Gaza: the journalist of Al-Jazeera Anas Al-Sharif and his four Palestinian colleagues murdered by Israel

When we met Nasser Abou Baker, secretary general of the Palestinian journalists’ union in September 2024, the latter summed up: “You have all the time in mind the feeling that you will end up taking a bullet or get arrested because you are Palestinian.” »» Almost a year later, and while dozens of Gazaouis journalists had already been killed for having continued their profession as for their nationality, his feeling was confirmed.

Worse, it appeared, at the end of 2025, minimal in view of the damage caused by the Israeli army in the Gaza Strip. The Al-Jazeera channel, a rare channel still present daily in Gaza, announced that five of its journalists had been killed in an Israeli bombardment on their tent, Sunday, August 10. Their names: reporters Anas al-Sharif, and Mohammed Qreiqeh, photographers Ibrahim Zaher and Moamen Aliwa, driver Mohammed Noufal.

In one night, Tel Aviv killed all the reporters employed by the chain present in the city of Gaza. “Independent professionals Mahmoud Aliwa and Mohammed al-Khaldi, creator of an information YouTube channel, were also killed in this strike”adds the NGO Reporters Without Borders (RSF), in a press release where it “Denounces the claimed assassination with force and anger” by Israel.

Nearly 200 to have perished under bombs and shots

The journalists present in the Gaza Strip were approximately 200, before Tel Aviv launched the massacres from October 8, 2023. They are, according to the International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) and RSF, nearly 200 to have perished under the bombs and the shooting of the Israeli army since. The Stop Murdering Journalists platform speaks of 298 journalists killed by the Israeli army. Meanwhile, only the feeling of abandonment punctuated these months of massacres, famine, a genocide whose international community has looked away. ​​

Anas Al-Sharif, 28-year-old correspondent, was one of the best known faces among the last journalists to cover the genocide in progress in a gaza strip, whose life and history have been shaved. The Israeli army, more than a horror, confirmed to having targeted it. Neither did she hesitate to flout her commitment by qualifying him as “Head of a terrorist cell within Hamas” Who “Was pretended to be a journalist”. Tel Aviv thus affirmed, to justify his attack, that Anas al-Sharif “Was responsible for preparing rocket attacks against Israeli civilians and troops (Israeli) ».

The Israeli army has thus launched a real discredit operation against it to justify its crime. For example through a video posted by the spokesperson for the occupation forces Avichay Adraee, posted Monday August 11 on X. The latter headed the Palestinian journalist head to Monday: “You talk about the ceasefire and the sufferings of the inhabitants of Gaza, while you are actually part of the false media machine which diffuses propaganda and distorts the facts. »» The attacks were such that Irene Khan, special rapporteur of the United Nations (UN) on freedom of expression, had to recall, on July 31, that “The fears for the safety of Al-Sharif are founded”.

Always the same rhetoric, coupled with an opportunism launched in the face of the world. A few hours before bombing the tent where the five journalists from Al-Jazeera had taken refuge, Israeli Prime Minister Benyamin Netanyahu announced, during a press conference organized on Sunday August 10, having “Give the military to invite foreign journalists” During their operation to conquer the city of Gaza.

“The fact of deliberately targeting journalists is a war crimerecalls Anthony Bellanger, secretary general of the International Federation of Journalists. Israeli leaders must be held responsible. »»

“A desperate attempt to silence the voices that denounce”

Tel Aviv killed the last votes that alerted to the current genocide, then invites international media to visit a desolate region, emptied of its population and doomed to be colonized. A feeling summarized by the Al-Jazeera channel, which believes that the murder of its journalists present in Gaza “Is a desperate attempt to silence the voices that denounce imminent catch and occupation” of the Palestinian enclave. “The murders, the attacks, the arbitrary detention and the harassment of the Palestinian journalists as well as the destruction of the installations and the press equipment in Gaza and in the West Bank are part of a deliberate strategy of Israel aimed at suppressing the truth, to hinder the documentation of international crimes and to bury any possibility of future responsibility”Confirme Irene Khan.

The US deputy Democratic Pramila Jayapal reacted by intimating to “United States to stop providing weapons for this genocide”. The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights has condemned “The murder by the Israeli army” Palestinian journalists present in the tent, in a press release published on the social network X. The High Commission thus accuses Israel of “Violation of international humanitarian law”. Ken Roth, former executive director of Human Rights Watch, also castigated, with Al-Jazeera, “a targeted assassination”.

According to the latter, the death of these five journalists “Is not accidental murder. He is not a journalist taken by chance in the systematic Israeli bombings of Palestinian civilians. When you add to that the systematic harassment of which (Anas Al-Sharif) has been the subject, efforts to silence it, you clearly understand what is happening. ”

In a posthumous text, posted following the announcement of his death, Anas Al-Sharif requests that the international community does not forget Gaza. “” I entrust you with Palestine, the jewel of the crown of the Muslim world, the beating heart of each free person in this worldhe launches in this text written in case the Israeli army kills it. I entrust you with his people, his innocent children and victims of injustice who have never had time to dream or live in security and peace. Their pure bodies were crushed under thousands of tonnes of Israeli bombs and missiles, shredded and dispersed on the walls. I urge you not to let the channels reduce you to silence, nor the borders immobilize you. »»