The International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) Tuesday issued a renewed demand for the safety and freedom of journalists in Gaza to be upheld following the killing of a Palestinian journalist and his daughter.
Baha Edeen Gharib, 55, who worked as Israeli affairs editor for Palestinian TV, and his 16-year-old daughter Ola were killed by an Israeli rocket attack this morning in Rafah, south Gaza Strip, while they were travelling home, according to an IFJ statement. In another media attack, at dawn this morning Israeli war jets are reported to have bombed the offices of the Al-Aqsa TV station, in the Alnaser neighbourhood of Gaza, and the Al-Aqsa radio station, in the El-Sheikh Radwan neighbourhood in northern Gaza. No-one was injured in the attack but the radio station's transmission was stopped for a while. "We pay our deepest condolences to the family and colleagues of the journalist Baha Edeen Gharib and his daughter Ola who were brutally murdered in the latest Israeli bombardment of Gaza," said IFJ President Jim Boumelha. "We repeat our demand that the Israeli forces who continue to defy humanitarian and international law by attacking journalists and their families on a daily basis answer for their crimes," he said.
"The latest violations add to the ever increasing toll of atrocities being carried out by Israel against media workers and journalists in Gaza, with five media workers now having lost their lives since the conflict began," noted the statement. The attack on the Al-Aqsa offices means that four media outlets have now been targeted, while there have been numerous incidents where journalists have suffered injuries due to shrapnel. The Brussels-based IFJ represents more than 600, 000 journalists in 134 countries.