Action needed after the killing of five journalists in Gaza - Daphne Foundation
EU member states urged to suspend the EU-Israeli trade agreement
Updated 10.24pm
The Daphne Foundation has called for action after five Al Jazeera journalists were killed in an Israeli targeted strike late in Gaza on Sunday.
The victims were well-known reporters Anas al-Sharif and Mohammed Qreiqeh, and camera operators Ibrahim Zaher, Mohammed Noufal, and Moamen Aliwa.
Israel’s military claimed responsibility, alleging that Al-Sharif headed a Hamas militant cell and “was responsible for advancing rocket attacks against Israeli civilians and IDF (Israeli) troops.”
The foundation said the five are the latest victims in a horrifying roll call of journalists and media workers killed in Gaza, the West Bank, Israel, and Lebanon. Since 7 October 2023, the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) has documented the killing of 186 journalists and media workers - 178 of them are Palestinians killed by Israel.
CPJ has determined that 20 of the victims were directly targeted and killed by Israeli forces and classified their deaths as murders. The organisation is investigating at least another 20 deaths that show signs of possible targeting.
"States that supply weapons, including members of the Media Freedom Coalition, Germany, the United Kingdom and the United States, have a greater responsibility to ensure human rights are respected and that justice for war crimes is served," the foundation said.
"We repeat our calls to those states to take action to end the killings by stopping the flow of arms used to commit atrocities and to EU member states to suspend the EU-Israeli trade agreement. Trade cannot come before human lives or press freedom."
'Rogue state'
In a statement later on Tuesday, writers association PEN Malta called the killing of the five journalists a "horrifying confirmation of a long-standing, genocidal policy aimed at wiping out Palestinian life and culture".
"In the last 22 months and before, Israel has behaved like a rogue state with total impunity, wiping out all of Gaza's universities, killing over 230 journalists, destroying hospitals and targeting civilians on a daily basis."
The association said governments "can no longer speak of Gaza and Palestine unless they follow up with the most severe sanctioning of Israel as it commits genocide on live TV".
It called on Malta's government and others in the EU to "stop their bigotry and duplicity and hold Israel to account for the gravest crimes against humanity".