Targeting of Gaza’s journalists continues: Ismail al-Ghoul and Rami al-Rifi killed in Israeli strike
Reporters Without Borders (RSF)
2 August 2024
Dozens of journalists protest the killing of “Al Jazeera” journalist Ismail al-Ghoul and photographer Rami al-Rifi, while holding pictures of their colleagues and their press vest which was torn, in Gaza City, Gaza 1 August 2024. Dawoud Abo Alkas/Anadolu via Getty Images
These deadly attacks against "Al Jazeera" personnel coincided with a steady defamation campaign by Israeli authorities.
This statement was originally published on rsf.org on 1 August 2024.
An Israeli strike killed Al Jazeera journalist Ismail al-Ghoul and photographer Rami al-Rifi on 31 July while they were on assignment in the north of Gaza. Reporters Without Borders (RSF) expresses outrage over this latest attack and calls for increased international pressure on the Israeli government to immediately halt its forces’ massacre of journalists.
Al Jazeera journalists Ismail al-Ghoul and Rami al-Rifi were reporting live from the al-Shati refugee camp, west of Gaza city, shortly before an Israeli strike hit their car, killing them both. Footage published by their colleague Anas al-Sharif shortly after the strike at around 4PM on 31 July shows both reporters killed inside an isolated white car in the middle of an empty street, visibly damaged by a direct strike. Al-Sharif said both reporters were found decapitated. They were wearing their press vests, according to RSF’s information.
A statement by the 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.” According to the media outlet, the two reporters had contacted their news desk 15 minutes before the deadly strike. During the call, they reported on another nearby attack and were advised to leave the area. Ismail al-Ghoul, one of Gaza’s most recognisable reporters, had already been arrested by Israeli forces in al-Shifa hospital on 18 March and released 12 hours later.
Al-Ghoul and al-Rifi were on assignment along with other reporters in the al-Shatti refugee camp, near the house of Hamas political leader Ismail Haneya. They were covering the aftermath of Haneya’s assassination in Iran the night before. The Israeli army did not comment on the strike that killed the two reporters, but constantly denies targeting journalists in Gaza. According to RSF’s information, however, more than 120 journalists have been killed by Israeli forces in the strip since 7 October 2023. At least 29 of them have been killed in circumstances that point to intentional targeting, in violation of international law. RSF has filed three complaints with the International Criminal Court (ICC) since then, calling on the court to investigate these war crimes against journalists as a matter of urgent priority.
“We are appalled by this violent attack on two prominent Al Jazeera journalists – the latest incident in nearly 10 months of crimes against journalists in Gaza, where more than 120 journalists have now lost their lives. RSF urges the Israeli government to immediately commit to ending the violence against journalists that continues to be mercilessly committed by Israeli Defence Forces, constituting flagrant examples of war crimes. We also call for increased international pressure to ensure journalists still working in Gaza are able to safely do their jobs, and to secure justice for the far too many already killed. This massacre must stop now.”
Rebecca Vincent, RSF’s Director of Campaigns
With the killing of al-Ghoul and al-Rifi, the number of Al Jazeera journalists killed in Gaza rises to five, all targeted by direct strikes according to RSF’s information. Journalist Hamza al-Dahdouh – the son of Wael al-Dahdouh, Al Jazeera’s bureau chief in Gaza – and his colleague Moustafa Thuraya – were killed by a targeted Israeli strike at the start of January. A month later, Wael al-Dahdouh was himself injured by another targeted drone strike that killed Al Jazeera cameraman Samer Abu Daqqa.
These deadly attacks against Al Jazeera personnel coincided with a steady defamation campaign by Israeli authorities, which accused Al Jazeera of being a “spokesperson for Hamas” that “threatens the Israeli military,” and which resulted in a temporary ban of the broadcaster enforced in Israel and Palestine. The ban was renewed for 45 days on 5 May, then for another 45 days on 9 June. RSF has repeatedly warned that the campaign against Al Jazeera, as well as the relentless conflation of journalism with “terrorism,” endangers reporters and threatens the right to information everywhere.
‘ELIMINATED’: Israel Brags Of Killing Noted Al Jazeera Journalist In GazaReporters Without Borders (RSF)
2 August 2024
Dozens of journalists protest the killing of “Al Jazeera” journalist Ismail al-Ghoul and photographer Rami al-Rifi, while holding pictures of their colleagues and their press vest which was torn, in Gaza City, Gaza 1 August 2024. Dawoud Abo Alkas/Anadolu via Getty Images
These deadly attacks against "Al Jazeera" personnel coincided with a steady defamation campaign by Israeli authorities.
