Three journalists killed in Lebanon, who denounce an Israeli “war crime”

Three journalists killed in strike Israeli forces attacked Lebanon on Friday, with the government denouncing a “war crime” at a time when Israel is intensifying its bombings against Hezbollah while conducting a ground offensive in the south of the country.

The Israeli army is continuing in parallel its offensive in the Gaza Strip against the Palestinian Islamist movement Hamas, an ally of Hezbollah and also supported by Iran, where air strikes have left at least twenty dead, according to the Civil Defense.

In Lebanon, the pro-Iranian Al Mayadeen channel announced the death of a cameraman, Ghassan Najjar, and a broadcast engineer, Mohammad Reda, in a strike it described as “deliberate against a journalists' residence.”

The bombing occurred during the night in Hasbaya, a town in southern Lebanon located in a previously unaffected area, where the journalists had set up camp with other teams, according to local media.

Israel has not commented on the strike, which, according to the Lebanese Ministry of Health, also injured three people.

On Wednesday, the same channel reported that an Israeli strike had hit an office it had evacuated in Beirut.

Hezbollah's Al-Manar channel also announced the death in Hasbaya of its video journalist Wissam Qassem.

“The Israeli enemy waited for the journalists' night break to surprise them while they were sleeping (…) This is a war crime,” Information Minister Ziad Makari said on X, specifying that 18 journalists representing seven media outlets were present.

“The Israeli enemy targeted the journalists' residence in Hasbaya,” said a journalist from the local Al-Jadeed channel, filmed on site with his face covered in a layer of grayish dust, in front of his bed buried under the rubble of his bungalow.

Strikes also targeted the southern suburbs of Beirut, one of Hezbollah's strongholds, one of which destroyed two buildings and caused a fire, according to the Lebanese news agency Ani.

Meanwhile, fighting is raging in southern Lebanon, where the Israeli army has announced that it has lost ten soldiers in two days, or 32 since the start of its ground operation on September 30, according to a report compiled by AFP.

A building destroyed by an Israeli strike in the Maghazi refugee camp in the Gaza Strip, October 24, 2024 © AFP – Eyad BABA

The war in the Gaza Strip has spread over the past month to Lebanon, where Israel launched a campaign of massive airstrikes against Hezbollah on September 23.

Israel claims to want to neutralize the Shiite Islamist movement in the border regions of southern Lebanon and allow the return to northern Israel of 60,000 residents displaced by incessant rocket fire over the past year.

At least 1,580 people have been killed in Lebanon since September 23, according to an AFP count based on official data.

The UN has counted some 800,000 displaced people.

– Strikes on Gaza –

200% Deposit Bonus up to €3,000 180% First Deposit Bonus up to $20,000

In the Gaza Strip, an Israeli strike left 14 dead and another killed six people on Friday in Khan Younis, in the south of the territory, according to the Civil Defense.

The Israeli military said it had “eliminated several terrorists from the air and on the ground and dismantled numerous terrorist infrastructures.”

Since October 6, Israel has concentrated its offensive mainly in the north of the Palestinian territory, claiming that Hamas fighters are trying to regroup there.

The talks for a truce could resume after a call by the United States for Israel to seize the opportunity created by the death of Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar, killed by Israeli soldiers on October 16.

Previous indirect negotiations conducted under the aegis of Qatar, the United States and Egypt, for a ceasefire, have not accomplished.

The war in Gaza was triggered by the unprecedented attack by Hamas on Israel on October 7, 2023, which resulted in the deaths of 1,206 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP count based on official Israeli data, including hostages killed or killed in captivity.

Of the 251 people kidnapped at the time, 97 remain hostages in Gaza, 34 of whom have been declared dead by the army.

In retaliation, Israel vowed to annihilate Hamas, which has ruled Gaza since 2007, and launched an offensive that has killed at least 42,847 Palestinians, mostly civilians, according to data from the Hamas government's Health Ministry, considered reliable by the UN.

– “Race against time” –

Hamas said it was “ready for a cessation of hostilities” but demanded from Israel a “commitment to a ceasefire,” a “withdrawal from the Gaza Strip” and a “serious agreement for an exchange” between Israeli hostages and Palestinian prisoners held by Israel, according to a Hamas official.

These conditions have always been rejected by Israel.

After talks in Cairo between Egyptian officials and a Hamas delegation, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu will send his head of foreign intelligence, the Mossad, David Barnea, to Qatar, according to his office.

M. Barnea is scheduled to meet with CIA chief Bill Burns and the Qatari prime minister on Sunday to discuss “various options for resuming negotiations on the release of the hostages,” the source said.

Israelis holding portraits of hostages held in Gaza call on their government to act for their release, during a demonstration in front of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's residence in Jerusalem, October 24, 2024 © AFP – Ahmad GHARABLI

The Mossad number one has already spoken with Egyptian officials as part of efforts for a “return to negotiations and for a ceasefire,” according to Al Qahera News, a channel close to Egyptian intelligence.

The international community is still trying to contain a military escalation in the region, while Israel has threatened to retaliate for Iran's missile attack on its territory on October 1.

The head of European diplomacy, Josep Borrell, warned on Friday that a “race against time” was underway to find a way out of the war in Lebanon and avoid a “generalized conflagration”.

Returning from his eleventh tour of the Middle East, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken is due to meet Lebanese Prime Minister Najib Mikati on Friday in London.

All reproduction and representation rights reserved. © (2024) Agence France-Presse