Murtaja, a co-owner and camera operator for the privately owned Record Media production company, was killed while on assignment in an Israeli airstrike at the Hafiz Mustafa school in Gaza City on August 20, 2024, along with 11 others, according to multiple media reports.
Murataja, 32, was filming a TV report about the displaced people taking shelter in the school in the al Rimal neighborhood, west of Gaza City, when the airstrike killed him, according to those sources and his brother and colleague at Record Media, Motasem Murtaja, who spoke to CPJ via messaging app from southern Gaza.
Motasem Murtaja told CPJ that “Hamza was wearing a helmet and a press vest” at the time, adding that Record Media is committed to safety requirements for their journalists and “we agreed to minimize the number of journalists on the ground reporting to minimize the human loss if the places we report from were hit.”
Motasem added that Record Media works with multiple outlets including Reuters, The British Channel 4, Anadolu Agency, Al Jazeera TV, Al Araby TV, and Al Mashhad TV.
Hamza and Motasem’s older brother, Yaser Murtaja, was a photojournalist who died in 2018 after he was shot by Israeli forces while covering a protest.
“Yaser was like a father to us, and Hamza was like a support and partner to me,” Motasem told CPJ. “There is no doubt that this is a difficult and great loss, but our hope is in God, and His compensation is greater.” Motasem added, “Hamza and Yaser are now martyrs, Bilal [their brother] and I are the only ones left. We are all journalists.”
Hamza Murtaja was the father of two children: Omar, 4, and Yaser, 6 months. Yaser was named after his uncle, the murdered journalist, and was born during the Israel-Gaza war, on the same day Yaser was killed. According to Motasem Murtaja, Hamza had not met his son Yaser.
Record Media was established in 2019 by Motasem and Hamza Murtaja after their brother’s shares in Ain Media were sold to Roshdi Sarraj, a photojournalist who was killed in an Israeli airstrike in October 2023.
“We established it with one camera, but we were able to cooperate with major media institutions,” Motasem told CPJ.
The IDF said in an August 28 letter to CPJ that "Murtaja was an operative in the military branch of Hamas and was struck while staying in a Hamas command and control center that was embedded and hidden by the Hamas terrorist organization inside the ‘Mustafa Khaft’ School compound in Gaza City." The letter did not provide details to support this claim.