Israeli strikes on journos in Lebanon were likely deliberate: Right groups

Beirut, Dec 7: Two Israeli strikes that killed a Reuters videographer and wounded six other journalists in south Lebanon nearly two months ago were apparently deliberate and a direct attack on civilians, two international human rights groups said on Thursday. Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch said that the strikes should be investigated as a war crime. Their findings were released simultaneously with similar investigations by Reuters and Agence France-Presse. Israeli officials have said that they don’t deliberately target journalists. The investigations by the rights groups found that two strikes 37 seconds apart targeted the group of journalists near the village of Alma al-Shaab on October 13. The strikes killed Issam Abdallah and wounded Reuters journalists Thaer Al-Sudani and Maher Nazeh, Qatar’s Al-Jazeera television cameraman Elie Brakhya and reporter Carmen Joukhadar, and AFP’s photographer Christina Assi, and video journalist Dylan Collins. The seven journalists, all wearing flak jackets and helmets, were among many who deployed in southern Lebanon to cover the daily exchange of fire between members of Lebanon’s militant Hezbollah group and Israeli troops. The violence began a day after the October 7 attack by Hamas on southern Israel that triggered the latest Israel-Hamas war.
Amnesty International said that it had verified more than 100 videos and photographs, analysed weapons fragments from the site, and interviewed nine witnesses.It found that the group “was visibly identifiable as journalists and that the Israeli military knew or should have known that they were civilians yet attacked them”. London-based Amnesty said that it determined that the first strike, which killed Abdallah and severely wounded Assi, “was a 120mm tank round fired from the hills between al-Nawaqir and Jordeikh in Israel”, while the second strike appeared to be a different weapon, likely a small guided missile, causing a vehicle used by the Al Jazeera crew to go up in flames. (AP)