This statement was originally published on rsf.org on 1 August 2024.
An Israeli strike killed Al Jazeera journalist Ismail al-Ghoul and photographer Rami al-Rifi on 31 July while they were on assignment in the north of Gaza. Reporters Without Borders (RSF) expresses outrage over this latest attack and calls for increased international pressure on the Israeli government to immediately halt its forces’ massacre of journalists.
Al Jazeera journalists Ismail al-Ghoul and Rami al-Rifi were reporting live from the al-Shati refugee camp, west of Gaza city, shortly before an Israeli strike hit their car, killing them both. Footage published by their colleague Anas al-Sharif shortly after the strike at around 4PM on 31 July shows both reporters killed inside an isolated white car in the middle of an empty street, visibly damaged by a direct strike. Al-Sharif said both reporters were found decapitated. They were wearing their press vests, according to RSF’s information.
A statement by the 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.” According to the media outlet, the two reporters had contacted their news desk 15 minutes before the deadly strike. During the call, they reported on another nearby attack and were advised to leave the area. Ismail al-Ghoul, one of Gaza’s most recognisable reporters, had already been arrested by Israeli forces in al-Shifa hospital on 18 March and released 12 hours later.
Al-Ghoul and al-Rifi were on assignment along with other reporters in the al-Shatti refugee camp, near the house of Hamas political leader Ismail Haneya. They were covering the aftermath of Haneya’s assassination in Iran the night before. The Israeli army did not comment on the strike that killed the two reporters, but constantly denies targeting journalists in Gaza. According to RSF’s information, however, more than 120 journalists have been killed by Israeli forces in the strip since 7 October 2023. At least 29 of them have been killed in circumstances that point to intentional targeting, in violation of international law. RSF has filed three complaints with the International Criminal Court (ICC) since then, calling on the court to investigate these war crimes against journalists as a matter of urgent priority.
“We are appalled by this violent attack on two prominent Al Jazeera journalists – the latest incident in nearly 10 months of crimes against journalists in Gaza, where more than 120 journalists have now lost their lives. RSF urges the Israeli government to immediately commit to ending the violence against journalists that continues to be mercilessly committed by Israeli Defence Forces, constituting flagrant examples of war crimes. We also call for increased international pressure to ensure journalists still working in Gaza are able to safely do their jobs, and to secure justice for the far too many already killed. This massacre must stop now.”
Rebecca Vincent, RSF’s Director of Campaigns
With the killing of al-Ghoul and al-Rifi, the number of Al Jazeera journalists killed in Gaza rises to five, all targeted by direct strikes according to RSF’s information. Journalist Hamza al-Dahdouh – the son of Wael al-Dahdouh, Al Jazeera’s bureau chief in Gaza – and his colleague Moustafa Thuraya – were killed by a targeted Israeli strike at the start of January. A month later, Wael al-Dahdouh was himself injured by another targeted drone strike that killed Al Jazeera cameraman Samer Abu Daqqa.
These deadly attacks against Al Jazeera personnel coincided with a steady defamation campaign by Israeli authorities, which accused Al Jazeera of being a “spokesperson for Hamas” that “threatens the Israeli military,” and which resulted in a temporary ban of the broadcaster enforced in Israel and Palestine. The ban was renewed for 45 days on 5 May, then for another 45 days on 9 June. RSF has repeatedly warned that the campaign against Al Jazeera, as well as the relentless conflation of journalism with “terrorism,” endangers reporters and threatens the right to information everywhere.
Matt Shuham
HUFFPOST
Thu, August 1, 2024
Mourners and colleagues surround the body of Al-Jazeera Arabic journalist Ismail al-Ghoul, killed along with his cameraman Rami al-Rifi in an Israeli strike. OMAR AL-QATTAA via Getty Images
A day after an Israeli air strike killed a noted Al Jazeera journalist and his cameraman, the Israeli army acknowledged killing the reporters — and indicated the strike was purposeful.
Al Jazeera correspondent Ismail al-Ghoul and his cameraman Rami al-Rifi were killed by an Israeli airstrike Wednesday, shortly after reporting from the destroyed home of Ismail Haniyeh, the leader of Hamas’ political wing, who had earlier in the day been assassinated in Iran.
Graphic video of the scene of the airstrike shows al-Ghoul was wearing a blue vest reading, “PRESS,” when he was killed. Both al-Ghoul and al-Rifi were wearing press vests and their vehicle carried “identifying signs,” Al Jazeera reported. Multiplereports indicated a nearby child was also killed in the strike.
