The Israeli military claimed on Wednesday that two Palestinian journalists from Qatar’s Al Jazeera television network killed in a strike in the Gaza Strip were directly linked to “terrorist” organizations, Hamas and the Palestinian Islamic Jihad.

Hamza Dakhtouh and Mustafa Thuraya — the latter, a cameraman and journalist working with several international media outlets, including AFP — were killed on Sunday when the car they were traveling in was hit in the southern part of the Palestinian enclave, where they had gone to report. for the Qatar Television Network.

“Prior to the strike, the two were piloting drones that posed a direct threat to Israeli troops,” Chahal said in a statement.

When AFP asked what kind of drones they used and exactly what the nature of the “threat” was, the Israeli military replied that it would “look into” the matter.

Hamza Dakhtouh and Mustafa Thuraya “have been identified as members of terrorist organizations in Gaza,” he claimed.

Information from his intelligence service “confirmed that the two deceased were members of terrorist organizations based in Gaza and were actively involved in attacks against Israeli forces.”

The families of the two men and Al Jazeera have not yet responded.

According to eyewitnesses, the car they were riding in was hit by two rockets while it was moving on a road. A third journalist and the driver were injured.

Mustafa Thuraya, in his thirties, has been working with AFP since 2019 on the piece, as well as with other international media.

Hamza Dakhtouh was the son of Al Jazeera’s bureau chief in the Palestinian territories, Wael Dakhtouh, a prominent figure in the journalism world in the Gaza Strip, who was already mourning the deaths of his wife Umm, a son, a daughter and a grandson. in October to an Israeli bombardment. Also, two of his nephews were killed on Monday.

Israel’s military presented Mustafa Thuraya as “a member of the Hamas brigade in Gaza City, deputy battalion commander in the Battle of Qadisiya” and Hamza Dakhtouh as “a Palestinian Islamic Jihad terrorist who was actively involved in the organization’s terrorist activities.”

According to the same source, “documents” “found in the Gaza Strip” reveal “his role in an electronic engineering unit of the Palestinian Islamic Jihad” and that he was the “deputy commander” of a cell responsible for launching rockets, among others from “the battalion of Zaitoun”.

After the deaths of its two journalists, Al Jazeera “strongly condemned the targeting by Israeli occupation forces of the Palestinian journalists’ car” and accused Israel of “violating the principles of press freedom”.

US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken described the deaths of the two journalists as an “unthinkable tragedy”.

At least 79 journalists and media professionals, the vast majority of them Palestinians, have been killed since the Israel/Hamas war broke out on October 7, according to the NGO Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ).