He knew he would be killed.
For months, Israeli officials had phoned him with threats: stop reporting, or die. Four days before the end, they offered him a way out, safe passage if he silenced himself. He refused.
On August 10th, 2025, an Israeli airstrike struck a tent for journalists outside Al-Shifa hospital in Gaza City, killing Anas Jamal Mahmoud al-Sharif, aged 28, along with four colleagues and two others, including his nephew. Minutes earlier, he had posted on social media about the night’s bombardment.
Born in the Jabalia refugee camp in 1996, al-Sharif had wanted to be a journalist since childhood. After studying mass communication at Al-Aqsa University, he volunteered at local outlets, eventually joining Al Jazeera Arabic. By the time of his death, he was among the most widely recognized voices in Gaza, followed by more than half a million people online. His work gave the outside world rare glimpses into a sealed-off war zone.
He documented hunger as families scavenged animal feed for bread, filmed hospitals overflowing with the injured, and recorded funerals of colleagues killed by Israeli fire. In 2023, an airstrike killed his father in Jabalia. He described it as cruel and painful, yet pressed on. His camera often captured him gaunt with exhaustion, but he spoke as if duty left no alternative.
“Do not forget Gaza,” he wrote in a message prepared for his death.
His reporting earned him global recognition. In 2024, he was part of Reuters’ Pulitzer Prize-winning team for photography. Amnesty International Australia named him a Human Rights Defender. To his supporters, he was a chronicler of suffering; to the Israeli military, a terrorist. It offered no convincing proof.
At his funeral, hundreds wept as his body lay wrapped in white. He leaves behind a wife, a four-year-old daughter, and a son not yet two.
In words he left to be read only if he was killed, he turned from his work to them:
“I entrust you to take care of my family. I entrust you with my beloved daughter, Sham, the light of my eyes, whom I never got the chance to watch grow up as I had dreamed. I entrust you with my dear son, Salah, whom I had wished to support and accompany through life until he grew strong enough to carry my burden and continue the mission.”
