Updated 11.20am with Maltese envoy's comments

A Maltese-American media man who reported the Palestinian-Israeli conflict for years is bracing himself for the toughest story of his life, as he seeks cover in the besieged Gaza Strip.

“I don’t know if I will stay alive or not, but please tell my story,” Qassem Ali told Times of Malta on Tuesday night. 

The 65-year-old’s call on a faint line from a school in Gaza where he is taking shelter took place just an hour after a hospital was blown up in Gaza, killing hundreds, 10 days after Hamas sparked a new bloody uprising. 

Ali said he had been trying to get through to a doctor friend of his who worked at the hospital after the blast, but the line went dead. It came at the tail end of a day when he was jolted out of his sleep by the sound of an Israeli F-16 bomber at 5am which destroyed a compound just half a kilometre away from the school premises. 

A Palestinian paramedic carries a child injured in an Israeli air strike at the Nasser hospital in Khan Yunis in Gaza. Photo: AFP

Ali, who is of Palestinian descent, is the only known Maltese passport holder who is stuck in Gaza, which is facing a siege from Israel in the wake of a Hamas terrorist attack which left 1,400 people dead.

Israel declared war shortly after the first attacks and unleashed a relentless bombing campaign on the Gaza Strip that flattened neighbourhoods and has killed at least 2,700 people, mainly civilians.

Family in Mqabba

A frequent visitor to Malta, Ali lived in Rabat and has family in Mqabba. Residing in Beit Hanoun in the north of Gaza, he is a war veteran, having worked with ABC, as an Associated Press cameraman, and founded the Palestinian TV company and news agency Ramattan.

“What’s happening here is unbelievable. I covered the first intifada and many of the successive clashes, but they were nothing close to this in terms of brutality. In the past, people would get injured or killed by bullets, now a single missile wipes out hundreds of innocent lives.”

Since the October 7 attack, Ali said he has already lost 70 members of his extended Palestinian family and countless friends and acquaintances.

We simply cannot close our eyes to what’s going on

“Most of the victims had nothing to do with Hamas. This is not a war against Hamas, this is a war against the people of Gaza who are paying the price. We simply cannot close our eyes to what’s going on.”

Ali is staying with 25,000 other people on school premises with fast-vanishing basic supplies and hardly any access to sanitary facilities.

“You count yourself lucky if you have a mattress. I sleep for one to two hours a day, sometimes there’s only space to sleep in the street. Some people do manage to wash, but I’m wary of taking a shower in case a bomb drops while I’m in there and photos of my naked body end up on the news!” he laughed. 

The school premises currently hosting Ali and 25,000 others. Photo: Facebook

Unaware if his house in the north is still standing, Ali appears to have come to terms with the possibility that he could fall victim to the relentless bombing of a brutal war. 

“Of course, I don’t want to die, I want to see my (half-Maltese) wife and children who are now in Canada."

Asked if he had a message to send, he replied: “Please write my story. I was a journalist as well. Tell the Maltese about the inhumane things that have been happening in Gaza for years. You are the messengers of the truth.”

Ali, who obtained his Maltese nationality in 2011 through marriage, last visited Malta a few years ago and was planning another visit shortly.

“My warm greetings to everyone in Malta. I really appreciate what the Maltese government is doing for me to try to help me out in Gaza. I am really proud to be Maltese and I love Malta. You have no idea how similar the Maltese are to the Gazans. Please remember that, even if it’s the last time I’m speaking to you,” he said, as the sound of sirens screeched in the background. 

Karl Schembri, a former Malta Today journalist who spent four years in Gaza and worked as English service editor for Ramattan, said Ali was the man who got him into Palestine as a journalist.

“In the 2009 war Ramattan… was the only live satellite camera feed from across the Gaza Strip showing the massacre so it is a tragic irony that Qassem in this war finds himself in this state and I hope that we can help him,” he said.

'The situation is tragic'

The situation in Gaza is tragic and the humanitarian situation is alarming, Malta's representative to the Palestinian authorities said.

"The destruction of properties, including a hospital, and the loss of thousands of lives is appalling. As to other Palestinian territories, in East Jerusalem the situation seems calm but tense, particularly during rocket alarms," Franklin Aquilina said.

The West Bank, on the other hand, has seen an increase in tension with clashes between Palestinians and Palestinian Authority security forces, as well as between Palestinians and the Israeli military.

Since the terror attack against Israel of October 7 and the start of hostilities, around 60 Palestinians have been killed during such clashes in the West Bank.

Aquilina said as soon as the Foreign Ministry received the information about Ali, action was taken immediately to inform the relevant authorities as well as the United Nations Office in Jerusalem.

This was done through the Representative Office of Malta in Ramallah and the embassies of Malta in Tel Aviv and Cairo.

"In the meantime, we established contact with the Maltese citizen involved and kept him abreast of the steps taken by the ministry. Frequent follow-up is being made with both the Maltese citizen as well as competent authorities, in view of changes that may happen when the border opens," Aquilina explained.