As many as 21 journalists were among the more than 4,000 dead in Israel and Palestine since the war started on October 7, according to the Committee to Protect Journalists.
As of Thursday, October 19, the committee reported that of the 21 confirmed dead, 17 journalists were Palestinian, three Israeli and one Lebanese. Eight journalists were also reported injured and three were reported missing or detained.
“CPJ emphasizes that journalists are civilians doing important work during times of crisis and must not be targeted by warring parties,” said Sherif Mansour, CPJ’s Middle East and North Africa program coordinator. “Journalists across the region are making great sacrifices to cover this heartbreaking conflict. All parties must take steps to ensure their safety.”
Significantly, more journalists have been killed in Gaza during the past two weeks than since 2001 in the region, Mansour told AP. Reporters in Gaza also face power and internet outages under Israeli siege, and many have lost their offices, homes and family members.
Gaza health officials said that, as of Thursday, Israel’s airstrikes have killed 3,785 people and wounded more than 12,000. These airstrikes came after the Hamas militant group attacked Israel on October 7, killing more than 1,400 people. Israel said at least 203 people are being held hostage in Gaza.
CPJ published descriptions of the journalists killed, injured, detained and missing so far.
Of the reporters killed is Ahmed Shehab, a journalist for Sowt Al-Asra Radio (Radio Voice of the Prisoners). Shehab was killed in an Israeli airstrike on October 12 that struck his house in the northern Gaza Strip, along with his wife and three children, according to The New Arab.
Also, Salam Mema, a freelance journalist and head of the Women Journalists Committee at the Palestinian Media Assembly, was confirmed dead a day later on October 13.
“Her body was recovered from the rubble three days after her home in the Jabalia camp, situated in the northern Gaza Strip, was struck by an Israeli airstrike on 10 October,” CPJ said.
On October 13, an Israeli airstrike also killed Reuters video journalist Issam Abdallah in Lebanon.
Most recently, Khalil Abu Aathra, a video journalist for Hamas-affiliated Al-Aqsa TV, was killed by an Israeli airstrike on Thursday with his brother in the southern Gaza Strip.
“CPJ is also investigating numerous unconfirmed reports of other journalists being killed, missing, detained, hurt or threatened, and of damage to media offices and journalists’ homes,” the organisation stated.
Here is the full list of journalists killed, as compiled by CPJ, below.
October 19, 2023
Khalil Abu Aathra
A videographer for the Hamas-affiliated Al-Aqsa TV, Abu Aathra was killed along with his brother in an Israeli airstrike in Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip, as reported by the Palestinian Journalists Syndicate and the Amman-based news outlet Roya News.
October 18, 2023
Sameeh Al-Nady
A journalist and director for the Hamas-affiliated Al-Aqsa TV, Al-Nady was killed in an Israeli airstrike in the Gaza Strip, according to the Palestinian Journalists Syndicate and the Palestinian press agency Safa.
October 17, 2023
Mohammad Balousha
Balousha, a journalist and the administrative and financial manager of the local media channel “Palestine Today” office in Gaza, was killed in an Israeli airstrike on the Al-Saftawi neighborhood in northern Gaza, as reported by Anadolu Agency and The Guardian.
Issam Bhar
Bhar, a journalist for the Hamas-affiliated Al-Aqsa TV, was killed in an Israeli airstrike in the northern Gaza Strip, according to TRT Arabia and the Cairo-based Arabic newspaper Shorouk News.
October 16, 2023
Abdulhadi Habib
A journalist who worked for Al-Manara News Agency and HQ News Agency, Habib was killed along with several of his family members in a missile strike that targeted his house near the Zeitoun neighborhood, south of Gaza City, according to the Palestinian Journalists Syndicate and the independent news organization International Middle East Media Center, run by Palestinians living in the Palestinian territories.
October 14, 2023
Yousef Maher Dawas
Dawas, a contributing writer for Palestine Chronicle and a writer for We Are Not Numbers (WANN), a youth-led Palestinian nonprofit project, was killed in an Israeli missile strike on his family’s home in the northern town of Beit Lahia, located in the Gaza Strip north of Jabalia, according to WANN and Palestine Chronicle.
