Every day, we feature one story of a person or family surviving in Gaza and one about someone killed there recently, based on media reports.
Follow us on Bluesky.
Mariam Dagga, 33, photo journalist, killed at a Gaza hospital along with 20 other people including four other journalists
Israeli troops fired on Nasser Hospital in Gaza August 15 and then fired again on journalists and rescue workers rushing to the scene. Among the dead were five journalists, including 33-year-old Mariam Dagga, a visual journalist who worked for The Associated Press.
The AP posted a selection of Mariam Dagga’s photos here, along with links to some of the stories that included her work.
The Reuters news agency said one of its reporters was killed in the initial strike as he operated a live television shot on an upper floor of the hospital.
According to the British newspaper The Guardian, it has become the norm for journalists working in Gaza to prepare their wills in case they are killed. In hers, Dagga left behind two sets of instructions: to her colleagues, do not cry at her funeral; to her 13-year-old son, Ghaith, make her proud.
More at The Associated Press and The Guardian
Rajab Hind, 6, appealed for help after relatives were killed around her
Hind spent her final hours trapped in a bullet-ridden car, surrounded by the bodies of six dead relatives, making desperate calls for help. For three hours, a Red Crescent operator stayed on the line, reciting the Quran and comforting her as an Israeli tank approached. “Come get me, quickly,” she pleaded.
The Red Crescent sent two paramedics in an ambulance to rescue her, after clearing the trip with the Israeli military, but the Red Crescent lost contact with the ambulance staff. Twelve days later, Hind and her family were found dead. So were the two paramedics sent to help them.
More information at Washington Post
Mohamed Kullab, 29, killed in an airstrike
Mohamed Kullab, 29, was in his tent in a camp for displaced persons when an Israeli airstrike killed him on Tuesday, July 22, between 5pm and 6pm.
His brother-in-law, Amar Ragaida said he had talked with Mohamed just a day earlier when they bumped into each other looking for aid. "He told me, 'don't go on your own, I will try and get you some flour',” said Amar. “The next day, he was dead.”
Amar found out several hours later when people called Mohamed’s sister to tell her.
Mohamed leaves behind a sister and a younger brother.
More information: BBC
Abdullah Abu Zerka, 4, died of starvation despite evacuation to Turkey
Abdullah Abu Zerka died in the Adana City Training and Research Hospital in Turkey despite 10 days of relentless effort by doctors to help him recover from severe malnutrition.
The staff are still working to save his six-month-old sister, Habiba, and they are cautiously optimistic that she will make it.
The evacuation to Turkiye came through a Turkish Foreign Ministry humanitarian programme, with Turkish officials working diplomatic channels to secure the family’s passage. But the process took weeks – time that Abdullah’s failing body couldn’t afford. “We arrived carrying children who were already ghosts of themselves,” said Hamed Abu Zerka, the children’s father.
Abdullah’s body was cremated in the Gulbahcesi neighbourhood cemetery in Adana
More at Al Jazeera
Ismail Abu Hatab, filmmaker and photojournalist
Ismail Abu Hatab, 34, was the founder of the Clight TV production company. Hatab worked with a range of media outlets and organized photo exhibitions highlighting life in Gaza.
On November 2, 2023, he was seriously injured in an Israeli airstrike that targeted his office on the 16th floor of Al-Ghifari Tower in Gaza City.
On June 30, he was killed in the Israeli airstrike on the beachfront Al-Baqa Cafe.
More at Channel 4 (British TV) and Committee to Protect Journalists
Abdullah Alhore, bodybuilding champion
An Israeli drone attack in Gaza’s Ashik Rudwan district on Saturday, August 2, killed three people and more according to Al Jazeera correspondent Hani Mahmoud. The dead included Abdullah Alhore, a fitness bodybuilder celebrity.
Mahmoud also reported a Red Crescent medical staff worker was killed in an Israeli attack on a Red Crescent facility associated with Nasser Hospital.
More at Al Jazeera
Malak Musleh, young woman boxer
Malak Musleh, 20, was a young boxer who was training to represent Palestine in international women’s boxing competitions.
On June 30, she went to the beachside Al-Baqa Cafe in Gaza to meet a good friend. They had had a falling out, and the friend arrived with a giant teddy bear as a peace offering. When an Israeli missile struck, the teddy bear survived. Malak and her friend were killed.
More at Channel 4 (British TV) and CGTN (Chinese government broadcaster)
Motasem al-Batta, his wife, and their baby daughter
An Israeli airstrike killed Motasem al-Batta, his wife, and their baby daughter on Saturday, August 16. They died in their tent in the crowded Muwasi area of Gaza.
