GLOBAL outrage has followed Israel’s assassination of five Al Jazeera journalists in a targeted drone strike outside the main gate of Gaza City’s al-Shifa Hospital late on Sunday, killing seven people in total.
The dead included correspondents Anas al-Sharif and Mohammed Qreiqeh, and camera operators Ibrahim Zaher, Moamen Aliwa, and Mohammed Noufal.
Freelance reporter Mohammad al-Khaldi was also killed, while three other journalists were wounded.
Anas Al-Sharif, 28, known for his fearless coverage of Israel’s genocide in Gaza, had hours earlier posted about ‘intense, concentrated bombardment’ in Gaza City.
Yesterday, a rolling day-long protest was held outside the BBC’s Portland Place headquarters condemning the killings and demanding justice for the slain Al Jazeera journalists.
The Palestinian mission to the UN accused Israel of ‘deliberately assassinating’ al-Sharif and Qreiqeh, calling them among the ‘last remaining journalists’ in Gaza who had ‘systematically and dutifully exposed and documented Israel’s genocide and starvation’.
Iran’s Foreign Ministry said the killings showed that ‘a press badge is no shield against genocidal war criminals’, urging immediate global action to end the genocide and hold those responsible to account.
UN Secretary-General António Guterres’ spokesman, Stéphane Dujarric, offered condolences and called for an investigation, reiterating that journalists must be able to work ‘without harassment, intimidation or fear of being targeted’.
The UN human rights office condemned the killings as a ‘grave breach of international humanitarian law’ and demanded safe, unhindered access to Gaza for all media workers.
Al Jazeera condemned ‘in the strongest terms’ what it called a premeditated assassination, stating the Israeli military ‘admitted to their crimes’ by deliberately striking the journalists’ location.
It said the killings were ‘a desperate attempt to silence the voices exposing the impending seizure and occupation of Gaza’.
The Committee to Protect Journalists said Israel’s repeated labelling of reporters as militants without evidence ‘raises serious questions about its intent and respect for press freedom’, recalling how Israel had branded al-Sharif and others as ‘terrorists’ in 2023.
Amnesty International called the strike a war crime and paid tribute to al-Sharif, who had received its 2024 Human Rights Defender Award for his commitment to exposing Israel’s atrocities.
Reporters Without Borders described his killing as ‘acknowledged murder by the Israeli army’, likening it to the 2023 assassination of Al Jazeera’s Ismail al-Ghoul, and warned that without decisive UN Security Council action, ‘more such extrajudicial murders’ would follow.
The US-based National Press Club called for a thorough and transparent investigation, while the Council on American-Islamic Relations said the killings were ‘part of a consistent, documented policy of silencing media voices and hiding the truth of the genocide’.
Since October 2023, Israel has killed 269 journalists in Gaza, making it the deadliest conflict ever recorded for members of the press.
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