In a tweet Thursday, the Israeli military indicated it had purposefully targeted the journalist, claiming without evidence that al-Ghoul was a “terrorist” and a member of Hamas’ military wing.
“🔴ELIMINATED: Ismail al-Ghoul, a Hamas Military Wing operative, Nukhba terrorist and @AJEnglish journalist,” read the Israel Defense Forces’ post on X (formerly Twitter).
The post further asserted, without evidence: “As part of his role in the military wing, Al-Ghoul instructed other operatives on how to record operations and was actively involved in recording and publicizing attacks against IDF troops. His activities in the field were a vital part of Hamas’ military activity. The IDF and ISA will continue to operate in order to eliminate terrorists who participated in the October 7 massacre.”
“We have no further comment than what has already been said,” an IDF spokesperson told HuffPost in an email Thursday.
Al-Ghoul had been covering the war in Gaza since November. In March, he reported that he and other journalists had been arrested by Israeli soldiers during the Israeli attack on al-Shifa Hospital in Gaza City. They were then stripped, handcuffed, blindfolded and interrogated over several hours, according to al-Ghoul; witnesses said he was severely beaten. Al-Ghoul reported being detained for about 12 hours.
Among other questions, the IDF spokesperson did not answer why Israeli forces had released al-Ghoul in March if he was supposedly a military operative of Hamas.
In a statement Thursday, Al Jazeera repeated its earlier condemnation of Israel’s killing of al-Ghoul and al-Rifi, noting that the decision to release al-Ghoul in March “debunks and refutes their false claim of his affiliation with any organisation.”
“The Network condemns the accusations against its correspondent, Ismail Al Ghoul, without providing any proof, documentation or video, and highlights Israel’s long history of fabrications and false evidence used to cover up its heinous crimes, while also denying journalists from around the world access to the Gaza Strip to report on the deteriorating humanitarian conditions and the suffering of Palestinians in Gaza,” the statement said.
Al Jazeera called for an independent international investigation into “the brutal and heinous crimes” committed by Israeli forces against its journalists and staff, and noted that it “reserves its right to pursue all legal actions.”
The Committee to Protect Journalists has called the war in Gaza the deadliest period for journalists since the nonprofit began recording data in 1992.
Since Oct. 7, CPJ has confirmed that 108 Palestinian journalists have been killed, in addition to two Israeli and three Lebanese journalists. Fifty-two journalists have been reported arrested, 32 have been reported injured, and two have been reported missing, CPJ said Thursday, noting there are “numerous” other reports under investigation.
Palestinian officials put the number of Palestinian journalists killed at over 160. Multiple journalists have been directly targeted by Israeli forces, CPJ’s president, Jodie Ginsberg, told Al Jazeera.
“Documenting a war isn’t terrorism, it’s journalism,” the Freedom of the Press Foundation said in response to the Israeli military’s post Thursday.
“If the @IDF can prove al-Ghoul was working for Hamas’ military, it should do so immediately,” the post added. “If not, this looks like a flimsy excuse for intentionally murdering a journalist from an outlet Israel dislikes.”
Thursday marked the 300th day of Israel’s military operation in Gaza, which started when Hamas and other Palestinian militants launched a surprise attack on Israel on Oct. 7, killing some 1,200 people and taking around 250 hostages into Gaza.
Nearly 39,500 Gazans have been killed since hostilities began, according to Palestinian officials.
Israeli government officials have a track record of accusing journalists of being militants. In November, top Israel officials amplified allegations that Palestinian journalists were participants or accomplices in the Oct. 7 attack — only for the source of the allegations, the group HonestReporting, to walk back its claims, saying it was just “raising questions.”
Al Jazeera rebuffs Israeli claim killed journalist was Hamas operative
Thu, August 1, 2024
Mourners and colleagues surround the body of Al-Jazeera Arabic journalist Ismail al-Ghoul, killed along with his cameraman Rami al-Rifi in an Israeli strike. OMAR AL-QATTAA via Getty Images
A day after an Israeli air strike killed a noted Al Jazeera journalist and his cameraman, the Israeli army acknowledged killing the reporters — and indicated the strike was purposeful.
Al Jazeera correspondent Ismail al-Ghoul and his cameraman Rami al-Rifi were killed by an Israeli airstrike Wednesday, shortly after reporting from the destroyed home of Ismail Haniyeh, the leader of Hamas’ political wing, who had earlier in the day been assassinated in Iran.
