Israel Kills Another Journalist. She has a name. Her Name is Amal Khalil. Photographer Zeinab Faraj was seriously Hurt
Israel has sought to silence those who document its actions—its abuses, its excesses, its killings. And the world has allowed it.
Israel targets and kills journalists with impunity.
The latest victim, Amal Khalil, who has been covering the region since 2006 for the Beirut daily newspaper Al Akhbar, was killed by an Israeli strike on a house in south Lebanon where she was sheltering. Her colleague Zeinab Faraj, a freelance photographer was seriously wounded.
Khalil, a well-respected journalist with decades of experience, had reportedly received threats during an earlier war—warnings to stop reporting and leave Lebanon if she wanted to keep her head on her shoulders. The calls, according to news reports, came from an Israeli number.
Israeli firing prevented ambulances from immediately reaching the journalists .They eventually got to the site but after evacuating Faraj, who was seriously wounded, Israeli attacks aimed directly at them and their ambulance forced them to leave. It was hours before they could return to collect Khalil’s body.
There is a deep cruelty here to the Israeli actions: blocking rescue workers, firing on them when they do arrive, forcing them to leave the wounded behind. Leaving Khalil where she lay for hours. It’s a horrific thought.
I know of what I speak. My friend and colleague, Anja Niedringhaus, and I were shot in Afghanistan while covering national elections. Anja died and I was seriously wounded. We share that horror with Amal and Zeinab. But we were helped immediately. No one prevented our rescue. No one fired on those trying to reach us. We were not denied care or left abandoned.
The cruelty of the deliberate denial of care and the targeting of those whoare trying to come to help, feels almost beyond imagining.
The Committee to Protect Journalists has warned the killing and obstruction of medical care could amount to a war crime. Reporters without Borders worked to get Israel to allow rescuers to reach the journalists.
“The repeated strikes on the same location, the targeting of an area where journalists were sheltering, and the obstruction of medical and humanitarian access constitute a grave breach of international humanitarian law,” said CPJ Regional Director Sara Qudah. “CPJ holds Israeli forces responsible for the endangerment of Amal Khalil’s life and the injuries Zeinab Faraj sustained after the targeted strike on their location.”
It’s horrific. But it is almost certain Israel will not be held accountable.
The grave breaches of humanitarian law cited by CPJ have become a constant, yet the international community remains largely silent—occasionally offering a muted rebuke, a token insistence that journalists should not be killed.
The CPJ says Israel has killed 257 journalists and media workers. most of them in Gaza but across the conflict zone which would also include Lebanon, since the horrific attacks of Oct. 7, 2023.
In 2025 two thirds of all journalists killed worldwide were killed by Israel.
There has been no accountability, no punishment and barely a raised voice of outrage from the world’s so-called democracies.
The relentless refusal of the world to punish and hold Israel accountable most certainly ensures more journalists will be targeted and lives lost.
Israel has sought to silence those who document its actions—its abuses, its excesses, its killings. And the world has allowed it.