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Qatar-based news outlet Al Jazeera said that five of its staff members were killed in an Israeli airstrike that struck Gaza City on Aug. 10, one of whom the Israeli military accused of being a Hamas terrorist.
Al Jazeera said the strike hit a tent near Al-Shifa Hospital in Gaza City, killing seven people in total, including journalist Anas al-Sharif, correspondent Mohammed Qreiqeh, and camera operators Ibrahim Zaher, Mohammed Noufal, and Moamen Aliwa.
The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said that it had targeted 28-year-old Al-Sharif, alleging he was a Hamas terrorist posing as a journalist. The IDF did not provide further details about the attack.
Al Jazeera Media Network condemned the IDF’s attack as “yet another blatant and premeditated attack on press freedom,” alleging that its staff were a direct target of the attack.
“The order to assassinate Anas Al Sharif, one of Gaza’s bravest journalists, and his colleagues, is a desperate attempt to silence the voices exposing the impending seizure and occupation of Gaza,” it stated.
The IDF stated that intelligence and documents it retrieved from Gaza, such as terrorist training lists and salary records, showed that Al-Sharif was a Hamas operative integrated into Al Jazeera.
“A press badge isn’t a shield for terrorism,” the IDF stated on X, accusing Al-Sharif of leading a Hamas terrorist cell that “advanced rocket attacks on Israeli civilians and IDF troops.”
IDF spokesperson Avichay Adraee also posted a photo allegedly showing Al-Sharif with Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar, who was killed by Israeli forces last year, and others he said were terrorists.
Al-Sharif was one of six Al Jazeera journalists the IDF accused in October 2024 of being Hamas operatives. The Israeli military stated that most of them “spearhead the propaganda for Hamas at Al Jazeera, especially in northern Gaza.”
Al Jazeera Media Network responded at the time by calling the IDF’s allegations “baseless” and denounced what it called “fabricated evidence” presented by the Israeli military. Before his death, Al Sharif also rejected the claims made against him by Israel.
The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) issued a statement saying it was appalled by the killing of Al Jazeera staff members in Gaza, accusing Israel of “a war crime under international law.”
“Israel wiped out an entire news crew. It has made no claims that any of the other journalists were terrorists. That’s murder,” CPJ regional director Sara Qudah stated.
Al Jazeera is one of the few international media outlets that have remained in Gaza throughout the war. Israel has accused the outlet of collaborating with Hamas and shut down its branch in Israel after passing a law last year that allowed the temporary closure of foreign broadcasters considered to be a threat to national security.
Last month, the CPJ said it was “gravely worried about the safety of Al Jazeera Arabic’s Gaza correspondent Anas Al-Sharif, who is being targeted by an Israeli military smear campaign, which he believes is a precursor to his assassination.”
“We are deeply alarmed by the repeated threats made by Israeli army spokesperson Avichay Adraee against Al Jazeera’s Gaza correspondent Anas Al-Sharif and call on the international community to protect him,” Quadah said in July.
“This is not the first time Al-Sharif has been targeted by the Israeli military, but the danger to his life is now acute. Israel has killed at least six Al Jazeera journalists in Gaza during this war. These latest unfounded accusations represent an effort to manufacture consent to kill Al-Sharif.”
The war in Gaza broke out after Hamas-led terrorists launched a large-scale attack on Southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, killing about 1,200 civilians and taking about 250 captives back to Gaza.
The death toll in Gaza, according to the Hamas-controlled Gaza health ministry, has risen to more than 61,000 to date. That number does not distinguish between combatants and civilians. The Epoch Times is unable to verify the total.
