Istanbul Photo Awards 2026: Single News Category Winners


Each year, the İstanbul Photo Awards — organized by Anadolu Agency and now in its twelfth edition — stands as one of photojournalism's most closely watched international honors. This year, nearly 19,000 photographs were submitted, with 26 photographers receiving awards across 10 categories. Among them, the Single News category offered some of the year's most searing visual testimony, as reported by Daily Sabah.


-At Bisotun Art Collective, we believe this is what photography is for at its most essential — not decoration, but testimony. These three images, taken an ocean apart yet bound by the same instinct to bear witness, ask something of the viewer: to look, to remember, and to refuse to look away.


Wong, 71, shouts in anguish as Wang Fuk Court burns behind him during Hong Kong's deadliest fire in decades, Tai Po, Nov. 2025.



Photo of the Year — 1st Prize

Haitham Imad / EPA / Palestine

Gaza, No Hope


The photograph depicts two-year-old Sham Qudeih, lying exhausted in her mother's arms at Nasser Hospital in the southern Gaza Strip. Anadolu's leadership described the image as a powerful visual testimony — evidence of how photojournalism can document human suffering while preserving historical memory.



A boy runs as the Mushtaha Tower collapses following an Israeli airstrike in western Gaza City, Sept. 5, 2025.
Sham Qudeih, a malnourished 2-year-old, held by her mother at Nasser Hospital, Khan Younis, Gaza, Aug. 2025

3nd Prize

Mohammed Saber / EPA / Palestine


Widespread Destruction


A boy runs as the Mushtaha Tower collapses following an Israeli airstrike in western Gaza City, Sept. 5, 2025. Large-scale destruction has left much of the territory uninhabitable, with hospitals, housing, and infrastructure severely damaged.



2nd Prize

Tyrone Siu / Reuters / Hong Kong

Desperate Plea Amid Hong Kong's Deadliest Fire



Wong, 71, breaks down in anguish as he shouts that his wife is still trapped inside Wang Fuk Court, engulfed in flames during Hong Kong's deadliest fire in nearly 80 years, on Nov. 26, 2025. Moments earlier, she told him her final words over the phone. The blaze in Tai Po claimed at least 160 lives. Weeks later, DNA tests confirmed she was among the victims.