Geolocation
Airwars assessment
On October 11th, 2023, an airstrike in Yabna Refugee Camp, Rafah killed Muhammad Fayez Yousef Abu Mattar, a 28 year old photojournalist.
Multiple sources, including Iyad Abu Zubaida, reported that there were “no casualties” in the Abu Shamala family home in Yabna Camp. However, journalist Adel Zourob posted on Facebook that “without warning, [Israeli] aircraft bombed the house of Tayseer Abu Shamala in the Yabna camp, south of Rafah, which led to its complete destruction. Our colleague, Muhammad Fayez Yousef Abu Matar, 28 years old, was martyred inside his home”. According to a Facebook post from “Yabna children in Palestine and abroad”, the walls of Muhammad Abu Mattar’s apartment collapsed on him during the bombing, killing him.
Muhammad Fayez Yousef Abu Mattar was an independent journalist who frequently collaborated with international news agency photographers. He was covering the Israeli campaign in Gaza at the time of his death, as reported by Wafa News. Organisations dedicated to the protection of journalists condemned the killing of Mr. Mattar, including the Palestinian Journalists Syndicate. UNESCO Director-General, Audrey Azoulay, called for an independent investigation into his death.
Om Nael, an uncle of Muhammad Abu Mattar, posted a condolence message to him on Facebook and Nabel Al Aker offered condolences to Fayez Abu Matar “Abu Youssef” on the death of his son. A image posted by Alaa Hasan shows Muhammad’s body on a stretcher with rescue crews.
Airwars has identified Muhammad Mattar’s name among the Palestinian Ministry of Health list of nearly 7000 victims’ names and ID numbers released on October 26th.
Where sources identified a belligerent, all sources attributed the strike to Israeli forces.
Due to the scale and urgency of Airwars’ assessment process, all images have been automatically uploaded to each assessment with the graphic filter applied to protect users. We have also included all images identified from the sources, which may also include any imagery of combatants.
The local time of the incident is unknown.
The victims were named as:
Geolocation notes
Reports of the incident mention the area of Yabna camp (مخيم يابنا) to the south of Rafah (رفح). Due to limited satellite imagery and information available to Airwars, we were unable to find boundaries for the neighbourhood and to verify the location further. The generic coordinates for Yabna camp are: 31.284173, 34.249653.
Summary
Sources (46) [ collapse]
Media
from sources (13) [ collapse]
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Source: Yabna children in palestine and abroad -
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Source: Mukhtar al-balad -
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Source: Hosam abo taha -
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Source: Alaa Hasan -
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Source: Eyad Abu Matar -
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Source: Mohammed Ey Al Jamal -
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Source: @CPJMENA -
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Source: @channeldraw -
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Source: Wafa News -
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