# Three journalists killed in Israeli attack on southern Lebanon compound
On Oct. 25, 2024, an Israeli air strike hit a compound in Hasbaiyya, southern Lebanon, killing at least three journalists who were sleeping in their accommodation. The attack landed in a part of the country that had been relatively calm and where no evacuation orders were in place, making the strike especially alarming to local reporters and media groups.
The victims were identified by the news organizations they worked for. Al Mayadeen said cameraman Ghassan Najjar and engineer Mohamed Reda were killed, while Al-Manar TV said its camera operator Wissam Qassim also died. Al Jazeera reported that the building housing several journalists was hit around 4 a.m., and that the strike appeared to be a direct hit on the bungalow where the men were sleeping.
Local footage showed collapsed buildings and cars marked "press" covered in dust and rubble. Lebanon's information minister, Ziad Makary, called the attack a war crime and said it amounted to an assassination carried out after monitoring and planning. Ghassan bin Jiddo, the director of Al Mayadeen, said the journalists' residence had been deliberately targeted and said injured journalists from other Arab channels were among those hurt. The report also said 18 journalists from seven media organizations had been present at the site.
Israel said the incident was under review and that it had received reports only hours after the strike that journalists had been hit. The Committee to Protect Journalists called for an independent probe, saying deliberate targeting of journalists would amount to a war crime under international law. That response captured the central problem in the case: the military had not offered a clear public explanation, while the press corps saw a direct threat to anyone documenting the war.
The attack came one day after an Israeli strike hit an office used by Al Mayadeen in Beirut's southern suburbs, killing one person and wounding five others. It also followed earlier months in which journalists had already been killed or wounded in Lebanon and Gaza. The result, according to the report, was a worsening environment for media workers trying to cover the conflict. In a war that has repeatedly struck civilian neighborhoods, the Hasbaiyya attack stood out because it appeared to hit the journalists themselves while they slept.
The strike's broader significance lies in how it affects the flow of information itself. When reporters and camera crews are hit in accommodation that was not under evacuation orders, it becomes harder for media outlets to keep covering the war from the south of Lebanon. That is why the response from press groups was so sharp. The attack was not only a loss of life; it was also a warning to everyone trying to document the conflict that being identified as press did not offer protection.
For news crews, the key point was that the compound had not been warned. That made the strike harder to justify and sharper in its effect on reporting, because journalists cannot cover a war if they are forced to assume sleeping quarters are targets. The incident therefore became both a human tragedy and a direct hit on the ability to document the conflict.