Graphic video of the scene of the airstrike shows al-Ghoul was wearing a blue vest reading, “PRESS,” when he was killed. Both al-Ghoul and al-Rifi were wearing press vests and their vehicle carried “identifying signs,” Al Jazeera reported. Multiplereports indicated a nearby child was also killed in the strike.
In a tweet Thursday, the Israeli military indicated it had purposefully targeted the journalist, claiming without evidence that al-Ghoul was a “terrorist” and a member of Hamas’ military wing.
“🔴ELIMINATED: Ismail al-Ghoul, a Hamas Military Wing operative, Nukhba terrorist and @AJEnglish journalist,” read the Israel Defense Forces’ post on X (formerly Twitter).
The post further asserted, without evidence: “As part of his role in the military wing, Al-Ghoul instructed other operatives on how to record operations and was actively involved in recording and publicizing attacks against IDF troops. His activities in the field were a vital part of Hamas’ military activity. The IDF and ISA will continue to operate in order to eliminate terrorists who participated in the October 7 massacre.”
“We have no further comment than what has already been said,” an IDF spokesperson told HuffPost in an email Thursday.
Al-Ghoul had been covering the war in Gaza since November. In March, he reported that he and other journalists had been arrested by Israeli soldiers during the Israeli attack on al-Shifa Hospital in Gaza City. They were then stripped, handcuffed, blindfolded and interrogated over several hours, according to al-Ghoul; witnesses said he was severely beaten. Al-Ghoul reported being detained for about 12 hours.
Among other questions, the IDF spokesperson did not answer why Israeli forces had released al-Ghoul in March if he was supposedly a military operative of Hamas.
In a statement Thursday, Al Jazeera repeated its earlier condemnation of Israel’s killing of al-Ghoul and al-Rifi, noting that the decision to release al-Ghoul in March “debunks and refutes their false claim of his affiliation with any organisation.”
“The Network condemns the accusations against its correspondent, Ismail Al Ghoul, without providing any proof, documentation or video, and highlights Israel’s long history of fabrications and false evidence used to cover up its heinous crimes, while also denying journalists from around the world access to the Gaza Strip to report on the deteriorating humanitarian conditions and the suffering of Palestinians in Gaza,” the statement said.
Al Jazeera called for an independent international investigation into “the brutal and heinous crimes” committed by Israeli forces against its journalists and staff, and noted that it “reserves its right to pursue all legal actions.”
The Committee to Protect Journalists has called the war in Gaza the deadliest period for journalists since the nonprofit began recording data in 1992.
Since Oct. 7, CPJ has confirmed that 108 Palestinian journalists have been killed, in addition to two Israeli and three Lebanese journalists. Fifty-two journalists have been reported arrested, 32 have been reported injured, and two have been reported missing, CPJ said Thursday, noting there are “numerous” other reports under investigation.
Palestinian officials put the number of Palestinian journalists killed at over 160. Multiple journalists have been directly targeted by Israeli forces, CPJ’s president, Jodie Ginsberg, told Al Jazeera.
“Documenting a war isn’t terrorism, it’s journalism,” the Freedom of the Press Foundation said in response to the Israeli military’s post Thursday.
“If the @IDF can prove al-Ghoul was working for Hamas’ military, it should do so immediately,” the post added. “If not, this looks like a flimsy excuse for intentionally murdering a journalist from an outlet Israel dislikes.”
Thursday marked the 300th day of Israel’s military operation in Gaza, which started when Hamas and other Palestinian militants launched a surprise attack on Israel on Oct. 7, killing some 1,200 people and taking around 250 hostages into Gaza.
Nearly 39,500 Gazans have been killed since hostilities began, according to Palestinian officials.
Israeli government officials have a track record of accusing journalists of being militants. In November, top Israel officials amplified allegations that Palestinian journalists were participants or accomplices in the Oct. 7 attack — only for the source of the allegations, the group HonestReporting, to walk back its claims, saying it was just “raising questions.”
Al Jazeera rebuffs Israeli claim killed journalist was Hamas operative
Yolande Knell - BBC News, Jerusalem
Fri, August 2, 2024
Al Jazeera said its correspondent and cameraman were killed in an Israeli strike [Reuters]
Al Jazeera has strongly rejected the Israeli military’s claim that its correspondent killed in an air strike in Gaza this week was a Hamas operative who participated in the 7 October attacks.
Harrowing video shared on social media showed Ismail al-Ghoul’s decapitated body after he was targeted in his car in Gaza City on Wednesday.
