Hamza Dahdouh, the eldest son of Al Jazeera's Gaza bureau chief Wael Dahdouh, was killed by an Israeli rocket attack in the western part of Khan Younis, Gaza.
Journalist Mustafa Thuraya also died in the attack when the vehicle in which they were traveling near al-Mawasi, a supposedly safe area to the southwest, was hit by the rocket. A third passenger, Hazem Rajab, was seriously injured.
According to reports from Al Jazeera correspondents, Hamza and Mustafa's vehicle was attacked as they attempted to question civilians displaced by previous bombings.
Hamza Dahdouh shared this picture of him with his brother Mahmoud with a sad farewell message in October last year [Courtesy Dahdouh family]Hamza, 27, was a journalist like his father. Mustafa was also in his twenties.
Speaking from the cemetery where his son was buried, Wael appeared dejected yet resigned, saying he was among the throngs of people in today's Gaza who say bitter goodbyes to their loved ones every day.
He vowed to continue his journey and show the world what is happening in Gaza, despite the pain of one loss after another.
“Hamza was everything to me, the eldest boy, he was the soul of my soul… these are the tears of farewell and loss, the tears of humanity,” he said.
The body of journalist Mustafa Thuraya is brought to the Kuwaiti hospital mortuary in Rafah, Gaza, after he and Hamza Dahdouh were killed by an Israeli missile that hit their car in Khan Younis on January 7, 2024 [Abed Zagout/Anadolu]Al Jazeera Media Network strongly condemned the attack, adding: “The killing of Mustafa and Hamza… while they were on their way to carry out their duty in the Gaza Strip reiterates the need to immediately take the necessary legal measures against the occupying forces.” make sure there is no impunity.”
Reacting to the news, Gaza's media office condemned the killing of the two journalists and condemned “in the strongest terms this heinous crime.”
Constant pain
Hamza was very attached to his family and was devastated when he heard on October 25 that an Israeli raid had hit the house where his family was taking refuge in the Nuseirat refugee camp.
Shortly afterwards he learned that his mother Amna, his brother Mahmoud (15), his sister Sham (7) and his nephew Adam (1) had been killed in the Israeli attack. His grief over her loss seemed to motivate him to work harder on covering the war in Gaza, his colleague said.
Wael Dahdouh (center) and his youngest son Yehia (12) mourn his wife, son, daughter and grandson, who were killed in an Israeli attack on the Nuseirat refugee camp on October 26, 2023 [Ali Mahmoud/AP Photo]As news of Hamza's murder spread, his wife of one year and his surviving siblings rushed to the cemetery to take one last look at him before he was buried.
Wael stood next to his son's head, comforting the rest of his family as they tried to make sense of the sudden loss.
His composure and strength have made Wael Dahdoud much more than just the head of Al Jazeera's Arab bureau in Gaza. He is the face of the channel's coverage of Israel's war on Gaza and a symbol of the resilience of Gaza's people.
When he lost his wife, son, daughter and grandson to the Israeli airstrike in late October, the world watched in horror as he ran to the hospital where the bodies of his four loved ones had been taken.
Wael Dahdouh mourns the body of one of his children, who was killed along with his wife and son in an Israeli attack at Al-Aqsa Hospital in Deir el-Balah in the southern Gaza Strip [Majdi Fathi/AFP]After saying an emotional goodbye to his children, grandchild and partner, he seemed more determined than ever to do his job.
Then, in mid-December, he was seriously injured in an attack that killed his colleague Samer Abudaqa, but soon after he was back on the road covering the news.
The Palestinian Journalists Syndicate has documented the killing of 102 journalists and the injury of 71 others by Israeli forces since hostilities began in October.
The list of Al Jazeera journalists and employees who have lost family members or died themselves is also growing.
In December, Anas al-Sharif lost his father in an Israeli airstrike that hit his family home in Jabalia.
A few days earlier, on December 6, Moamen Al Sharafi, a correspondent for Al Jazeera Arabic, killed 22 members of his family when an Israeli attack hit the house where they were taking refuge in the Jabalia refugee camp.
In late October, broadcast engineer Mohamed Abu Al-Qumsan lost 19 members of his family, including his father and two sisters, in Israeli airstrikes on the same refugee camp.
