Al-Shami, a photographer for Rassd News Network, was shot in the chest by a sniper while trying to escape gunfire from security forces dispersing a sit-in demonstration in Nasr City in support of former President Mohamed Morsi, the network's director, Smahy Mustafa, told CPJ. The Rassd network had sharply criticized the ouster of Morsi.
The raid to disperse the Rabaa Al-Adawiya sit-in sparked a week of clashes that left nearly 1,000 dead and many more injured. At least two other journalists, Sky News' Mick Deane and Al-Akhbar's Ahmed Abdel Gawad, were also killed while covering the events that day.