Reuters has published an investigation into Israel killing one of their journalists in Lebanon and has called for those responsible to be held accountable.
The October 13 strike by the IDF killed journalist Issam Abdallah, 37, and wounded six other reporters, including Agence France-Presse (AFP) photographer Christina Assi, 28, who was severely injured.
"An Israeli tank crew killed a Reuters journalist and wounded six reporters in Lebanon on Oct. 13 by firing two shells in quick succession from Israel while the journalists were filming cross-border shelling, a Reuters investigation has found," the special report began.
Reuters reports that the strikes were just over a kilometer from the Israeli border near the Lebanese village of Alma al-Chaab.
The news agency posted a detailed timeline of the incident, minute by minute.
The Reuters team began transmitting a live feed video at 5:16 p.m.
At 6:01, the camera panned to focus on an Israeli outpost and tank that had started firing into Lebanon.
"Less than 90 seconds later, the first of two tank rounds fired from another hill hits the team, killing Abdallah. A second-round hits 37 seconds later, setting Al Jazeera’s car ablaze," the report explains.
Reuters said that they "spoke to more than 30 government and security officials, military experts, forensic investigators, lawyers, medics and witnesses to piece together a detailed account of the incident."
"The news agency reviewed hours of video footage from eight media outlets in the area at the time and hundreds of photos from before and after the attack, including high-resolution satellite images," the report explains. "As part of its investigation, Reuters also gathered and obtained evidence from the scene including shrapnel on the ground and embedded in a Reuters car, three flak jackets, a camera, tripod and a large piece of metal."
The evidence that Reuters collected from the scene was analyzed by the Netherlands Organisation for Applied Scientific Research (TNO) at The Hague.
TNO determined that "the large piece of metal was the tail fin of a 120 mm tank round fired by a smoothbore tank gun positioned 1.34 km away from the reporters, across the Lebanese border."
Reuters brought this evidence to the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) and asked if the troops knew that they were firing upon journalists.
Lieutenant Colonel Richard Hecht, the IDF’s international spokesman, told Reuters, "We don’t target journalists," but did not provide any additional comment.
"The evidence we now have, and have published today, shows that an Israeli tank crew killed our colleague Issam Abdallah," Reuters Editor-in-Chief Alessandra Galloni said. Reuters Editor-in-Chief Alessandra Galloni gives statement on Reuters investigation of the killing of video journalist Issam Abdallah pic.twitter.com/MOnubAPzkr
— Reuters Press Team (@ReutersPR) December 7, 2023
"We condemn Issam’s killing. We call on Israel to explain how this could have happened and to hold to account those responsible for his death and the wounding of Christina Assi of the AFP, our colleagues Thaier Al-Sudani and Maher Nazeh, and the three other journalists," she said. "Issam was a brilliant and passionate journalist, who was much loved at Reuters."
The AFP said that Reuters findings line up with what they determined in the course of their own investigation.
"It is absolutely essential that Israel provides a clear explanation for what happened. The targeting of a group of journalists who were clearly identified as media is both inexplicable and unacceptable," said AFP Global News Director Phil Chetwynd in a statement to Reuters.
Al Jazeera's manager of international communications, Ihtisham Hibatullah, added, "The Reuters investigation into the October 13 attack underscores Israel's alarming pattern of deliberately targeting journalists in an attempt to silence the messenger."
Journalists are considered civilians and cannot be military targets under international humanitarian law.
Reuters' report included a comment from international criminal law expert Carolyn Edgerton, who said that what had happened may have been a war crime. She said two back-to-back rounds fired at a group of clearly identified journalists "is a clear violation of international humanitarian law and may also amount to the war crime of attacking civilians."
The report added that "directly targeting civilians or civilian objects is strictly forbidden under the laws of armed conflict, such as the 1949 Geneva Conventions, which have been ratified by all U.N. member states. Neither Israel nor Lebanon are signatories to the International Criminal Court, whose 124 member states accept its jurisdiction in the prosecution of war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide."
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"The war in Gaza has been more deadly for journalists than any single conflict since the IFJ began recording journalists killed in the line of duty in 1990," the organization said in a statement, adding that deaths have come at "a scale and pace of loss of media professionals' lives without precedent."
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