Al Jazeera correspondent Ismail al-Ghoul (R) and camera operator Rami al-Rifi (file photo)

Doha, August 2 (RHC)-- An Israeli airstrike has killed two Al Jazeera journalists after blowing up a vehicle west of Gaza City, the Qatar-based news network says.  In a statement on Wednesday, the media office of the Doha-based broadcaster said Al Jazeera Arabic reporter Ismail al-Ghoul and his cameraman Rami al-Rifi were killed in the attack that “targeted a car near the Aidia area, west of Gaza City.”

Al Jazeera Media Network also called the killings a “targeted assassination” by Israeli forces and pledged to “pursue all legal actions to prosecute the perpetrators of these crimes.”  “We condemn the targeting and killing of Palestinian journalists, and hold Israel responsible for this heinous crime. We call on the international community and media groups to pressure Israel into stopping these continuing violations,” it added.

According to Gaza’s Government Media Office, the new fatalities brought the number of Palestinian journalists killed in Israeli attacks in the Gaza Strip to 165 since October 7, when Israel unleashed its war machine in the blockaded Palestinian enclave.

“This latest attack on Al Jazeera journalists is part of a systematic targeting campaign against the network’s journalists and their families since October 2023,” further said Al Jazeera in its statement.

Al Jazeera also said in a report that the pair lost their lives in the Shati refugee camp, where they wanted to report from near the Gaza house of Ismail Haniyeh, head of the political bureau of the Palestinian resistance movement Hamas, who was assassinated in an attack on his residence in the Iranian capital of Tehran in the early hours of Wednesday.

“Ismail was conveying the suffering of the displaced Palestinians and the suffering of the wounded and the massacres committed by the [Israeli] occupation against the innocent people in Gaza,” said Al Jazeera’s Anas al-Sharif, who was at the hospital where the bodies of his two colleagues were brought.

“The feeling – no words can describe what happened,” he added.

The two journalists were wearing media vests and there were identifying signs on their car when they came under an Israeli missile attack, Al Jazeera said, adding that pair had last contacted their news desk 15 minutes before the strike.

“During the call, they had reported a strike on a house near to where they were reporting and were told to leave immediately.  They did, and were traveling to Al-Ahli Arab Hospital when they were killed,” the report added.

The killings on Wednesday brought the total number of Al Jazeera journalists killed in Gaza since October to four, the Qatar-based broadcaster said.