JERUSALEM, Aug 11, 2025 (BSS/AFP) - Media advocacy group the Committee to 
Protect Journalists on Monday slammed an Israeli strike that killed several 
Al Jazeera staff in Gaza overnight, saying journalists should never be 
targeted in war.

"Journalists are civilians. They must never be targeted in war. And to do so 
is a war crime," Jodie Ginsberg, chief executive of the Committee to Protect 
Journalists (CPJ), told AFP.

The CPJ in July called for the protection of Anas al-Sharif, one of the 
journalists killed in the Israeli strike, after an Israeli military spokesman 
claimed he was a militant, accusing Israel of a "pattern" of labelling 
journalists militants "without providing credible evidence".

Numerous Al Jazeera staff in Gaza have faced similar accusations from the 
Israeli military during the war.

According to local journalists who knew him, Sharif had worked at the start 
of his career with a Hamas communication office, where his role was to 
publicise events organised by the militant group that has exercised total 
control over Gaza since 2006.

"International law is clear that active combatants are the only justified 
targets in a war setting," Ginsberg said.

"So unless the IDF can demonstrate that Anas al-Sharif was still an active 
combatant, then there is no justification for his killing," she said, using 
an acronym for the Israeli military.