Israel kills Al Jazeera journalist and four colleagues in airstrike near Gaza hospital
By Nidal al-Mughrabi and Maayan Lubell
A journalist described as one of Al Jazeera’s most recognisable faces reporting from Gaza has been killed alongside four colleagues in an Israeli airstrike, the Qatari broadcaster has said.
Anas al-Sharif, 28, was among a group of Al Jazeera staff who died in a strike on a tent near Shifa Hospital in Gaza City on Sunday, Gaza officials and Al Jazeera said.
Al Jazeera journalist Anas al-Sharif reporting from Gaza.Credit: Al Jazeera
Confirming the strike, Israel said it had killed a Hamas cell leader posing as an Al Jazeera journalist, citing intelligence and documents found in Gaza, but rights advocates said Sharif had been targeted for his frontline reporting on the Gaza war and that Israel’s claim lacked evidence. Al Jazeera and organisations representing journalists also rejected the Israeli claims.
The other staff killed included Al Jazeera correspondent Mohammed Qreiqeh and camera operators Ibrahim Zaher, Mohammed Noufal and Moamen Aliwa. Their deaths take the number of journalists killed since the start of the Israel-Gaza war to 186, 178 of whom were Palestinian, according to the international Committee to Protect Journalists.
A hospital official said seven people in total were killed in the attack.
‘A desperate attempt to silence voices’
Calling al-Sharif “one of Gaza’s bravest journalists”, Al Jazeera said the attack was “a desperate attempt to silence voices in anticipation of the occupation of Gaza”.
“Anas al-Sharif and his colleagues were among the last remaining voices in Gaza conveying the tragic reality to the world,” Al Jazeera said.
Sharif, whose X account has more than 500,000 followers, posted on his account minutes before his death that Israel had been intensely bombarding Gaza City for more than two hours.
A press freedom group and a UN expert previously warned that his life was in danger due to his reporting from Gaza. UN Special Rapporteur Irene Khan said last month that Israel’s claims against him were unsubstantiated.
In a statement, the Committee to Protect Journalists said Israel had failed to provide any evidence to back up its allegations against Sharif.
“Israel’s pattern of labelling journalists as militants without providing credible evidence raises serious questions about its intent and respect for press freedom,” Sara Qudah, the committee’s director for the Middle East and North Africa, said.
The Australian journalists’ union, the Media Entertainment and Arts Alliance, said the deaths followed “a long smear campaign of unsubstantiated allegations against Al Sharif and other journalists”.
“As Al Jazeera has said, this was a ‘dangerous attempt to justify the targeting of journalists in the field’. Tragically, these warnings have now come to fruition,” the MEAA said in a statement.
“The targeting of journalists is a blatant attack on press freedom, and it is also a war crime. It must stop.”
Palestinian militant group Hamas, which runs Gaza, said the killing might signal the start of an Israeli offensive.
“The assassination of journalists and the intimidation of those who remain paves the way for a major crime that the occupation is planning to commit in Gaza City,” Hamas said in a statement.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Sunday that he expected to complete a new Gaza offensive “fairly quickly” as the United Nations Security Council heard new demands for an end to suffering in the Palestinian enclave.
Displaced Palestinians walk through a makeshift camp along the beach in Gaza City on Sunday. Credit: AP
Speaking after his security cabinet on Friday approved a much-criticised plan to take control of Gaza City, Netanyahu said he had no choice but to “complete the job” and defeat Hamas to free hostages seized from Israel in October 2023.
London’s Telegraph reported that Sharif left a pre-recorded message to be published in the event of his death in which he said he had “lived the pain in all its details” and “tasted grief and loss repeatedly”.
“Despite that, I never hesitated to convey the truth as it is, without distortion or misrepresentation, hoping that God would witness those who remained silent, those who accepted our killing, and those who suffocated our very breaths,” he said.
A man-made crisis
Meanwhile, European representatives at the UN said famine was unfolding in Gaza, and Israel’s plan to expand its offensive would only make things worse.
“Expanding military operations will only endanger the lives of all civilians in Gaza, including the remaining hostages, and result in further unnecessary suffering,” Denmark, France, Greece, Slovenia and the United Kingdom said in a joint statement.
“This is a man-made crisis, and therefore urgent action is needed to halt starvation and to surge aid into Gaza,” they said.
Malnutrition is widespread in the enclave due to what international aid agencies say is a deliberate plan by Israel to restrict aid. Israel rejects that allegation, blaming Hamas for the hunger among Palestinians and saying a lot of aid has been distributed.
Five more people, including two children, died of malnutrition and starvation in Gaza in the past 24 hours, Gaza’s Health Ministry said, taking the number of deaths from such causes to 217, including 100 children.
The Hamas-run Gaza government media office said a further 23 people had been killed so far in the war by airdrops of aid that countries have resorted to, due to the difficulties of getting aid in by road.
The US representative at the Security Council defended Netanyahu and said Washington was committed to addressing humanitarian needs, freeing hostages and achieving peace.
Netanyahu said Israel was working with Washington on creating a surge of aid into Gaza, including by land. After a conversation with Donald Trump, the prime minister’s office said he had thanked the US president “for his steadfast support of Israel”.
The war began on October 7, 2023 when Hamas-led militants attacked Israel, killing 1200 people and taking 251 hostages, according to Israeli figures. Israeli authorities say 20 of the remaining 50 hostages in Gaza are alive.
Israel’s offensive since then has killed more than 61,000 Palestinians, according to health officials, who do not distinguish between civilians and combatants. The war has left much of the territory in ruins.
Reuters, AP
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