[News] Israeli army legitimizes murder of journalists in Gaza

[Anti-Imperialist News]

 Israeli army legitimizes murder of journalists in Gaza: Report

Over 75 percent of journalists who died in 2023 were killed by the Israeli
army in the Gaza Strip

News Desk <https://thecradle.co/authors/news-desk-9>

JUN 26, 2024 -
https://thecradle.co/articles/israeli-army-legitimizes-murder-of-journalists-in-gaza-report
(Photo credit: MEE/Mohammed al-Hajjar)

The Israeli army views media outlets affiliated with the resistance as
legitimate military targets, according to an investigation by *The Guardian*
<https://www.theguardian.com/world/article/2024/jun/25/grey-zone-how-hamas-linked-journalists-legitimate-targets>
released on 25 June.

The investigation is part of what is called the Gaza project, led by the
France-based Forbidden Stories NGO, which has analyzed the killing of
journalists in the Gaza Strip since the beginning of the Israeli war in
October.

The US-based Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) places the number of
journalists killed in Gaza since the start of the war at a minimum of 103.
According to CPJ, 30 percent worked for media outlets affiliated with
Hamas.

*The Guardian* investigation identified at least 23 dead journalists
employed by the largest Hamas-linked outlet, the Al-Aqsa media network.

When asked about the number of journalists belonging to the Al-Aqsa network
who have been killed, a senior Israeli army spokesman said there is “no
difference” between working for the outlet and being a member of Hamas’
armed wing, the Qassam Brigades.

Adil Haque, professor of law at the US Rutgers University, said, “It’s a
shocking statement … a complete misunderstanding or just a willful
disregard for international law.”

The Al-Aqsa network’s offices have been bombed by Israeli jets during
previous assaults on Gaza.

In 2019, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu signed an order using
broad legal powers to designate the network, which is also under US
sanctions, as a terrorist organization. The designation was made under
domestic Israeli law, which legal experts said was not a “blank cheque” to
kill journalists affiliated with the network.

Sources cited by *The Guardian* say Al-Aqsa’s offices were evacuated at the
start of the current war in Gaza due to the belief that they would be
targeted.

One Israeli source said there has been “a permissive approach to targeting
across” the army when it came to the war.

Another source familiar with legal advice given to the Israeli army said
journalists affiliated with Hamas exist within a “grey zone” and that there
is a “problematic view” in the military that “whenever there’s someone
getting a salary ultimately from Hamas,” they become legitimized as a
target.

According to the CPJ, over 75 percent of all journalists
<https://www.icij.org/inside-icij/2024/02/over-75-of-all-journalists-killed-in-2023-died-in-gaza-war-per-cpj/>
who died in the year 2023 were killed by the Israeli military in Gaza.

Many of these journalists have had nothing to do with Hamas. Hamza Dahdouh
<https://thecradle.co/articles-id/18020>, son of renowned *Al Jazeera*
bureau chief Wael Dahdouh, was killed in an Israeli airstrike on the Gaza
Strip on 7 January.

Dahdouh was killed alongside another journalist, Mustafa Thuraya, as they
were reporting on the damage caused by an Israeli airstrike on a
residential area between the southern cities of Khan Yunis and Rafah.

Several journalists have also been killed in southern Lebanon while
covering Israeli bombardment there since the beginning of the war.
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