Gaza City, Palestine
An Israeli airstrike late Sunday night in Gaza City killed seven people, including at least four journalists from the Al Jazeera network, in what is being described as one of the deadliest attacks on media workers since the war began nearly two years ago.
According to Al Jazeera, the dead included veteran correspondent Anas Al-Sharif, reporter Mohammed Qreiqeh, and photojournalists Ibrahim Al Thaher and Mohamed Nofal. The group had been stationed in a tent marked “Press” near the entrance of Al-Shifa Hospital when the strike hit, hospital director Dr. Mohammad Abu Salmiya confirmed.
The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) claimed Al-Sharif, 28, was leading a Hamas cell involved in rocket attacks against Israel. The military said it had “unequivocal proof” of his affiliation, citing intelligence and documents allegedly recovered in Gaza. Al-Sharif had strongly denied the allegations, stating last month, “I am a journalist with no political affiliations. My only mission is to report the truth from the ground — without bias.”
Moments before his death, Al-Sharif posted online: “If this madness does not end, Gaza will be reduced to ruins, its people’s voices silenced, their faces erased — and history will remember you as silent witnesses to a genocide you chose not to stop.”
The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) has condemned the killings, noting that 186 journalists have died since the start of the war — 178 of them Palestinians killed by Israeli forces. In July, CPJ had warned of threats to Al-Sharif’s life following what they called “an Israeli military smear campaign.”
The United Nations had also dismissed Israel’s accusations as “unfounded,” with UN Special Rapporteur Irene Khan warning just weeks ago that Al-Sharif faced “grave danger” as the last surviving Al Jazeera journalist in northern Gaza.
Al-Sharif, a husband and father of two young children, had prepared a farewell letter in case he was killed. In it, he urged care for his daughter Shams and son Salah, and called on colleagues to remain steadfast: “Do not be silenced by chains, nor hindered by borders… until the sun of dignity and freedom shines upon our occupied homeland.”
The strike comes just hours after Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu announced foreign journalists would be allowed into Gaza only under IDF escort, continuing restrictions that have kept independent international reporting out of the enclave.
