An Israeli airstrike on a automotive close to Rafah in southern Gaza on Sunday killed two Palestinian journalists who have been reporting, based on well being officers in Gaza and the journalists’ union.
Hamza Al-Dahdouh and Mustafa Thuraya have been each freelancers. Al-Dahdouh had executed freelance work for Al Jazeera and was the son of the Qatar-based TV station’s chief correspondent in Gaza, Wael Al-Dahdouh. A 3rd freelancer, Hazem Rajab, was wounded.
Al Jazeera Media Community condemned the killing of the 2 and stated it had been a deliberate assault.
“We urge the Worldwide Prison Court docket, the governments and human rights organizations, and the United Nations to carry Israel accountable for its heinous crimes and demand an finish to the focusing on and killing of journalists,” the community stated in a press release.
An announcement from the Israel Defence Forces (IDF) stated that “an IDF plane recognized and struck a terrorist who operated an plane that posed a risk to IDF troops.”
“We’re conscious of the reviews that throughout the strike, two different suspects who have been in the identical car because the terrorist have been additionally hit,” the assertion stated.
In a press release on Dec. 16, in response to the demise of one other Al Jazeera journalist in Gaza, the Israeli military stated that “the IDF has by no means, and can by no means, intentionally goal journalists.”
The Israel-Hamas conflict that began on Oct. 7 has been lethal for journalists. The Committee to Shield Journalists, a world watchdog, stated that as of Saturday, 77 journalists and media employees had been killed — 70 Palestinians, 4 Israelis and three Lebanese.
The Hamas-run Gaza authorities’s media workplace stated the 2 new deaths raised its personal tally of journalists killed by the Israeli offensive to 109.
As worldwide consideration briefly shifted to the opportunity of a wider Center East conflict, each day Israeli assaults in Gaza are a reminder of the issue of life for individuals there — many Palestinians in Gaza struggling to search out locations to bury the lifeless.
A video posted on an Al Jazeera-linked YouTube channel confirmed Wael Al-Dahdouh crying subsequent to his son’s physique and holding his hand. Later, after his son’s burial, he stated in televised remarks that journalists in Gaza would hold doing their job.
“All of the world must see what is going on right here,” he stated.
Wael Al-Dahdouh is especially well-known to viewers throughout the Center East after he discovered throughout a stay broadcast final month that his spouse, one other son, daughter and grandson had been killed in an Israeli airstrike.
Wael Dahdouh, Al Jazeera’s Gaza bureau chief, misplaced a number of members of the family after an Israeli airstrike hit an space the place his household was taking shelter. The Israel Protection Pressure acknowledged it did perform an airstrike in that space and it had been focusing on what it known as ‘Hamas terrorist infrastructure.’
U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken stated Sunday’s killings have been an “unimaginable tragedy” and that he was “deeply deeply sorry” for the Al-Dahdouh household’s loss.
“One [journalist killed] is much too many,” Blinken stated at a press convention in Doha, the Qatari capital.
One other journalist who died protecting the battle was Reuters visuals journalist Issam Abdallah. A Lebanese citizen, he was killed on Oct. 13 by an Israeli tank crew whereas filming cross-border shelling in Lebanon, a Reuters investigation discovered.