October 13, 2023
Salam Mema
The death of Mema, a freelance journalist, was confirmed on this date. Mema held the position of head of the Women Journalists Committee at the Palestinian Media Assembly, an organization committed to advancing media work for Palestinian journalists. Her body was recovered from the rubble three days after her home in the Jabalia camp, situated in the northern Gaza Strip, was struck by an Israeli airstrike on October 10, according to the Palestinian Journalists Syndicate and the Palestinian Authority’s official news agency, Wafa.
Husam Mubarak
Mubarak, a journalist for the Hamas-affiliated Al Aqsa Radio, was killed in an Israeli airstrike in the northern Gaza Strip, according to the Skeyes Center for Media and Cultural Freedom and the Palestinian Journalists’ Syndicate.
Issam Abdallah
Abdallah, a Beirut-based videographer for the Reuters news agency, was killed during a shelling attack from the direction of Israel near the Lebanon border. Abdallah and a group of other journalists were covering the back-and-forth shelling near Al-Shaab in southern Lebanon between Israeli forces and Lebanon’s militant Hezbollah group.
October 12, 2023
Ahmed Shehab
A journalist for Sowt Al-Asra Radio (Radio Voice of the Prisoners), Shehab, along with his wife and three children, was killed in an Israeli airstrike that struck his house in Jabalia, located in the northern Gaza Strip, according to the Palestinian Journalists’ Syndicate and the London-based news website The New Arab.
October 11, 2023
Mohamed Fayez Abu Matar
Abu Matar, a freelance photojournalist, was killed during an Israeli airstrike in Rafah city, in the southern Gaza Strip, according to the Palestinian Journalists’ Syndicate and to the Palestinian Authority’s official news agency Wafa.
October 9, 2023
Saeed al-Taweel
Al-Taweel, editor-in-chief of the Al-Khamsa News website, was killed when Israeli warplanes struck an area housing several media outlets in Rimal district in western Gaza, specifically targeting the Hiji building, according to the U.K.-based newspaper, The Independent, the Qatari-owned English-language news channel Al Jazeera English, and the Palestinian Authority’s official news agency Wafa.
Mohammed Sobh
Sobh, a photographer from “Khabar” News Agency, also was killed in the Rimal district air strike, according to the news reports.
Hisham Alnwajha
Alnwajha, a journalist at the “Khabar” news agency, also was reported killed in the same bombing that took the lives of Al-Taweel and Sobh.
October 8, 2023
Assaad Shamlakh
Shamlakh, a freelance journalist, was killed along with nine members of his family in an Israeli airstrike on their home in Sheikh Ijlin, a neighborhood in the southern Gaza Strip, according to the Beirut-based nonprofit research and advocacy organization, The Legal Agenda (LA), and BBC Arabic.
October 7, 2023
Shai Regev
Regev, who served as an editor for TMI, the gossip and entertainment news section of the Hebrew-language daily newspaper Ma’ariv, was killed during a Hamas attack on Israel. The confirmation of Shai Regev’s death came after she was reported missing for six days, with the announcement made to her family, as reported by Maariv and The Times of Israel.
Ayelet Arnin
A 22-year-old news editor with the Israel Broadcasting Corporation Kan, Arnin was killed during a Hamas attack in the south of Israel. Her killing was reported to her parents by a friend, according to The Times of Israel and Yahoo.
Yaniv Zohar
Zohar, an Israeli photographer working for the Israeli Hebrew-language daily newspaper Israel Hayom, was killed during a Hamas attack on Kibbutz Nahal Oz in southern Israel. Israel Hayom and Israel National News reported that his wife and two daughters also died in the attack. Israel Hayom editor-in-chief Omer Lachmanovitch told CPJ that Yaniv was working on that day.
Mohammad Al-Salhi
Al-Salhi, a photojournalist working for the Fourth Authority news agency, was shot dead near a Palestinian refugee camp in the central Gaza Strip, according to the Palestinian Authority’s official news agency Wafa, and the Journalist Support Committee (JSC), a nonprofit which promotes the rights of the media in the Middle East.
Mohammad Jarghoun
Mohammad Jarghoun, a journalist with Smart Media, was shot while reporting on the conflict in an area to the east of Rafah city in the southern Gaza Strip, according to Palestinian press freedom group MADA and the JSC.
Ibrahim Mohammad Lafi
Ibrahim Mohammad Lafi, a photographer for Ain Media, was shot and killed at the Gaza Strip’s Erez Crossing into Israel, according to MADA and JSC.
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