The eldest son of Al Jazeera’s Gaza bureau chief, Wael Al-Dahdouh, was one of two journalists killed in an Israeli air strike on a car near Rafah in southern Gaza on Sunday. Mustafa Thuria and Hamza Al-Dahdouh, a journalist with the Al Jazeera television network, lost their lives while traveling in a car, according to statements from the health ministry and medics.
Wael Al-Dahdouh gained widespread recognition across the Middle East after discovering during a live broadcast in October that his wife, another son, daughter, and grandson had been killed in an Israeli air strike.
The Gaza government’s media office reported that the deaths of these two journalists brought the total count of journalists killed by the Israeli offensive to 109.
A video posted on an Al Jazeera-linked YouTube channel depicted Wael Al-Dahdouh crying next to his son’s body and holding his hand. Later, following his son’s burial, he stated in televised remarks that despite the losses, journalists in Gaza would persist in their duty. “All the world needs to see what is happening here,” he emphasized.
Simultaneously, the Al Jazeera Media Network condemned the killing of the two journalists and asserted that it was a deliberate attack. In a statement, the network urged the International Criminal Court, governments, human rights organizations, and the United Nations to hold Israel accountable for what it termed “heinous crimes” and demanded an end to the targeting and killing of journalists.
The toll on journalists covering the conflict was further highlighted by the death of Reuters visuals journalist Issam Abdallah, a Lebanese citizen killed on October 13 by an Israeli tank crew while filming cross-border shelling in Lebanon, as revealed by a Reuters investigation.
