A LEADING journalist has criticised Sky News's coverage of the killing of Lebanese reporter Amal Khalil.
Mehdi Hasan, who has previously held senior roles at MSNBC, Al Jazeera, the New Statesman, among others, criticised the wording of a Sky News report on her death.
Sky News had posted: "BREAKING: The body of a Lebanese journalist has been found under the rubble after an Israeli strike."
While working with photographer Zeinab Faraj, the pair had run into a nearby house after a vehicle in front of them was hit by an Israeli strike, which killed two people, whose identities have yet to be confirmed.
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The house was then also targeted by an Israeli strike, according to Lebanon’s health ministry.
Rescuers were able to retrieve Faraj, who reportedly had a head wound, according to Elsy Moufarrej, who runs the Union of Journalists in Lebanon.
But rescuers were unable to help Khalil when they returned, as the Israeli military allegedly fired a sound grenade to block their path, along with firing at the ambulance.
Khalil was later found dead by civil defence, who pulled her corpse from under the rubble of the destroyed building, after she had remained under the rubble for hours.
Her body was retrieved shortly before midnight, at least six hours after the strike.
Hasan responded on X/Twitter saying: "The people who write these tweets and the people who employ them don’t deserve to have jobs in journalism.
"Israel killed the Lebanese journalist Amal Khalil.
"Just say that."
The people who write these tweets and the people who employ them don’t deserve to have jobs in journalism.
Israel killed the Lebanese journalist Amal Khalil.
Just say that. https://t.co/UOLqHfEfs6— Mehdi Hasan (@mehdirhasan) April 23, 2026
The health ministry said Israel’s military “prevented the completion of the humanitarian mission by firing a sound grenade and live ammunition at the ambulance”.
Despite a ceasefire in place Israeli strikes killed five people on Wednesday, including Khalil.
In a statement before Khalil’s death was confirmed, Israel’s military said it had received reports that two journalists were injured as a result of its strikes.
However, it denied it was preventing rescue teams from reaching the area. Israel’s military claimed individuals in the village had violated the ceasefire, endangering its troops.
Lebanon’s prime minister Nawaf Salam, said that Israel’s targeting of journalists and rescuers amounted to “war crimes”.
Khalil, who was from southern Lebanon, had been covering the area since 2006 for al-Akhbar.
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Her latest reporting was about Israeli demolitions of Lebanese homes in villages where Israeli troops are now positioned inside Lebanon.
Her death brings the number of journalists killed in Lebanon so far this year to nine.
In late March, an Israeli air strike on southern Lebanon killed three journalists covering the war.
Hezbollah’s al-Manar TV said its longtime correspondent Ali Shoeib was killed.
Israel’s military said it had targeted Shoeib, accusing him of being a Hezbollah intelligence operative, without providing evidence.
Also killed in the same strike was reporter Fatima Ftouni, who worked for the Beirut-based Al-Mayadeen TV along with her brother Mohammed Ftouni, a video journalist.
Days earlier, an Israeli air strike on an apartment in central Beirut killed Mohammed Sherri, the head of political programmes at Hezbollah’s Al-Manar TV, along with his wife.
At least 2300 people have been killed in Israeli strikes and more than one million displaced since the latest Israel-Hezbollah war erupted on March 2.
The Committee to Protect Journalists expressed its “outrage” at the apparent targeting of the two journalists and warned the obstruction of rescue efforts “may amount to a war crime”.
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