Late on Tuesday, October 24th 2023 or in the early hours of Wednesday 25th, three civilians, including a young child, were reportedly killed and at least two others were injured after an alleged Israeli airstrike on the al-Faqawi family home. A fourth individual, a journalist who was also affiliated with Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ), was also killed.
The home was in the Tahlia and Ma’an areas, south-east of Khan Younis, in the southern Gaza Strip.
Local sources reporting the incident first appeared on social media on the night of Tuesday, October 24th. However, later reports from the Committee to Protect Journalists and Wafa news agency claim that the incident occurred on Wednesday, October 25th 2023.
Mohammed Yaheea reported in a post on Twitter/X that the victims were taken to Al Nasser Hospital following the incident. Accompanying the post was a video showing the hurried arrival of at least four victims to the hospital, three of them lying on stretchers and one man being carried in.
Facebook posts from members of the al-Faqawi family identified the victims as 74-year-old Arif Salem al-Faqawi (also known as Abu Muhammed) and his wife Sabah Subhi Mansour al-Faqawi, as well as their son, 28-year-old journalist Jamal Arif al-Fawaqi (a militant, also known as Abu Muhammed) and their granddaughter, Rafif Mahmoud Arif al-Faqawi.
Family member Naser al-Faqawi reported in a post on Facebook that Arif Salem al-Faqawi’s son Mahmoud Arif al-Faqawi was injured in the incident alongside his wife and a number of family members. Another family member, Arafat Ma al-Fawaqi, reported in a post on Facebook that the majority of those killed in the incident were women and children.
Ahmed Abu Aziz, posted a tribute to Jamal al-Faqawi, his “companion, friend, and fellow journalist” on Facebook, noting that Mr al-Faqawi had “fought cancer and defeated it”. Jamal al-Faqawi was a journalist, working for Mithaq Media.
When Airwars first published this incident on June 1, 2024, no open sources were found to suggest that Jamal al-Faqawi was a militant. As such, Jamal al-Faqawi was recorded as a civilian. This was in line with Airwars’ methodology which is employed across all conflicts we document, and informed by international standards regarding the ‘presumption of civilian status‘. Specifically, as outlined by the International Committee of the Red Cross, civilian status is assumed until evidence is identified to the contrary.
On June 9, 2026, a Telegram account affiliated with Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ), published a tribute to Jamal al-Faqawi, identifying him as a “martyred fighter”. As such, Airwars updated Jamal al-Faqawi’s status from civilian to militant, and changed the minimum number of civilians reportedly killed in this incident from four to three.
His death was reported by both local sources and international organisations including the International Federation of Journalists, and the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ).
Multiple sources mourned the al-Faqawi family on social media, with Dr Hasan Ali describing Arif al-Faqawi as his “uncle”, and asking “may God have mercy on him and make [his] resting place in Paradise”.
Yasser Abu Janaa shared a post on Facebook which included photographs of three members of the al-Faqawi family who were reported to have been killed in this incident.
One source, @Irqilover, posted a video on Twitter/X of the building after the alleged incident. The video, filmed at night, showed that two fires seem to have broken out amidst the rubble of a building.
The CPJ was the only source that specified that Jamal al-Faqawi died in an “airstrike”.
Where possible, Airwars has matched names with 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.