The raid resulted in the deaths of five Al Jazeera journalists, including Al-Sharif and his colleague Mohammed Qreiqea, bringing the number of journalists killed by Israel since the beginning of the war to 237, according to data from media and human rights organizations.
Anas Al-Sharif, born on December 3, 1996, in Jabalia camp, north of the Gaza Strip, grew up in an environment saturated with conflict and lived through the repeated wars that the Strip witnessed.
He was educated at UNRWA schools and the Palestinian Ministry of Education schools, before enrolling at Al-Aqsa University in 2014 to study radio and television, graduating in 2018.
Al-Sharif began his media career as a volunteer at a local network, then joined Al Jazeera as a field correspondent. He distinguished himself in his coverage of the ongoing war on Gaza since October 2023. He was stationed in the northern Gaza Strip and central Gaza City, successfully documenting the Israeli massacres, the siege conditions, famine, and the health and humanitarian collapse in the affected areas.
With electricity and communications out, Al-Sharif used the rooftops of homes and hospitals to find internet signals to send out his reports. His coverage featured shocking scenes of starving children, families searching for food amid the rubble, and school shelters transformed into collective housing for the displaced.
Anas documented direct attacks on UNRWA schools and hospitals, and in his reports, documented the deliberate use of shelling on densely populated civilian areas. Last year, he received the Human Rights Defender Award from Amnesty International Australia in recognition of his courage and determination to report the truth.
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Al-Sharif was subjected to a continuous campaign of incitement and threats by the Israeli occupation forces, who accused him of belonging to armed factions in an attempt to justify targeting him, accusations he repeatedly denied. In December 2023, an Israeli airstrike targeted his family's home in Jabalia, killing his father.
In response to the occupation's accusations, Al-Sharif tweeted: "I, Anas Al-Sharif, am a journalist with no political affiliations. My mission is to convey the truth from the ground as it is."
For her part, the UN Special Rapporteur on freedom of opinion and expression, Irene Khan, described the Israeli accusations against journalists as "baseless and dangerous," and called for the protection of journalists and an end to their targeting.
In late July, Al Jazeera issued a statement condemning the Israeli occupation army's incitement against its journalistic crews, particularly correspondent Anas Al-Sharif, stressing that this campaign poses a direct threat to the safety of journalists.
According to observers, the targeting of Anas al-Sharif is part of an Israeli plan to eliminate journalists ahead of the full occupation of Gaza City. This confirms, according to international organizations, that targeting the press has become a systematic policy within the ongoing war of extermination in the Gaza Strip.
