Human Rights Watch (HRW) has stated that the Israeli airstrike earlier this year—which killed Lebanese journalist Amal Khalil and injured her cameraman, Zainab Faraj—was “deliberate” and therefore constituted a “war crime.” This report comes from Al Jazeera.
Khalil, a journalist for the Lebanese media outlet Al-Akhbar, was killed on April 22 in the southern town of At-Tiri while reporting on the Israeli offensive in southern Lebanon.
HRW stated that evidence—including information from the UN mission in Lebanon and the Red Cross—indicates that Israeli forces were aware journalists were present in the building that was struck.
The human rights organization further revealed that Khalil was likely still alive when Israeli forces blocked rescue teams from reaching the journalists’ location.
In a statement, HRW’s Ramzi Kaiss said the gathered evidence clearly demonstrates that the Israeli military knew—or should have known—that Faraj and Khalil were civilians, yet they attacked them and subsequently prevented paramedics from rescuing them for hours.