“Two and a half months, what has she done?” neighbor Fathi Shubeir asked. “They are civilians in an area designated safe.”
More at PBS
Marah Abu Zuhri, 20, died in an Italian hospital after evacuation from Gaza
A young woman from Gaza who was evacuated to Italy for treatment while severely emaciated died in the University Hospital of Pisa on Friday, August 15, less than two days after arriving on a medical evacuation flight.
The hospital said the immediate cause of death was a heart attack. They said Zuhri had suffered severe loss of weight and muscle.
Meanwhile, as of Saturday, August 16, the Gaza health ministry reported another 11 people had died for lack of food bringing the total to 250.
More at BBC
Oday al-Quraan, a nurse, crushed by a falling aid packet
Oday al-Quraan was hoping to get some of the aid he knew would be air-dropped on Gaza on Monday, August 4. But one of the packets landed on him and killed him.
“Like all the young men, Oday waited in the scorching sun for four hours,” said his cousin, Moatasem al-Quraan, from central Gaza. “But when the planes arrived, he couldn’t get out of the way in time.”
“We thank all the countries that have helped and are trying to help, but the only solution is to open the crossing and distribute supplies,” said Moatasem as he attended the funeral of his cousin Oday.
“My cousin went to bring a meal to feed his family and children, but returned to them dead.”
More at The Independent
Mira Tanboura, 6, shot in the heart by an Israeli sniper
On November 18, 2023, Saeed Tanboura and his six-year-old daughter, Mira, fleeing northern Gaza, were permitted to pass through an Israeli checkpoint on a road the Israeli army had designated as an evacuation route. After they had walked a little over a kilometer farther down the road, Mira was shot in the heart and died, with the bullet coming from an area where Israeli soldiers were stationed.
No fighting was going on at the time.
Mira’s was one of more than 160 cases of children shot in the war that were investigated and confirmed by the BBC, which broadcast their findings in a 15-minute documentary on August 2, 2025.
In many cases, the BBC concluded that Israeli soldiers shot the children despite no indication of a battle or a threat to the soldiers.
More at BBC
Mohamed Abdallah al-Majdalawi and his two-year-old daughter, Layan, shot by an Israeli sniper
Mohamed Abdallah al-Majdalaw and his two-year-old daughter, Layan, were shot to death on Hamid Street in Gaza City in late December, 2023. A video showing them lying on the street, dying, was broadcast by the Qatari Al-Araby news service. The BBC spent many months trying to track down what happened and how it happened, and finally broadcast their findings on August 2, 2025.
Layan’s was among more than 160 cases of children shot in Gaza that the BBC reported on that day.
In many instances, as in this one, the evidence points to individual Israeli marksmen shooting the children with no indication that the killing was part of a battle or in response to a threat to the Israelis.
More at BBC
Nader, 23, killed trying to get food for his family
Before the current war in Gaza began, Nader worked as a guard at an orphanage in the east of Khan Younis. That’s according to his friend, Rafaat Ibrahim, who wrote about him in Al Jazeera.
Ibrahim says Nader did more than guard the shelter. He cared for the children, helped them in their daily lives, and gave them a sense of safety. After his work at the orphanage was destroyed, he took on the responsibility of supporting his family and his relatives’ children.
“I would see him returning from aid sites covered in dust from head to toe, utterly exhausted, yet greeting me with a faint smile even when he did not manage to get anything,” says Ibrahim.
On July 19, Nader and Ibrahim’s 16-year-old cousin Khaled went to an aid distribution site run by the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation. Nader never returned. Khaled came back wounded with shrapnel in his leg.
Israeli forces had opened fire and launched several shells at the people waiting for food. Most of those killed were in front. Nader was hit by three bullets, along with shrapnel from a shell.
Anas al-Sharif, 28, and four other Al Jazeera journalists
An Israeli air attack killed five journalists with the Al Jazeera news organization Sunday, August 10.
The five included Anas Al-Sharif, 28, a prominent on-air correspondent, reporter Mohammed Qreiqeh and cameramen Ibrahim Zaher, Mohammed Noufal and Moamen Aliwa.
The five were in their tent outside the Shifa medical complex in Gaza City.
The strike also killed two other people and damaged part of the hospital.
The Israeli military said Al-Sharif “posed as a journalist” but was actually the head of a terrorist cell.
