The International Press Institute (IPI) today condemns the targeted killing in Gaza of two Palestinian journalists – Al Jazeera reporter Hossam Shabat and Palestine Today journalist Mohammad Mansour – in targeted strikes by the Israeli military on March 24.

The two journalists died on the same day in separate airstrikes in Gaza carried out by the Israeli Defence Forces (IDF), which later confirmed the attacks and accused one of the reporters, without providing evidence, of being a “terrorist” posing as a journalist while fighting for Hamas.

Shabat, a 23-year-old journalist who worked for Al Jazeera Mubasher channel, was killed during an airstrike on his vehicle in northern Gaza. Mansour, who worked for the pro-Islamic Jihad Palestine Today TV, was killed along with his wife and son in an airstrike on his home in southern Gaza the same day.

In the wake of the killings, the IDF issued a statement saying it had “eliminated the terrorist Hossam Shabat, a sniper terrorist from the Beit Hanoun Battalion of the Hamas terrorist organisation, who cynically posed as an Al Jazeera journalist.” It claimed it had documentation linking Mansour to the military wing of Hamas but did not provide any evidence.

The IDF did not directly mention Mansour but confirmed it had carried out airstrikes on Hamas and Islamic Jihad terrorists in Khan Younis, the area in which the journalist and his family were killed.

IPI and our global network strongly condemn the unsubstantiated accusations and targeted killings as a flagrant attack on press freedom and demand international condemnation of the IDF for its deliberate targeting of journalists, which is prohibited under international law and constitutes a war crime.

IPI has previously highlighted and condemned multiple cases involving the targeted killing of journalists by the Israeli military. We lament the further loss of journalistic life since the Israeli military resumed airstrikes on Gaza on March 18, ending a temporary ceasefire.

More than 170 journalists have been killed since the start of the Israel-Gaza War on October 7, 2023 – the largest number of journalists to be killed in this span of time in any modern war or conflict.

Last year, IPI and our partner IMS jointly presented the 2024 World Press Freedom Hero award to Palestinian journalists in Gaza. The award recognized the extraordinary courage and resilience they have demonstrated in being the world’s eyes and ears in Gaza.

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Hours after Al Jazeera’s journalist Shabat was killed, his colleagues posted a message on social media that had been written by the reporter to be published in case of his death.

“I documented the horrors in northern Gaza minute by minute, determined to show the world the truth they tried to bury. I slept on pavements, in schools, in tents – anywhere I could. Each day was a battle for survival,” he wrote. “I endured hunger for months, yet I never left my people’s side … I fulfilled my duty as a journalist. I risked everything to report the truth, and now, I am finally at rest – something I haven’t known in the past 18 months … for the last time, Hossam Shabat, from northern Gaza.”