‘I refuse cheap death’: Israel kills Palestinian journalist in Gaza | Israel-Palestine conflict news
A Palestinian writer, poet and journalist has been killed in an Israeli airstrike in the Jabaliya refugee camp in northern Gaza, according to his family, bringing the total number of journalists killed in the Israel-Palestine conflict since October 7, 2023 to 220.
Mohammed Hijazi was one of about 90 Palestinians killed in Israeli bombardment in the besieged territory over the past 24 hours, according to a statement from the Gaza Health Ministry on Sunday.
Hundreds of people have been killed in the Jabaliya camp since Israel imposed a military siege of northern Gaza on October 5 and intensified bombardment, forcing thousands to flee. Israel has also blocked aid groups from supplying basic food items to the area.
“I don’t know whether I will write to you again. Whatever I have written, I keep and am writing the same. Perhaps this will come to light one day. I refuse cheap death. I curse the murderer,” Hijazi wrote on Facebook in August last year.
“Let us, at this low point where we have finally reached, arm ourselves with patience and prayer, and count those days as a historic achievement, with broken hearts, bleary eyes and high heads. There are those coming, waiting for him, and a spirit that fights to the end of the road.”
It was not immediately clear whether Hijazi was working for any specific media organization at the time of his death.
Since the start of the war on Gaza on October 7, 2023, Israel has killed at least 220 journalists and media workers, including Hijazi.
Meanwhile, Gaza’s health ministry said on Sunday that at least 88 Palestinians were killed and 208 others were wounded in the past 24 hours.
The latest deaths bring the number of Palestinians killed in Israeli strikes in Gaza since October 2023 to at least 45,805, while an estimated 109,064 were injured.
Three Palestinians who were living in a tent in Deir al-Balah were among those killed in the latest Israeli strikes in Gaza on Sunday, according to Al Jazeera’s Hani Mahmoud from central Gaza.
Mahmoud said a family of 15 people was also buried under debris northwest of Gaza City after a separate attack.
“The Palestinian Civil Defense is trying its best to pull out the bodies from the debris, but only four family members have been rescued,” he said.
“It is estimated that there are at least 15 family members under the three-storey building that has been leveled to the ground.
“These repeated attacks – deliberate against families – continue unabated, causing more tragedies among Palestinians.”
“I refuse to die cheaply…I curse the murderer.”
This morning, the author of these words, author and journalist Mohammed Hijazi, was killed by Israeli forces in Beit Lahiya, northern Gaza. #GazanMassacre pic.twitter.com/LWsCak8IPr
– Rami Abdu رامي عبده (@RamAbdu) 5 January 2025
Mahmoud said Israeli forces had killed more than 200 people in Gaza in the past three days.
He said the few remaining hospitals across Gaza were now overwhelmed.
Mahmoud said that in the emergency department of Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital in Deir al-Balah, many people were left on the floor and others were waiting to be admitted to the operating theatre.
“By the time their turn comes, it’s too late – they’ve bled to death. (Many) injuries are quite serious, and there is no pain medication available at the hospital,” he said.
“There is a silent death going on. “People are dying silently due to lack of medical supplies due to the continuous attacks over the past weeks.”
On Sunday, the Israeli military claimed it had struck more than 100 “terrorist targets” in the Gaza Strip over the past two days. The army said many of the strikes targeted areas from where Palestinian fighters had been shelling Israel in recent days.
The latest violence in Gaza comes as Qatar resumes indirect talks for a prisoner release deal.
Mediators Qatar, Egypt and the United States have been engaged for months in efforts to reach an agreement to end the war and secure the release of dozens of detainees still held in Gaza.
Israel has detained more than 10,000 Palestinians since it began its devastating war, drawing global condemnation. Rights groups have labeled the Israeli military attack genocide, while the UN’s top court, the International Court of Justice (ICJ), said in March 2024 that the Israeli operation “probably” amounts to genocide.
The International Criminal Court (ICC) has separately issued arrest warrants against Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his former Defense Minister Yoav Galant.
