Update: Israel kills 5 more journalists in double tap drone strike on Nasser hospital

The number of people Israel killed in its double tap drone strike on the Nasser Medical Complex on Monday has risen to 25 including five journalists, according to the Gaza Government Media Office.

The assault took place on  Monday morning, when two consecutive Israeli drone strikes targeted the hospital in western Khan Younis, southern Gaza, according to eyewitnesses and a health official who spoke to Mada Masr.

The health facility, south Gaza’s largest, has been targeted repeatedly throughout the nearly two years of Israel’s genocidal war on the strip, including in the May airstrike that killed journalist Hassan Eslaih.

The journalists killed in Monday’s attack were Reuters photojournalist Hossam al-Masry, who was targeted in the first strike, Al Jazeera photojournalist Mohamed Salama who contributed photography to Mada Masr earlier this year, Moaz Abu Taha and Associated Press journalist Mariam Abu Dagga, according to Gaza’s Government Media Office. Al-Quds journalist Ahmed Abu Aziz later died of injuries he sustained in the attack, the media office said on Monday afternoon.

The first strike on the hopsital came early on Monday morning, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry General Director Mounir al-Bursh, who told Mada Masr that an Israeli suicide drone targeted the fourth floor of a building within the medical facility without prior warning. A reporter identified the targeted site as an external staircase to the Yassin building. 

As first respondents and journalists gathered to try to rescue those killed and injured and to document the aftermath of the initial strike, the site was hit a second time by a missile fired from a surveillance drone, eyewitness Raafat al-Attar said.

The second blast was massive, scattering shrapnel and body parts throughout the complex, Attar said. Some fragments fell on people outside the hospital.

A second eyewitness who rushed into the medical complex after the first airstrike said it took place at around 10 am, with the second following around 20 minutes later, as medical teams worked to retrieve those killed and injured in the first strike. The eyewitness described the scene as “horrific.”

Several operating rooms within the facility were forced out of service, Bursh said, telling Mada Masr that the blast caused extensive destruction to the hospital.

Mohamed Saqr, head of nursing at the complex, told Mada Masr that the strike caused extensive damage to several departments, forced the suspension of many operations and injured multiple patients. The strike would further cripple the facility already operating beyond capacity, he said.

Alongside the journalists killed in the attack was a civil defense agency firetruck driver, while seven civil defense members were injured as they were rescuing the injured and recovering bodies following the initial strike, the Civil Defense Agency said. The attack raised the death toll among civil defense members to 136 since the start of the war.

Israeli assaults have deliberately targeted at least six other journalists in Gaza in August alone. Palestine TV’s Khaled al-Madhoun was shot down on Saturday. Earlier this month, Israel targeted a press tent at the Shifa Medical Complex, killing Al Jazeera correspondents Anas al-Sharif and Mohamed Qraiqea and photojournalists Ibrahim Taher, Mohamed Noufal and Mosaab al-Sharif.

According to the Gaza Government Media Office, the attack brings the total number of journalists killed since the start of the Israeli war on Gaza to 244.

Editorial note: This piece was updated after publication to include additional information provided by a second eyewitness, the head of nursing at the Nasser Medical Complex and the Gaza Health Ministry.