Israeli strikes kill 22, including 5 journalists, in a Gaza hospital

Editor’s note: This story contains a graphic image.

KHAN YOUNIS, Gaza Strip — Israeli forces killed 22 people, including five journalists, in two consecutive strikes on Gaza’s largest functioning hospital, drawing global condemnation and prompting a rare admission of regret by the Israeli government.

The death toll from the strikes was confirmed by Nasser Hospital’s morgue to NPR.

The journalists worked for several international outlets, including The Associated Press, Reuters and Al Jazeera’s Arabic news channel. They were killed by strikes on the fourth floor open stairwell of the Nasser Hospital building Monday morning, where they were standing along with first responders and medical staff.

The first strike took place around 10 a.m. when Hussam al-Masri, a cameraman for the Reuters news agency, was operating a live feed with a bird’s-eye view of nearby Israeli military positions, including tanks, in the devastated city of Khan Younis in southern Gaza.

A second missile, fired from a tank, slammed into the same spot just minutes later, as rescue workers raced to Masri, with other journalists photographing and filming the aftermath of that initial strike, according to witnesses and footage. At the site, another camera feed for Al-Ghad news channel zoomed in, capturing the moment of the second attack in real time.

“Oh God, the rescuers are gone. They killed the people! They killed them,” the reporter yells in disbelief on live television.  

Other people killed in the attacks at Nasser Medical Complex in Khan Younis include medical staff, a medical resident and a first responder, according to morgue records.

It marked one of the deadliest days for the press in the Palestinian territory, where Israeli attacks have killed 245 media workers in the past 22 months of the war, according to lists published by Palestinian journalists.

By early afternoon, fellow journalists and dozens of other people had gathered to mourn their dead colleagues, who were prepared for burial with their body armor marked “PRESS” placed on top of their corpses that were wrapped in white sheets.

“This is a criminal enemy that wants to silence us,” Reuters photojournalist, Hatem Omar, said. He was among several journalists wounded in the attack.

Among those killed was Mariam Dagga, a contributor with The Associated Press.

Her most recently filed AP photos showed emaciated, severely malnourished Palestinian children in Gaza, and a story with her byline published earlier this month highlighted the death of a 2-year-old child, Ro’a Mashi, who doctors said had “wasted away over months as her family struggled to find food and treatment.”

In the final video of herself shared on Instagram, and posted just before her death, the 33-year-old stands in front of a mirror taking deep breaths to the backdrop of a song about ascending to heaven. She looks gaunt and pale — a glimpse of the starvation and exhaustion journalists and other Palestinians face in Gaza.

The AP says Dagga evacuated her 13-year-old son out of Gaza early in the war, and hadn’t seen him since. The news agency said it was “shocked and saddened to learn” of her death. Reuters said in a statement it was “devastated” to learn about al-Masri’s death, as well as that of another journalist, Moaz Abu Taha, who had occasionally worked for the news wire. It said it was “urgently seeking more information” as well as medical assistance for Hatem Khaled, another Reuters contractor wounded in the same attack.

Al Jazeera said cameraman Mohammad Salama was the 10th of its journalists to be killed by Israel in Gaza in this war, calling the attack an “atrocity.” It said it “condemns, in the strongest possible terms, this horrific crime.” The outlet said the blood had not yet dried on an attack just two weeks ago that killed six journalists, five of them with Al Jazeera, including Gaza’s most prominent and well-known reporter, Anas al-Sharif in a targeted Israeli airstrike. 

In a letter to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and the military’s top brass, Reuters and AP expressed their “outrage” and demanded a swift and transparent investigation.

“We are outraged that independent journalists were among the victims of this strike on the hospital, a location that is protected under international law,” the letter said.

But they raised doubts about how Israel investigates military actions. “We have found the [Israeli military’s] willingness and ability to investigate itself in past incidents to rarely result in clarity and action, raising serious questions including whether Israel is deliberately targeting live feeds in order to suppress information,” the letter said.

The Committee to Protect Journalists condemned the attack. “Israel’s broadcasted killing of journalists in Gaza continues while the world watches and fails to act firmly on the most horrific attacks the press has ever faced in recent history,” CPJ Regional Director Sara Qudah said.

The Foreign Press Association in Israel and the Occupied Palestinian Territories, which represents hundreds of journalists including NPR reporters, said the attack should mark a watershed moment as Israel continues to block independent access to Gaza to foreign journalists and kills journalists in Gaza without justification.

“We call on Israel once and for all to halt its abhorrent practice of targeting journalists,” said a statement from the association.

Within hours of the incident, the Israeli military had acknowledged the attack, but by late Monday had not yet identified any specific target. “The IDF does not intentionally target civilians,” Israeli military spokesperson Brig. Gen. Effie Defrin said in a video statement on social media, using the initials for the Israeli military. “We regret any harm to uninvolved individuals.”

The office of Israel’s prime minister issued a statement saying Israel “deeply regrets the tragic mishap” at the hospital, adding that it “values the work of journalists, medical staff, and all civilians.” The statement offered no further details on what accountability there might be for the killing of 22 people in the attack. 

Anas Baba reported from Khan Younis, Gaza, and Aya Batrawy from Dubai, United Arab Emirates.