The Palestinian National Council on Monday condemned what it called a “savage massacre” by Israeli forces at the Nasser Medical Complex in Khan Younis, where several journalists were killed while covering the ongoing war. Officials said the group had been reporting from inside the hospital compound when the strike occurred, describing it as a deliberate attempt to silence those documenting the conflict.
Rawhi Fattouh, president of the PNC, said the killings amounted to a war crime under international law. “This was not an accident of war,” he said in a statement. “It was a direct targeting of journalists performing their professional, ethical and humanitarian duty — to report the truth.”
According to Palestinian officials, more than 244 journalists have been killed since the fighting began last year — a toll they say is unprecedented in modern conflict. Rights groups have long warned that the Gaza war has become the deadliest for reporters in recent history, with local correspondents bearing the brunt of the violence.
Fattouh argued that the targeting of journalists is part of a wider strategy to obscure events on the ground. “The aim is clear: to commit genocide and ethnic cleansing without witnesses,” he said. “By silencing the protectors of truth, Israel seeks to cloak its crimes from the world.”
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International law explicitly protects journalists in war zones. Article 79 of Additional Protocol I to the Geneva Conventions grants reporters the same protections as civilians, barring direct attacks. Human rights advocates say the repeated strikes on journalists and media workers represent a grave breach of those obligations.
Fattouh appealed to the United Nations, the International Federation of Journalists, and other international bodies to intervene more forcefully. “The global community must not remain silent,” he said, urging immediate measures to safeguard reporters in Gaza and to hold Israel accountable for what he described as “repeated, systematic war crimes.”
The deaths at Nasser Medical Complex have further intensified calls from press freedom organizations for independent investigations into attacks on journalists, underscoring the perils faced by those documenting one of the world’s most intractable and deadly conflicts.