According to Alkhateb's social media accounts, he was born in 1992 and started working for the RT Arabic on June 12, 2017. He had been working for two years on the Arabic site of the Sputnik agency, then switched to the Syrian state television channel Al-Ekhbariya, and then he took the job for RT.
The attack also took the life of a Syrian soldier and injured three other people, including a cameraman working with the reporter, the head of the RT Arabic broadcaster, Maya Manna, said.
"This morning, he was traveling with the soldiers of the Syrian army to the city of Sukhnah, where fierce battles for its liberation are now taking place. On the way, in the suburbs of [the city of] Homs, IS militants attacked the convoy. There is no official data on the number of casualties yet, but according to our information, in addition to Khaled, a Syrian army soldier was killed and three others were injured, including a cameraman who worked with Khaled," Manna said in a statement.
'GRIEF FOR ALL WHO KNEW HIM'
The death of a RT correspondent in Syria has become a grief for everyone who knew him, Sputnik and RT Editor-in-Chief Margarita Simonyan said.
"Stringer, with whom our Arabic television channel worked, was killed today in Syria. Grief for the family, for colleagues, for all who knew him," Simonyan said.
Alkhateb's death became the first one of such kind in RT's history, the chief editor noted.
"Courage to relatives, friends and colleagues of Khalid, to everyone who knew and loved him. We will do everything we can to help his family in this situation," she added.
The journalist's death was very hard news for all his colleagues, Maya Manna said.
"Khaled recently joined the RT team and, as a stringer, covered for us the clashes of the Syrian army with IS in the vicinity of Homs…. We express our condolences the family and friends of Khaled, we will support them in every possible way. Thanks to him for his courage," Manna said.
'WE ARE PROUD OF HIS WORK'
Dmitry Kiselev, the director general of the Rossiya Segodnya International Information Agency, expressed condolences on behalf of the agency over the death of a RT broadcaster's stringer in Syria.
"Our agency expresses its deepest condolences to relatives and colleagues of Khaled. We are proud of his work. The sooner this bloody conflict ends, the less people, including journalists, will die in Syria," Kiselev told Sputnik.
He also noted that the journalist died defending the truth.
"Politicians often do not want to know the truth, an example of such reluctance was the situation with the US bombing of the Ash Sha’irat base in April, [which happened] after claims that the Syrian army allegedly used chemical weapons in Khan Shaykhun. But these politicians did not want to send their people there to check these unfounded accusations, because they understood that their lies will be revealed," Kiselev said.
The deceased RT stringer was in the area of military operations, Kiselev pointed out.
"He also defended such journalism that does not sit on a chair, but shows the true state of things. And journalists like Khaled, when going to dangerous places, do it on their own will, realizing the importance of their work, the importance of letting people know the truth," the Rossiya Segodnya director general said.
'HIS DREAMS WERE WISER THAN HIS AGE'
Im-Khaled, mother of the deceased RT Arabic stringer, told Sputnik what her son was like in his age of 25. She noted that her son had always sought to obtain what other journalists could not get.
"The ones who know Khaled are aware of his passion for his work. He prepared reports quickly. He had big dreams and he loved his motherland and, despite his young age, was able to combine his work with studies," Im-Khaled, the mother of two sons, added.
She said that her son "loved life" and always helped the people in the area where he lived and the children of those killed in and around his native city of Salamiyah.
"I was very worried every time he was on air and prayed for him, but this time, the fate was stronger than all my prayers… The thoughts that appeared in his head were unique, his dreams were wiser than his age, that is why it was his fate," she said.
