Israel army claims two journalists slain in Gaza strike were ‘terror operatives’
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The car in which the two journalists, Mr Mustafa Thuria and Mr Hamza Wael Dahdouh, were killed in a reported Israeli strike in Rafah, in the Gaza Strip, on Jan 7, 2024.
PHOTO: AFP
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JERUSALEM – Israel’s army claimed on Jan 10 that two Al Jazeera journalists it killed in an air strike in Gaza were “terror operatives”.
Mr Hamza Wael Dahdouh and Mr Mustafa Thuria, who also worked as a video stringer for AFP and other news organisations, were killed on Jan 7 while they were on an assignment for the Qatar-based channel in the city of Rafah.
The army said in a statement on Jan 10 that its “intelligence has confirmed that both the deceased were members of Gaza-based terrorist organisations actively involved in attacks against Israel Defence Forces (IDF)”.
“Prior to the strike, the two operated drones, posing an imminent threat to IDF troops.”
There was no immediate reaction available from the television channel and families of the two men.
When asked on Jan 10 by AFP about what kind of drones were used by the two men and the nature of the threat the drones posed to Israeli troops, the army said it was “checking”.
It said Mr Thuria was identified in a document found by troops in Gaza to be a member of Hamas’ Gaza City Brigade, while Mr Dahdouh was identified as a terrorist belonging to Islamic Jihad.
The army statement included a copy of a document it said was a list of “operatives from an electronic engineering unit of the Islamic Jihad, including Dahdouh and his military number”.
Mr Dahdouh and Mr Thuria were killed when the car they were travelling in was hit by two rockets on a street in Rafah, according to witnesses. A third journalist and the driver of the car were wounded.
The widow (right) of Mr Hamza Wael Dahdouh, a journalist with the Al Jazeera television network, and his father, Al Jazeera’s bureau chief in Gaza, Mr Wael Al-Dahdouh (left) mourning over Mr Dahdouh’s body during the funeral.
PHOTO: AFP
Mr Thuria, in his 30s, had contributed to AFP since 2019 and also worked with other international media outlets.
He and Mr Dahdouh had been tasked with filming the aftermath of a strike on a house in Rafah, and their car was hit while they were on their way back, AFP correspondents said at the time.
Soon after the strike, Al Jazeera said it “strongly condemns the Israeli occupation forces’ targeting of the Palestinian journalists’ car”, accusing Israel of targeting journalists and “violating the principles of freedom of the press”.
Mr Wael al-Dahdouh, Mr Dahdouh’s father, is Al Jazeera’s Gaza bureau chief and was recently wounded in a strike himself after his wife and two other children were killed in Israeli bombardment in the initial weeks of the war.
Fellow journalists mourning over the body of Mr Mustafa Thuria, a video stringer for AFP news agency, who was killed in a reported Israeli air strike.
PHOTO: AFP
Soon after Mr Dahdouh and Mr Thuria were killed, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said their deaths were an “unimaginable tragedy”.
“And that’s also been the case for...far too many innocent Palestinian men, women and children,” he added.
On Jan 8, Mr Wael al-Dahdouh’s two nephews, Mr Ahmed al-Dahdouh and Mr Muhammad al-Dahdouh, were also killed in a strike when travelling in a car in Rafah, according to the Health Ministry in Hamas-run Gaza.
The war in Gaza erupted when Hamas militants stormed across Gaza’s border into Israel in an unprecedented attack on Oct 7,
Israel has vowed to eradicate Hamas, denounced as a terrorist group by the United States and European Union, and has kept up a relentless bombing of Gaza, which the Hamas-run Health Ministry says has killed at least 23,357 people, mostly civilians.
The New York-based Committee to Protect Journalists said at least 79 journalists and media professionals, the vast majority Palestinian, have been killed since the war began. AFP
