ICSPR Sends Briefing Memorandum to the United Nations and International Bodies on the Targeting of Nasser Medical Complex and the Killing of Journalists

Date: 28 August 2025

Press Release

ICSPR Sends Briefing Memorandum to the United Nations and International Bodies on the Targeting of Nasser Medical Complex and the Killing of Journalists

The International Commission to Support Palestinian Rights (ICSPR) has sent an urgent briefing memorandum to: the UN Secretary-General, members of the Security Council and the General Assembly, the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, the Human Rights Council, the UN Fact-Finding Committee, the International Court of Justice, the Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court, the UN Special Rapporteurs on Palestine and on Freedom of Expression, the International Federation of Journalists, Reporters Without Borders, the World Health Organization, the International Committee of the Red Cross, and Médecins Sans Frontières. This follows the latest massacre committed by the Israeli occupation forces against Nasser Medical Complex in Khan Younis, south of the Gaza Strip, which resulted in the killing of six journalists, a civil defense paramedic, as well as a number of patients, displaced persons, and medical staff.

The memorandum stated that the Israeli occupation authorities have been waging a systematic genocidal war against the population of the Gaza Strip for more than 680 consecutive days, resulting in the killing of around 62,744 civilians, including thousands of women and children, and injuring more than 158,259 people, while over 10,000 remain missing under the rubble. Israel also continues to impose a suffocating blockade and uses starvation as a weapon of war, which has led to the death of 303 civilians, including 117 children, due to hunger and malnutrition.

The memorandum stressed that the occupation deliberately targets both the health and media sectors simultaneously, with nearly 36 hospitals destroyed and put out of service, 144 ambulances and 96 health centers targeted, in addition to the killing of more than 1,590 medical personnel and 122 civil defense members. On the media front, ICSPR has documented the killing of 246 journalists since the start of the aggression, along with hundreds injured, hundreds of family homes belonging to journalists destroyed, and entire journalist families exterminated.

Detailing the crime of targeting Nasser Medical Complex, the memorandum explained that the occupation forces directly bombed the fourth floor of the hospital while journalist Hossam Al-Masri, a Reuters cameraman, was present. The occupation then re-bombed the “Al-Yassin” building inside the complex during rescue attempts, killing about 22 civilians, including 6 journalists, 4 doctors, and a number of patients and displaced persons, while more than 15 others were seriously injured.

The Commission refuted the false claims of the Israeli occupation, stressing the lack of credibility and seriousness in any investigations conducted by Israel. It highlighted the grave danger posed by the ongoing international silence and inability to stop the genocidal crimes or to provide international protection for civilians, journalists, patients, and medical staff.

ICSPR emphasized that targeting journalists, medical teams, and patients in facilities protected under international law constitutes a war crime, a crime against humanity, and part of the crime of genocide, documented with sound and image.

The Commission called in its memorandum on the United Nations and the High Contracting Parties to the Geneva Conventions to take urgent and serious action to stop these crimes against civilians and journalists, to halt the genocidal war, to hold Israeli leaders accountable before competent international courts, and to impose sanctions on Israel to compel it to respect international law and end its occupation of Palestinian territories. The Commission also demanded the provision of international protection for Palestinians.

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The International Commission to Support Palestinian Rights (ICSPR)