Al Jazeera journalist, cameraman killed in Israeli attack on Gaza

Al Jazeera Arabic journalist Ismail al-Ghoul and his cameraman Rami al-Rifi were killed in an Israeli air strike on the Gaza Strip.

According to initial reports, the incident occurred on Wednesday in the Shati refugee camp, west of Gaza City, when their vehicle was struck.

The journalists were on location to cover events near the residence of Ismail Haniyeh, a political leader of Hamas, who was reportedly assassinated earlier that day in Tehran, Iran—a killing that Hamas attributes to Israel, reports Al Jazeera.

Al Jazeera's Anas al-Sharif, reporting from Gaza, was present at the hospital where the bodies of his colleagues were taken.

"Ismail was conveying the suffering of the displaced Palestinians and the suffering of the wounded and the massacres committed by the [Israeli] occupation against the innocent people in Gaza," he said.

"The feeling – no words can describe what happened."

Ismail and Rami were wearing media vests and had clear identification markings on their car at the time of the attack. They last communicated with their news desk 15 minutes before the incident, reporting a strike on a nearby house and were instructed to leave immediately. While en route to Al-Ahli Arab Hospital, they were killed.

There has been no immediate response from Israel, which has previously denied targeting journalists during its 10-month conflict in Gaza. The war has resulted in at least 39,445 fatalities, predominantly among women and children, says Al Jazeera.

In a statement, Al Jazeera Media Network called the killings a "targeted assassination" by Israeli forces and pledged to "pursue all legal actions to prosecute the perpetrators of these crimes".

"This latest attack on Al Jazeera journalists is part of a systematic targeting campaign against the network's journalists and their families since October 2023," the network said.

According to preliminary figures by the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ), at least 111 journalists and media workers are among those killed since the start of the war on 7

October. The Gaza government media office has put the figure at 165 Palestinian journalists killed since the war began.