Israel kills Palestinian journalist in Gaza

Jan 06, 2025 News

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‘I refuse a cheap death’

(AL JAZEERA) A Palestinian writer, poet and journalist has been killed in an Israeli air attack in northern Gaza’s Jabalia refugee camp, according to his family, taking the total number of journalists killed in the Israel-Palestine conflict since October 7, 2023 to 220.  Mohammad Hijazi was among nearly 90 Palestinians slain in Israeli attacks across the besieged territory in the last 24 hours, according to a statement from the Gaza Ministry of Health on Sunday.

Hundreds of people have been killed in the Jabalia camp since Israel imposed a military siege of northern Gaza on October 5 and intensified bombardment, forcing thousands to flee. Israel has prevented even aid groups from supplying basic food items to the area.

“I don’t know if I will write to you again. I keep what I have written and am writing. Maybe it will come to light one day. I refuse a cheap death. I curse the murderer,” Hijazi wrote on Facebook in August last year. “Let us in this bottom that we have finally reached, arm ourselves with patience and prayer, and count the days we have lived as a historic achievement, while awaiting what is coming with a broken heart, an extinguished eye, a head held high, and a spirit that fights until the end of the road.”

It was not immediately clear whether Hijazi was working for a specific media organisation when he died. Since the beginning of its war on Gaza on October 7, 2023, Israel has killed at least 220 journalists and media workers, including Hijazi. The Health Ministry reported on Sunday that at least 88 Palestinians had been killed and 208 others injured in Gaza in the past 24 hours.

Meanwhile, another baby died from the cold in Gaza, as displaced Palestinians lack warm clothes and are forced to live in tents that provide little protection from the weather. The child’s mother told Al Jazeera that her baby, Yousef, was born healthy, but he became the eighth infant to die in Gaza in recent days due to the cold.

“They didn’t give a single moment to feel happy with my baby,” she said. “He slept next to me and in the morning, I found him frozen and dead. I don’t know what to say. No one can feel my misery. No one in the world can understand our catastrophic situation.”

The latest fatalities bring the death toll of Palestinians killed by Israeli attacks in Gaza to at least 45,805 since October 2023, while an estimated 109,064 have been injured. Among those slain in Israeli strikes across Gaza on Sunday were three Palestinians who were living in a tent in Deir el-Balah, according to Al Jazeera’s Hani Mahmoud, reporting from central Gaza. A family of 15 people was also buried under the rubble in the northwest of Gaza City, following a separate strike, Mahmoud reported.

“The Palestinian Civil Defence is doing its best to remove bodies from under the rubble, but has only removed four of the family members,” he said. “It’s estimated there are at least 15 family members under the three-storey building that was flattened to the ground. “These repeated attacks – deliberate against families – continue to unfold, causing more tragedies among Palestinians.” In the last three days, Israeli forces have killed more than 200 people in Gaza, Mahmoud noted. The last few remaining hospitals across Gaza are now overwhelmed, he added.

At the emergency department at Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital in Deir el-Balah, many people were left on the floor and others were waiting to be admitted into the operating theatre, Mahmoud said. “By the time it’s their turn, it’s too late – they have already bled to death. [Many] burns are quite severe, and no pain medication is available at the hospital,” he said.

“There’s a silent death going on. In the past weeks, due to the ongoing attacks, people are dying quietly because of the lack of medical supplies.” On Sunday, the Israeli military claimed that it had struck more than 100 “terror targets” in the Gaza Strip over the past two days. Several of the strikes targeted sites from which Palestinian fighters had been firing projectiles into Israel in recent days, the military said. The latest violence in Gaza comes as indirect negotiations for a captive release deal resumed in Qatar.

Mediators Qatar, Egypt and the United States have been engaged for months in efforts to strike a deal to end the war and secure the release of dozens of captives still held in Gaza. Israel has detained more than 10,000 Palestinians since launching its devastating war, which has brought it global condemnation. Rights groups have termed Israel’s military offensive as a genocide, while the International Court of Justice (ICJ), the top United Nations court, said in March 2024 that the Israeli operation “plausibly” amounted to genocide. Separately, the International Criminal Court (ICC) has issued arrest warrants against Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his former Defence Minister Yoav Gallant.

(Israel kills Palestinian journalist in Gaza)

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• intensified bombardment, Mohammad Hijazi, northern Gaza, Palestinian journalist

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