An Israeli tank crew killed a Reuters journalist and wounded six reporters in Lebanon on October 13 by firing two shells in quick succession from Israel while the journalists were filming cross-border shelling, a Reuters investigation has found.
The two strikes killed Reuters visuals journalist Issam Abdallah, 37, and severely wounded Agence France-Presse (AFP) photographer Christina Assi, 28, just over a kilometre from the Israeli border near the Lebanese village of Alma al-Chaab.
Reuters spoke to more than 30 government and security officials, military experts, forensic investigators, lawyers, medics and witnesses to piece together a detailed account of the incident. The news agency reviewed hours of video footage from eight media outlets in the area at the time and hundreds of photos from before and after the attack, including high-resolution satellite images.
As part of its investigation, Reuters also gathered and obtained evidence from the scene including shrapnel on the ground and embedded in a Reuters car, three flak jackets, a camera, tripod and a large piece of metal.
The Netherlands Organisation for Applied Scientific Research (TNO), an independent research institute that tests and analyses munitions and weapons for clients such as the Dutch defence ministry, examined the material for Reuters at its laboratories in The Hague.
TNO’s key findings were that the large piece of metal was the tail fin of a 120 mm tank round fired by a smoothbore tank gun positioned 1.34 km away from the reporters, across the Lebanese border.
Reuters presented the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) with its findings that the tank rounds were fired from within Israel and posed additional detailed questions, including whether Israeli troops knew they were firing upon journalists.
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Lieutenant Colonel Richard Hecht, the IDF’s inter-national spokesman, said: “We don’t target journalists.” He did not provide further comment.
The group of seven reporters from AFP, Al Jazeera and Reuters were all wearing blue flak jackets and helmets, most with “PRESS” written on them in white letters. There were journalists from at least another seven media outlets in and around Alma al-Chaab that day.
“The evidence we now have, and have published today, shows that an Israeli tank crew killed our colleague Issam Abdallah,” Reuters Editor-in-Chief Alessandra Galloni said.—Agencies
