New York, August 13, 2014–Simone Camilli, a video journalist for The Associated Press, and Ali Shehda Abu Afash, a freelance translator, were killed in the northern town of Beit Lahiya today when an unexploded missile blew up, the AP reported. The explosion also injured AP photographer Hatem Moussa. Camilli, an Italian, is the first international journalist to be killed on duty in Gaza this year.
“Day in and day out, journalists pay a high price to bring us the news,” said Sherif Mansour, CPJ’s Middle East and North Africa program coordinator. “The deaths of Simone Camilli and Ali Shehda Abu Afash are a stark reminder that even when direct hostilities subside or cease, journalists in tense regions court danger by simply doing their jobs.”
At least five other journalists and media workers have been killed covering the conflict in Gaza since it began in July, according to CPJ research.