Amal Khalil: The fearless journalist, killed by Israel, who embodied southern Lebanon

Amal Khalil: The fearless journalist, killed by Israel, who embodied southern Lebanon Submitted by Rayhan Uddin on Thu, 04/23/2026 - 14:13 The veteran correspondent, remembered as generous and brave, documented Israeli occupation and crimes for decades Amal Khalil, the veteran correspondent for the daily newspaper Al-Akhbar, in the southern Lebanese village of Jebbayn on 29 March 2024 (AFP) Off Amal Khalil, the seasoned journalist, was born during a years-long Israeli occupation of southern Lebanon. She was killed there four decades later by invading Israeli forces.  “Amal was present in every home. Every home in Lebanon has lost her,” Ali Khalil, her brother, said tearfully a day after she was targeted and killed by Israel. “Amal resembles the south in all its details – its sweet breeze, its valleys, its mountains, and its old houses. She resembles all of that.” Khalil is remembered fondly by her colleagues as generous, fearless and pioneering. “I want to express gratitude for everything she did for us young journalists,” Hussein Chaabane, a Lebanese investigative and legal journalist, told Middle East Eye.  “She was so generous even if we were competitors. She never hesitated in sharing a contact, a key – and she had all the keys in the south.  “She knew it like the palm of her hand and she shared this love and dedication with everyone who needed it.” Khalil, 42, was killed on Wednesday as she went to cover an earlier Israeli attack in the town of al-Tayri. 'She knew [the south] like the palm of her hand and she shared this love and dedication with everyone who needed it' – Hussein Chaabane, journalist An initial strike hit a vehicle in front of Khalil and freelance photographer Zeinab Faraj, prompting the pair to take shelter in a nearby house.  A second strike then hit the house, according to the health ministry. Rescuers retrieved Faraj, who sustained a head wound, but were fired on before they could reach Khalil.  Hours later, they found Khalil dead under the rubble. Lebanese Prime Minister Nawaf Salam described the killing as a war crime and said Lebanon would spare no efforts in pursuing the culprits internationally.  “The killing of Amal was the killing of a woman of resistance,” Lebanese filmmaker Bachir Abou Zeid told MEE.  “Israel killed her because she was a journalist of resistance, not simply because she was a journalist.”  Writer shaped by occupation Khalil was born in 1984 in al-Baisariyah, in the Saida district of southern Lebanon.  She grew up during the civil war and Israel’s occupation of large parts of southern Lebanon, and recounted seeing occupied villages in the distance when she was a child. Her own town was retaken from Israeli forces shortly before her birth.  Khalil grew up reading As-Safir, a now defunct popular Lebanese newspaper, through which she says she learnt about everyday people’s struggles, about prisoners and the forcibly disappeared, and about the civil war.  A history of Israel’s invasions of Lebanon Read More » She studied Arabic literature in the city of Saida, and – without the knowledge of her parents – travelled to Beirut, where she became involved in communist activism.  It was then that her writing career began to take off, and she wrote several pieces for al-Hasnaa magazine.  “One story I particularly remember was for the Valentine’s Day special issue, about how queer people celebrated love in a conservative society,” she recalled in an interview in January with The Public Source, a Beirut-based outlet.  Khalil joined the nascent Al-Akhbar newspaper in April 2006, a few months before the first issue went to print. She would go on to work there for 20 years. Weeks after she joined, Israel launched a 33-day war on Lebanon – a moment which Khalil described as a turning point in her career.  She had initially joined the paper to write about women’s and cultural issues. But amid the backdrop of war, she collected the stories of those displaced and bombarded by Israel.  It was a theme that would continue throughout her professional life. 'The pressure to break me was relentless, but I didn’t yield' – Amal Khalil Khalil was largely based in the city of Sour, also known as Tyre, where she pursued public interest stories.  “Going after corruption cases and social issues in the area, sparing no one – not even my family – led to confrontations,” she recounted. “I was threatened, assaulted, and intimidated. The pressure to break me was relentless, but I didn’t yield.” Although al-Akhbar has provided favourable coverage of Hezbollah and resistance against Israel, she said she did not write with limitations.  She recalled al-Akhbar defying a request by Hassan Nasrallah, then Hezbollah's leader, to not publish a WikiLeaks documents about Nabih Berri, the parliament’s speaker, back in 2011.  Over time, she became al-Akhbar’s go-to field reporter for the whole of the south, covering Sour, Bint Jbeil and Nabatieh, among other areas.  Face to face with Israeli troops Khalil knew all too well that Israeli forces have a habit of targeting Lebanese journalists.  In 2010, she wrote an obituary for her slain colleague Assaf Abu Rahhal, who was killed by Israeli shelling.  She recalled a Lebanese soldier handing her Abu Rahhal’s blood-stained ID card. “It was all that remained of Assaf. I will never forget that day,” she said.  Khalil was unwavering in her support for leftism and resistance against occupation. In more recent years she began to produce more video content, learning to edit the films herself, even though she was insistent that she did not want to appear in them.  'I’m here to tell the stories of the people, not to become the story myself' – Amal Khalil “For me, it was simple: I’m here to tell the stories of the people, not to become the story myself,” she said.  During Israel’s 2023-2024 war on Lebanon, which broke out when Hezbollah attacked Israel in solidarity with Palestinians being slaughtered in Gaza, she documented evidence of Israeli targeting of civilians and civilian infrastructure.  “From the very first day of the genocide, Amal confronted Israel through her coverage,” said Abou Zeid.  “Her documentation, her movement from one area to another, and her amplification of the story of the people in the land and the south.” After a ceasefire was announced in February last year, she reported on Israel's near-daily violations of the truce.  Khalil was confronted by Israeli forces on a number of occasions during her career. The closest shave, she said, was in November 2024, when Israeli forces fired volleys to drive her and colleagues back from a bulldozer.  'Never accepted Israeli limitations' Colleagues and friends remember that Amal refused to bow to Israeli orders or limitations on her movements.  “Not for a single moment did Amal abide by Israeli instructions about where she could go,” said Abou Zeid.  “Amal was not a journalist in the conventional sense of the profession. Her love for the land and for her people outweighed everything.” Khalil said herself following the 2024 war that people had advised her to restrict her movements, but that her faith and her revolutionary upbringing taught her to stand “in the face of oppression”.  'Her love for the land and for her people outweighed everything' – Bachir Abou Zeid, filmmaker “My alignment with the people of the south, my presence among them since the July 2006 war, has always been the right choice. They have always lived up to that faith placed in them,” she said.  “They will grow stronger, more steadfast, and more committed to this unwavering compass, toward truth, and toward Palestine.” Chaabane said her death was a test for those who remained.  “Amal never accepted what the Israelis tried to impose as limitations; she pushed their limits,” he said.  “Her death will leave a vacuum, a huge one, which we need to fill.” Israel's war on Lebanon MEE correspondent Beirut London News Post Date Override 0 Update Date Mon, 05/04/2020 - 21:19 Update Date Override 0