Tuesday, April 8, 2025
Year : 2, Issue: 32
AFP: Hamas and rescuers said an Israeli strike on southern Gaza killed one journalist and wounded nine others on Monday, while the Israeli military reported it targeted a militant posing as a reporter.
The journalist is one of at least 12 people killed in Israeli strikes across the Palestinian territory on Monday, according to Gaza’s civil defence agency, as the war entered its 19th month.
An air strike hit a tent used by journalists in the southern Gaza city of Khan Yunis, killing two people, said civil defence spokesman Mahmud Bassal.
Nine journalists were wounded in the strike, Bassal added.
The Hamas government media office said journalist Hilmi al-Faqaawi, who worked for a local news agency, was killed in the attack.
The Ramallah-based Palestinian foreign ministry called Faqaawi’s killing “part of a growing series of crimes targeting journalists directly, in a systematic attempt to silence the Palestinian voice and erase the truth”.
The Palestinian Journalists Protection Center (PJPC) also condemned the attack, saying “the deliberate targeting of journalists constitutes a war crime”.
Media watchdog Reporters Without Borders said it “strongly condemns” the strike on the tent sheltering the journalists.
“The endless massacre of journalism in Gaza must stop!” it said in a statement.
The Israeli military meanwhile said its forces had “struck the Hamas terrorist Hassan Abdel Fattah Mohammed Aslih in the Khan Yunis area” overnight, without specifying whether he had been killed.
The military claimed Aslih operated “under the guise of a journalist and owns a press company.”
It said Aslih had “infiltrated Israeli territory and participated in the murderous massacre carried out by the Hamas terrorist organisation on October 7th”.
“During the massacre, he documented and uploaded footage of looting, arson, and murder to social media.”
The Hamas government media office and the PJPC named Aslih among the nine wounded in the Khan Yunis strike.
