Israeli strike in Gaza kills three journalists, first responders say

Three Palestinian journalists have been killed in an Israeli strike in central Gaza, first responders say.

Gaza’s Hamas-run Civil Defence agency said their car was hit in the al-Zahra area and named them as Mohammed Salah Qeshta, Anas Ghunaim and Abdul Raouf Shaat. They are understood to have been working for an Egyptian relief organisation.

The Israeli military said it struck “several suspects who operated a drone affiliated with Hamas… in a manner that posed a threat” to its troops. It added that the incident was under examination.

Another eight people, two of them children, were killed by Israeli artillery and gunfire across Gaza on Wednesday, the Hamas-run health ministry said.

Medics said three people, including a 10-year-old boy, were killed by Israeli tank fire elsewhere in central Gaza, and that a 13-year-old boy and a woman were killed by Israeli gunfire in the southern Khan Younis area, according to Reuters news agency.

The Israeli military said on Wednesday morning that its troops had killed a “terrorist who crossed the Yellow Line and approached” them, without mentioning a location. The Yellow Line demarcates territory in Gaza still under Israeli control under the ceasefire deal.

At least 466 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza since a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas began on 10 October, according to the health ministry.

The Israeli military has said three of its soldiers have been killed in attacks by Palestinian armed groups over the same period.

The three photojournalists killed on Wednesday – one of whom contributed regularly to French news agency AFP – were reportedly working for the Egyptian Relief Committee in the Gaza Strip to film its camps for displaced people.

A spokesperson for the humanitarian organisation said the car that was struck was marked with its logo and that it was “targeted during a humanitarian mission, resulting in the martyrdom of three individuals”.

Hamas called the strike a “dangerous escalation of the flagrant violations of the ceasefire agreement”.

The Palestinian Journalists Syndicate said it constituted a war crime and evidence of what it called “a systematic Israeli policy aimed at silencing the Palestinian voice, obstructing the transmission of facts, and concealing crimes committed against civilians in the Gaza Strip”, according to Palestinian news agency Wafa.

The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) has documented the killing of at least 206 journalists and media workers by Israeli fire in Gaza since the start of the war – the deadliest conflict for journalists ever documented.

Before Wednesday, two journalists had been killed in Israeli strikes during the ceasefire, and a third had been killed by members of a Palestinian armed group, according to the US-based organisation’s data.

International news outlets rely on local journalists in Gaza, as Israel does not allow foreign media, including BBC News, to send their journalists into the territory independently. Some journalists are taken into Gaza by the Israeli military under controlled access.

The war was triggered by the Hamas-led attack on southern Israel on 7 October 2023, in which about 1,200 people were killed and 251 others were taken hostage.

Israel responded to the attack by launching a military campaign in Gaza, during which more than 71,550 people have been killed, according to the territory’s health ministry.