Latest news with #HossamShabat
Al Jazeera
10-04-2025
- Politics
- Al Jazeera
Unpacking Israel's war on international humanitarian law
On March 24, Israel struck a car in northern Gaza and killed Al Jazeera correspondent Hossam Shabat. The 23-year-old is one of countless civilians – men, women and children – Israel has killed since launching what legal scholars describe as a 'genocidal' war on Gaza. Israel often justifies its killings by claiming that the targets are people sympathetic or affiliated with Hamas or other armed factions. This was the justification given for killing Shabat. Israel also regularly destroys entire neighbourhoods and buildings, killing dozens – often hundreds – at a time, ostensibly to target a single Hamas operative. For years, Israel has tried to justify these practices by employing lawyers to create shadowy quasi-legal concepts in the hope of establishing new, dangerous precedents, according to legal scholars and experts. However, legal scholars told Al Jazeera that neither so-called 'targeted killings' nor disproportionate attacks against civilians have any grounding in international law. 'Is there any semblance of law or legal justification for the war tactics Israel is using in Gaza? The simple answer is no. There isn't,' said Heidi Matthews, assistant professor of law at York University in Toronto, Canada. On September 28, 2000, Palestinians across the occupied West Bank and Gaza began demonstrating against Israel's ever-entrenching occupation in what became known as the second Intifada. Israel's repression of the Intifada quickly prompted Palestinians to mobilise and fight back. Over the next five years, Israel launched what it named 'targeted killings', assassinating unarmed Palestinians. Israel claimed that these targets could pose a threat to Israelis in the future because of their alleged membership in an armed faction. 'Israel … strips protection from civilians based on their views or perspectives,' said Noor Kilzi, a researcher with Legal Agenda, a nonprofit in Lebanon that advocates for legal reform and human rights in the Middle East. Israel's concept of targeted killings laid out a blueprint which the United States adapted during its 'war on terror', analysts told Al Jazeera. '[In the early 2000s] Israel and the US changed their legal doctrines and implemented that as part of their military dogma,' York University's Matthews told Al Jazeera. 'When it came to distinguishing between civilians and combatants… the US and Israel began to view [anyone as a target] based on their membership to a group,' she added. According to the International Committee of the Red Cross, a person is only a legitimate target if they are directly engaged in armed combat at the time they are killed. This means that suspected membership in an armed group is not a sufficient basis to assassinate someone. Throughout Israel's war on Gaza, it has routinely dropped 2,000lb (900kg) bombs in densely populated residential areas, as well as systematically targeted schools, hospitals and displacement shelters. Israeli officials justify these attacks by claiming that Israel is fighting a 'just war' against barbarians. As a result, the ostensible goal of destroying Hamas outweighs minimising civilian casualties. This is rooted partly in the philosophy of Francis Leiber, a 19th-century German American military theorist, who was tasked with setting out the 'rules of conduct' for Unionist soldiers fighting the Confederates in the US Civil War. He argued that some wars are vital to the moral progress of civilised nations and require a quick victory, which can only be achieved using tactics that will likely cause huge civilian casualties. 'Leiber basically said that whatever is militarily necessary to carry out war is legal,' Alonso Gurmendi Dunkelberg, a legal scholar at the London School of Economics, told Al Jazeera. This terrifying reasoning is blatantly at odds with international norms and laws, Gurmendi Dunkelberg added. 'He believed in killing as many people as you can, so that you finish the job quickly. He believed that was more humane than trying to protect people to the point that the war drags on for say 15 years,' he said. Since the beginning of Israel's war on Gaza, its spokespeople have made similar arguments. Mark Regev, an adviser to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, said the goal was to 'get the [war] done quicker' when asked by PBS about why Israel had dropped 6,000 bombs in the first six days of attacks on the besieged enclave. Then spokesperson for the Israeli army, Daniel Hagari, also admitted during the first days of the war that the emphasis in Gaza was on 'damage and not accuracy'. In November 2024, the International Criminal Court (ICC) approved two arrest warrants for Netanyahu and his then-Defence Minister Yoav Gallant – accused of using starvation as a weapon of war and deliberately attacking civilians in Gaza. An earlier ruling by the International Court of Justice found that Palestinians in Gaza faced a real risk of genocide due to Israel's war practices. The rulings by the ICC and ICJ add weight to the argument that Israel has failed in trying to legally justify its war practices, which likely amount to multiple war crimes, crimes against humanity and even genocide. As a result, Israel and its western allies are now trying to sabotage the very institutions that were created to uphold international law and prosecute perpetrators of atrocities, said Nadim Khoury, former director at Human Rights Watch and the founder of the Arab Reform Initiative think tank. 'Israel has clearly hit the limit of what they can get away with by using legal arguments. Now, they're just acting with total impunity to undermine the institutions trying to enforce international laws,' he told Al Jazeera. Several legal scholars and experts expressed dismay that Netanyahu may be able to visit countries in Europe that are parties to the Rome Statute, the legal framework underpinning the ICC. Countries such as Hungary, Belgium and France have said they will not arrest Netanyahu if he visits their countries or passes through their land or airspace. York University's Matthews believes states that claim to uphold international law must act quickly to salvage what's left of the system, acknowledging that it was never a perfect model. 'Other states – beyond America and Israel – need to take action to save or salvage the system as a whole, or it will fade away quickly,' she told Al Jazeera. 'We are at an inflection point and it doesn't look good.'