Al-Sharif had apparently prepared for the possibility that he would be killed. After his death, a message to his X account saying, from him saying, “This is my last will and testament. If these words of mine reach you, know that Israel has succeeded in killing me and silencing my voice.” The message concluded, “
More at the British newspaper The Independent
Muhammad Zakaria Eid, 15, killed by a falling aid pallet
Al Jazeera posted a video showing 15-year-old Muhammad Zakaria Eid who had been crushed to death by a falling pallet during an airdrop of humanitarian aid in Gaza on Saturday, August 9.
The video shows aid pallets landing fast and hard on the ground. It shows people gathering around the boy’s body and then the boy’s brother carries him away.
“Despite the famine and the hard conditions that we live in, my brother went to get aid that was dropped into the sea by planes. A box fell on him directly and he was martyred,” Eid’s brother says.
More at Al Jazeera
Suleiman al-Obeid, soccer star, killed waiting for food aid
Suleiman al-Obeid, 41, a star soccer player with the Palestinian national team, was killed August 6 in an Israeli attack on aid seekers near an aid distribution center in southern Gaza, according to the Palestinian football association.
He leaves behind a wife and five children.
The European soccer teams association UEFA posted a photo and a tribute to him on X: “Farewell to Suleiman al-Obeid, the 'Palestinian Pelé'. A talent who gave hope to countless children, even in the darkest of times.”
Liverpool soccer player Mohamed Salah, who is from Egypt, posted, “Can you tell us how he died, where, and why?
More at Al Jazeera
Ahmed Alhasant, 41, diabetic, died of malnutrition
Ahmed Alhasant, 41, died on July 22. According to his brother, Yehia Alhasant, he "passed away peacefully" at his home in the city of Deir al-Balah in central Gaza.
Ahmed was particularly vulnerable to food deprivation than because he was diabetic.
“Day after day, he was getting more and more poorly," said his brother. He said Ahmed started to become unwell after Israel imposed a blockade of aid into Gaza in March. Since May, Israel has been allowing some aid into the territory, but aid groups say it is nowhere near enough.
For three months, Ahmed ate only bits of bread and occasionally canned food, Yehia said. His weight plummeted from nearly 180 pounds to less than 80, and his health rapidly deteriorated. "His speech was slurred and sometimes we could hardly understand him," Yehia said.
The family took him to a hospital, but according to Ahmed’s cousin Refaat Alhasant, the hospital staff told them, “He needs food, not medicines.”
More at BBC
Sela Mahmoud, 8, killed in Israeli shelling of a camp for displaced persons
Her last words to her mother were: "I want to eat a whole bowl of lentils until I'm full."
On Monday night, July 21, Alaa Shehada set off trying to get food for her family at the Zikim aid point in northern Gaza, a couple of kilometers from the camp for displaced persons where she was staying with her four children.
She brought her 13-year-old daughter with her and left her three other children behind.
About 1:45am, Alaa says she heard shelling in the distance and immediately feared the worst. “I felt the strike in my heart,” she said. “My intuition as a mother told me this strike reached my kids.”
When she managed to reach one of her daughters by phone, she learned that eight-year-old Sela Mahmoud had been killed. "My heart was broken," says Alaa.
Her other two children at the camp were seriously injured and are in al-Shifa Hospital.
More at BBC
Abdullah Jendeia, aged 19, went to get food and didn’t come back
Abdullah Omar Jendeia, 19, was killed on Sunday, July 20, when he went out to find food, according to his sister Nadreen.
"He was impatient to go and fetch some food that day," she said. "I told him, 'Just eat the few lentils we have left,' but he refused."
She said Abdullah left the house about 4pm to walk more than 3.1 miles north to an aid truck that comes weekly, hoping to come back with flour to feed the family. He was with two of his brothers and some in-laws.
At about 11 that night, one of the brothers, Mahmoud, called Nadreen to tell her that while they were waiting by the aid truck Israeli soldiers had suddenly opened fire on them.
More at BBC
Tariq Abu al-Shaer, 5, dreamed of becoming a pediatrician
Tariq Abu al-Shaer is one of the 18,500 children (under 18) on the list of children killed in Gaza published by the Washington Post.
The Post was able to get photos and descriptions of some of the children from family members. Tariq was one.
Unlike many children, Tariq would ask his mother to help him get ready quickly so he could hurry to school. He owned a bicycle and dreamed of becoming a pediatrician.
Last September, an airstrike killed Tariq, his brother Sannd who was just 70 days old, and his 8-year-old brother Abdul.
More information at Washington Post