The pro-Palestinian Hind Rajab Foundation, which hunts down Israeli soldiers who fought in Gaza, has filed a petition with the International Criminal Court in The Hague seeking arrest warrants for IDF Chief of Staff Eyal Zamir, Air Force Commander Maj. Gen. Tomer Bar, Southern Command Chief Yaniv Assor, former Unit 8200 Commander Brig. Gen. Yossi Sariel, the current Unit 8200 commander, the commander of Palmachim Airbase, the commander of 161st Squadron, and IDF Arabic-language spokesperson Col. Avichay Adraee. The request follows the killing of Al Jazeera journalists in a strike near al-Shifa Hospital.
The Palestinian Center for Human Rights joined the complaint, alleging the strike on Anas al-Sharif — described by Israel as a Hamas cell leader — and his colleagues was part of a systematic policy of terror and silencing journalists in Gaza, constituting a war crime under the Rome Statute. They accused Zamir and other senior officers of genocide as part of “a broad campaign to destroy the Palestinian people and eliminate those documenting their suffering.”
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The petition claimed IDF’s Arabic spokesperson used social media to defame al-Sharif by labeling him a Hamas operative — an allegation they said was false — and mocked his emotional reports from Gaza. It alleged a similar “pattern of defamation justifying the killing of journalists” in the cases of Hamza Wael al-Dahdouh, Ismail al-Ghoul, and Hossam Shabat, all of whom were killed shortly afterward.
Petitioners demanded the ICC prosecutor issue arrest warrants for these officers and expand the existing warrant against Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to cover all journalists killed during the Gaza conflict — without acknowledging that some of these journalists were engaged in terror activity and, in some cases, hid hostages in their homes.
“Killing journalists is not an accident,” the complaint read. “It is a deliberate policy to silence independent voices. Local journalists are the last line of defense in the absence of foreign press in Gaza, and silencing them is a strategy to conceal war crimes.”
Dyab Abou Jahjah, a Belgian-Lebanese supporter of terrorism who heads the Hind Rajab Foundation and has documented ties to Hezbollah and other Lebanese groups, said: “The assassination was so blatant, arrogant, and full of contempt for human life, for truth, and for the rule of law, that it cannot be allowed to pass quietly. Journalists are the eyes of humanity in war.”
Anas al-Sharif, 29, from Jabaliya, was one of the few veteran journalists left in Gaza and the most senior Al Jazeera correspondent in the Strip. During the war, his home was targeted and his father killed. In October, IDF published Hamas personnel records showing that while al-Sharif was considered a journalist, he was in fact a Hamas operative and cell leader in the rocket unit of the East Jabaliya Battalion. He was killed in an airstrike on Sunday, with IDF confirming he was the intended target.
“He operated under the guise of an Al Jazeera journalist, served as a Hamas cell leader, and promoted rocket fire plans against Israeli civilians and IDF troops,” the military said. IDF added that it had previously released intelligence and documents found in Gaza confirming al-Sharif’s Hamas affiliation: “The documents once again confirm his terrorist activity, which Al Jazeera sought to deny.”