Penny Wong Denounces Attacks on Journalists in Gaza

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Foreign Minister Penny Wong says she is “deeply concerned” about reports of the killing of five journalists in an Israeli airstrike in Gaza.

Five Al Jazeera staff, including well-known Arabic correspondent Anas al-Sharif, Mohammed Qreiqeh and three photojournalists, were killed when Israel bombed a journalists’ tent in Gaza City, near al-Shifa Hospital on Sunday.

“Journalists should be protected,” Wong told ABC Radio on Tuesday morning.

“We would say that journalists should be allowed there to do their work anywhere in the world and be protected in conflict,” she said.

“So, we’re deeply concerned about these reports, as we are about so many of the reports of death and destruction in Gaza.”

A hand holds up a poster of two killed journalists during a rally.

Protests have been held in the West Bank city of Ramallah following the killings of Anas al-Sharif (left) and Mohammed Qreiqeh (right) in an Israeli airstrike on Sunday. Source: AP / Nasser Nasser

Media rights groups and countries, including the United Kingdom, condemned the attack.

UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer said the UK government was “gravely concerned” about the repeated targeting of journalists in Gaza.

“Reporters covering conflicts are afforded protection under international humanitarian law, and journalists must be able to report independently, without fear, and Israel must ensure journalists can carry out their work safely,” his spokesperson told reporters on Monday.

Reporters Without Borders, a media freedom group, also strongly condemned the killing of al-Sharif.

Graph showing journalists killed in Hamas-Gaza war from October 2023 to August 2025

According to the International Federation of Journalists, at least 195 journalists and media workers have been killed in the Hamas-Gaza conflict since October 2023. Source: SBS News

Meanwhile, the United Nations Human Rights Office said the actions by Israel’s military represented a “grave breach of international humanitarian law”.

‘One of Gaza’s bravest journalists’

In a statement, Al Jazeera said al-Sharif was “one of Gaza’s bravest journalists” and called the attack a “desperate attempt to silence voices in anticipation of the occupation of Gaza”.

In a post on X, Israel’s military said it had struck an Al Jazeera correspondent in Gaza, calling him a “terrorist” who “posed as a journalist”.

“A short while ago, in Gaza City, the IDF struck the terrorist Anas Al-Sharif, who posed as a journalist for the Al Jazeera network. Anas Al-Sharif served as the head of a terrorist cell in the Hamas terrorist organisation and was responsible for advancing rocket attacks against Israeli civilians and IDF troops,” the Israeli military said.

Al Jazeera and al-Sharif have previously rejected these claims, with UN special rapporteur on freedom of expression Irene Khan calling the claim “a blatant assault on journalists”.

Opposition foreign affairs spokesperson Michaelia Cash said the killings “should be subject to independent scrutiny so the facts are clear”.

“They [Israel] should have, I assume, credible evidence they would now produce that one of the journalists killed was a Hamas operative,” she told ABC Radio on Tuesday morning.

“The death of any journalist in a conflict zone is serious.”

The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) said in a statement Israel had failed to provide evidence to back up its allegations against al-Sharif.

CPJ’s CEO Jodie Ginsberg told the BBC: “This is a pattern we’ve seen from Israel — not just in the current war, but in the decades preceding — in which typically a journalist will be killed by Israeli forces and then Israel will say after the fact that they are a terrorist, but provides very little evidence to back up those claims.”

Israel has not allowed international journalists into Gaza to report freely throughout the conflict, leading news outlets to rely on local reporters within the enclave for coverage.

CPJ says at least 186 journalists have been killed since the escalation of the Hamas-Israel conflict in October 2023 — the deadliest period for journalists since it started recording such data in 1992.

PM says ‘too many innocent lives lost’

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese told ABC News he couldn’t comment on the specific incident but that “too many innocent lives have been lost in Gaza”.

Graphic showing humanitarian workers killed in Hamas-Israel war

There have been 517 humanitarian workers killed in Gaza and 7 humanitarian workers killed in Israel since October 2023. Source: SBS News

“There have been too many journalists, people who are aid workers as well, providing assistance, including, of course, an Australian citizen, lost in the past couple of years.

“We see too many innocent lives being lost across the board.”