Brave and tireless, Al Jazeera journalist Ismail al-Ghoul was only 27 when he was killed by Israel in Gaza last week. He died with photojournalist Rami al-Rifi when a blast struck the car in which they were driving to cover reaction to the assassination of Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh near Haniyeh’s destroyed house in Shati refugee camp. A boy passing on a bicycle, Khalid al-Shawa, was killed too.
So far in the conflict Israel has killed 165 journalists in Gaza. At an emotional gathering honouring al-Ghoul in Gaza last week, journalists laid down their flak jackets. A friend of the two journalists said to the BBC: “They hadn’t been sleeping for days nor eating. They had even lost a lot of weight.”
During the past eight months al-Ghoul constantly risked his life to report on the massacres committed by the Israeli military. In his final weeks he spoke of the horror of having to help rescue children from under the rubble after having already lost his father and his brother during the conflict. He told a friend he was not afraid of death, but feared leaving his daughter alone in this terrifying world.
Israel responded to al Ghoul’s killing by stating that he was killed because he was a Hamas operative who participated in the October 7 attacks last year. But Al Jazeera called the accusations against its staff “baseless”.
Israel has repeatedly justified the killings of Palestinian men by claiming they were members of Hamas. The Israeli Defence Forces (IDF) have marked tens of thousands of men in Gaza as potential suspects for assassination. According to an investigation by +972 magazine, the military considers every male aged 16-50 as a terrorist and therefore legitimate targets.
For the purpose of humanitarian law journalists are considered civilians, which means the prohibition against killing civilians applies to journalists. The Geneva Conventions directly protects journalists in war zones as long as they do not take part in hostilities.
Whereas the UN has repeatedly condemned the killing of journalists in Gaza, there has been little or no accountability so far. There has for example been no accountability two years after Al Jazeera journalist Shireen Abu Akleh was shot during an Israeli raid on the occupied West Bank. The IDF has admitted that there is a high possibility that Abu Akleh was shot and killed by Israeli fire.
Al Jazeera journalists in particular have had to pay a heavy price by reporting on the conflict so far. In December, cameraman Samer Abu Daqqa was killed while covering a strike on a school in Khan Younis in Gaza. And Al Jazeera bureau chief in Gaza Wael al Dahdouh has lost his wife, daughter and two sons in Israeli air strikes. Journalists such as al-Ghoul and al Rifi were wearing press vests when they were killed, indicating that they were systematically targeted and killed deliberately.
Whereas there has been significant press coverage of al Ghoul’s death, little has been said about the young boy, Khalid al-Shawa, who was killed alongside al-Ghoul. Very little information is available about him so far.
All we know about Khalid al-Shawa is that he was the only child of his family. The boy’s mother put out a message on social media pleading for him to be remembered too: “My son is not an unidentified martyr,” she said. “We must say the names of our martyrs. They should not talk about us as numbers.”
The names and faces of Israeli hostages that are still kept in Gaza are displayed all over cities such as Tel Aviv and Jerusalem and even in subway stations in New York. Their faces are well known to the public. But no-one is likely to know or remember Khalid al-Shawa, the boy on the bicycle.
• Swart is a visiting professor at Wits Law School specialising in human rights, international relations and international law. She writes in her personal capacity.
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