Morocco World
07-04-2025
- Politics
- Morocco World
Palestinian Journalists Burned Alive in Israeli Strike on Khan Younis
Rabat – Yet more disturbing footage of the atrocities that Israel is committing in Gaza is again going viral, this time showing journalists being burned alive in a tent. At least one Palestinian journalist was burned alive in Khan Younis, southern Gaza, after an Israeli airstrike hit an area near Nasser Hospital, where a group of journalists had set up a tent. The Palestinian Information Center and the Quds News Network identified the victim as journalist Helmi al-Faqawi. Shocking footage circulating online showed him engulfed in flames as people tried desperately to save him. The attack also killed Yusuf Al-Khazandar, a young man who was in the area as the strike took place, and injured at least seven other journalists. One of the journalists, believed to be Ahmed Mansour, worked for Palestine Today and was a father. According to Wael Abo Omar, a Palestinian journalist, Israeli missiles hit the journalists' camp near the hospital, setting fire to the tent where Mansour was sitting. He is now in intensive care with serious burns. Another journalist, Mahmoud Bassam, said Mansour 'needs a miracle' to survive. Many Palestinian journalists have been intentially targeted and murdered by Israeli forces while reporting on the war on Gaza. In late March, Al Jazeera's correspondent Hossam Shabat and Palestine Today's reporter Mohammed Mansour were also killed by Israeli airstrikes. Before his death, Hossam Shabat had written a final message: 'By God, I fulfilled my duty as a journalist. I risked everything to report the truth.' His team shared it after he was targeted in northern Gaza. Since the start of the genocide, Israel has blocked foreign journalists from entering Gaza and has continued to target local Palestinian reporters. At least 210 journalists have been killed since the war began. The Palestinian Journalists Forum released a statement condemning Israel's attack on the tent sheltering journalists. The forum described the attack as a 'heinous crime and a deliberate targeting of journalists that violated all international laws and conventions.' Tags: GazaIsraeljournalists
Arab News
03-04-2025
- Politics
- Arab News
Report finds Israel's war on Gaza ‘worst ever conflict' for journalists
LONDON: A report released Tuesday by the Costs of War project at the Watson Institute for International Studies in the US has found that Israel's war on Gaza is the 'worst ever conflict' for journalists, with at least 208 Palestinian media workers killed since October 2023. Titled 'News Graveyards: How Dangers to War Reporters Endanger the World,' the study examines the toll of war on journalists, as well as broader trends in the US news industry that have weakened international coverage. It highlights how Gaza has seen an unprecedented death toll among journalists, far exceeding that of other conflicts in history. 'Attacks on journalists have exacerbated long term socio-economic shifts that have crippled the global news industry over decades and led to the de-prioritization of international news coverage and the closure of foreign news bureaus,' noted the report. 'Across the globe, the economics of the industry, the violence of war, and coordinated censorship campaigns threaten to turn an increasing number of conflict zones into news graveyards, with Gaza being the most extreme example.' The Brown University-based nonpartisan research project, which analyzes the human, financial, and political costs of post-9/11 wars, found that 'since Oct. 7, 2023, the war in Gaza has killed more journalists than the US Civil War, World War I, World War II, the Korean War, the Vietnam War, and the post-9/11 war in Afghanistan combined.' The report also revealed that in 2024, a media worker was killed or murdered every three days worldwide — an increase from 2023's rate of one every four days—attributed largely to the war in Gaza. 