His cameraman, Rami al-Rifi, and a boy passing on a bicycle, Khalid Shawa, were also killed.
While regional news this week has been dominated by other high-profile assassinations, many Palestinians have also focused on the killing of the locally prominent journalist.
In a statement on Thursday, the Israel Defence Forces (IDF) described Ismail al-Ghoul as a “Hamas military wing operative and Nukhba terrorist” - the assertion being he was part of an elite unit in the armed group.
It alleged that as part of his role he “instructed other operatives on how to record operations and was actively involved in recording and publicising attacks against IDF troops”. The IDF did not include Rami al-Rifi in its statement.
Al Jazeera called the accusation against its staff member “baseless” and said it “highlights Israel’s long history of fabrications and false evidence used to cover up its heinous crimes”.
Ismail's brother Jihad also told the BBC that his late sibling was strictly a civilian “portraying the suffering of the Palestinian people inside Gaza City to the outside world”.
Based in Gaza City, the reporter had become a regular face on the Qatar-based TV channel, which is a popular news source in the region but has faced intense criticism from Israeli authorities.
As Friday prayers in Gaza were dedicated to the late Hamas leader, Ismail Haniyeh, who was assassinated in the Iranian capital Tehran, some Palestinians said they were also thinking about those who had been killed closer to home.
Hamas leader Haniyeh buried in Qatar
“I am truly heartbroken about Ismail [al-Ghoul],” commented Maha Sarsak, who has been displaced from Shujaiyeh to the centre of the strip. “I was keeping up on the news in the north through him on social media. We didn’t always have a TV, but we could hear his voice on the radio.”
Journalists in Gaza laid down their flak jackets at one gathering to honour al-Ghoul and al-Rifi this week.
A friend of the pair said: “They hadn’t been sleeping for days nor eating. They had even lost a lot of weight.”
Ismail al-Ghoul covered Israel’s raid of Shifa Hospital in March and was arrested by the IDF at the site - but released after 12 hours without charge. Al Jazeera claimed this “debunks and refutes their false claim of his affiliation with any organisation”.
The two Al Jazeera journalists’ last assignment had been gathering reaction to news of Haniyeh’s death. Their car was targeted close to the Hamas leader’s destroyed house in Shati Camp, an urban refugee camp.
Israel has blocked international journalists from entering the Palestinian territory during the war, except on limited and highly controlled visits with the Israeli military. Prior to the closure of its Rafah border crossing with Gaza, Egypt also prevented reporters from entering.
Over 10 months, many networks, including the BBC, have relied on local Palestinian staff for their on-the-ground news coverage and taken on new employees or freelancers.
Al Jazeera said that Ismail al-Ghoul had been working for the channel since November. It said that he had endured “hardships” during the war including losing his father and brother.
Other cameramen spoke of how al-Rifi had used his technical expertise to help them with their filming.
After images of a dead Khaled al-Shawa, the boy killed in the strike, were widely publicised, the boy’s mother put out a message on social media pleading for him to be remembered too.
“My son is not an unidentified martyr,” she said. “We must say the names of our martyrs. They should not talk about us as numbers.”
Al Jazeera, which broadcasts in English and Arabic, has recently seen a series of attacks against its staff in Gaza and their families.
In late October, Wael Dahdouh, the network’s well-known bureau chief, was reporting when he received word on-air that his wife, daughter, a son, and grandchild were killed in an Israeli airstrike.
In December, he was injured in an attack that also killed another Al Jazeera cameraman, Samer Abudaqa.
In January, a strike killed Mr Dahdouh’s son, Hamza, and Mustafa Thuria, a video stringer, while they were working for Al Jazeera. The IDF later alleged the men were “members of Gaza-based terrorist organizations".
Al Jazeera has previously fiercely denied Israel’s claims and accused it of systematically targeting its employees.
The network has also condemned the decision by Israel’s government in May to ban its broadcast in the country on accusations it harms national security. Last month, the ban was extended by the Tel Aviv District Court.
The United Nations has called for a full investigation and accountability for the killings of the Al Jazeera journalists and others, saying that journalists everywhere must be protected.
There are differing tallies of the number of media workers killed since the unprecedented, deadly Hamas-led attacks on Israel that prompted the war in Gaza.
However, according to the Committee to Protect Journalists, the latest deaths in Gaza bring the number of journalists killed to 113, including 108 Palestinians, three Lebanese and two Israelis who were killed during the 7 October assault.
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