BEIRUT (AP) — A watchdog group advocating for press freedom said that the strikes that hit a group of journalists in southern Lebanon earlier this month…
A watchdog group advocating for press freedom said that the strikes that hit a group of journalists in southern Lebanon earlier this month, killing one, were targeted rather than accidental and that the journalists were clearly identified as press.
Reporters Without Borders, or RSF, published preliminary conclusions Sunday in an ongoing investigation, based on video evidence and witness testimonies, into two strikes that killed Reuters videographer Issam Abdallah and wounded six journalists from Reuters, AFP and Al Jazeera as they were covering clashes on the southern Lebanese border on Oct. 13.
The first strike killed Abdallah, and the second hit a vehicle belonging to an Al Jazeera team, injuring journalists standing next to it. Both came from the direction of the Israeli border, the report said, but it did not explicitly name Israel as being responsible.
“What we can prove with facts, with evidence for the moment, is that the location where the journalists were standing was explicitly targeted…and they were clearly identifiable as journalists,” the head of RSF’s Middle East desk, Jonathan Dagher, told The Associated Press Monday.