'Most reporters harmed or killed, as is the case in Gaza, are local journalists,' it added. BREAKING: More journalists have died in Gaza since Oct. 7, 2023 than in both World Wars and other major wars, combined. Our new report outlines the costs of war to journalists – and the journalism we all rely on. [THREAD, 1/8] — The Costs of War Project (@CostsOfWar) April 1, 2025 Late in March, Palestinian journalists Mohammad Mansour, a correspondent for Palestine Today, and Hossam Shabat, a journalist for Al-Jazeera Mubasher, became the latest media workers to be killed in Gaza in Israeli attacks. The Israeli military admitted to killing Shabat, accusing him of being 'a terrorist' it had 'eliminated.' The report accuses Israel of mounting 'a full-spectrum effort to undermine the free flow of information,' citing the 'near-total destruction' of media infrastructure, internet blackouts, misinformation campaigns, and restrictions preventing local journalists from leaving Gaza while barring foreign reporters from entering. It also underscores the vital role local journalists play in conflict zones, describing them as bearing witness to 'the realities and horrors of wars. 'Journalists serve as the eyes and ears of the world, seeking out solid, verifiable information amid a vortex of violence and a welter of rumor, manipulation, misinformation, disinformation, and propaganda,' the report continued. The study also references Syria's civil war, where hundreds of journalists were killed by government forces and armed groups. The Syrian Network for Human Rights estimates that 700 journalists and media activists have been killed since the conflict began in 2011. The Watson Institute report warns that increasing threats against journalists not only endanger individuals but also undermine global news coverage and the 'worldwide information ecosystem.' 'The decreasing number of experienced foreign correspondents in conflict zones, due to long term shifts in the global news industry that have led to the de-prioritization of international news coverage and the closure of foreign news bureaus, has likewise crippled critical knowledge and helped facilitate the creation of news graveyards,' said the report.
Middle East Eye
02-04-2025
- Politics
- Middle East Eye
Israel's war on Gaza 'worst ever conflict' for journalists: report
Israel's war on Gaza has been the "worst ever conflict" for journalists, with at least 208 Palestinian media workers killed since October 2023, according to a report by the Watson Institute for International and Public Affairs. The report, titled News Graveyards: How Dangers to War Reporters Endanger the World, said the Israeli assault on the Gaza Strip since October 2023 had "killed more journalists than the US Civil War, World Wars I and II, the Korean War, the Vietnam War (including the conflicts in Cambodia and Laos), the wars in Yugoslavia in the 1990s and 2000s, and the post-9/11 war in Afghanistan, combined." "In 2023, a journalist or media worker was, on average, killed or murdered every four days. In 2024, it was once every three days," said the report. "Most reporters harmed or killed, as is the case in Gaza, are local journalists." Just last week, Mohammad Mansour, a correspondent for Palestine Today, and Hossam Shabat, a journalist for Al Jazeera Mubasher, were killed by Israel in two separate attacks. Relatives and colleagues mourn at the funeral of Palestinian journalist Hossam Shabat, an Al Jazeera Mubasher correspondent, and Mohammad Mansour, a Palestine Today correspondent, in Beit Lahia in the northern Gaza Strip, on 24 March 2025 (Bashar Taleb / AFP)
Washington Post
25-03-2025
- Politics
- Washington Post
Israeli strikes kill two Gaza journalists, including Al Jazeera reporter
Al Jazeera reporter Hossam Shabat was killed in an Israeli airstrike in northern Gaza on Monday, months after the Israeli military accused him of being a member of Hamas, an allegation rejected by Al Jazeera and condemned by the Committee to Protect Journalists as a 'smear campaign.' CPJ, a nonprofit organization that tracks repression worldwide, has said Israel has 'repeatedly made similar unproven statements' against journalists. In a statement Monday, CPJ denounced Shabat's killing and that of Mohammad Mansour, a journalist who worked for Palestine Today, who was killed the same day in southern Gaza. Shabat's last post on Instagram only hours before he was killed was a post mourning Mansour.
