fotos sólo son una muy pequeña parte de lo que quería transmitir, pero aún así espero que puedan reflejar las ideas más importantes como la rebeldía, o el hecho de descubrir cosas nuevas. Pienso que la adolescencia es un momento en el cual uno trata de definirse como persona imitando a otra para distinguirse o al contrario, para pasar a ser desapercibido.

Espero que la lectura que tengan de mis imágenes les permita ver lo que trate de reflejar.

¡Gracias!››