Cellphone video from one of 15 Palestinian medics killed last month by Israeli forces appears to contradict Israeli claims that the medics’ vehicles did not have emergency signals on when troops opened fire on them in southern Gaza.
The footage shows Red Crescent and civil defense teams driving slowly with their emergency vehicles’ lights flashing and logos visible, as they pulled up to help an ambulance that had come under fire. The teams do not appear to be acting unusually or in a threatening manner as three medics emerge and head toward the stricken ambulance.
Their vehicles immediately come under a barrage of gunfire, which goes on for more than five minutes with brief pauses. The person filming can be heard praying.
Photo: Palestinian Red Crescent Society via AP
“Forgive me, mother. This is the path I chose, mother, to help people,” he cried, his voice weak.
Eight Red Crescent personnel, six civil defense workers and a UN staffer were killed in the shooting before dawn on March 23 by Israeli troops conducting operations in Tel al-Sultan, a district of the southern Gaza city of Rafah.
Troops bulldozed over the bodies along with their mangled vehicles, burying them in a mass grave. UN and rescue workers were only able to reach the site a week later to dig out the bodies.
Palestinian Red Crescent Society vice president Marwan Jilani said the phone was found in the pocket of one of its slain staffers.
The Palestinian ambassador to the UN distributed the video to the UN Security Council.
The Associated Press obtained the video from a UN diplomat on condition of anonymity because it has not been made public.
One paramedic who survived, Munzer Abed, confirmed the veracity of the video. Two block-shaped concrete structures visible in the video are also seen in a UN video showing the recovery of the bodies from the site — a sign they are in the same location.
Asked about the video, the Israeli military said the incident was “under thorough examination.”
One medic remains missing.
The Israeli military earlier said it opened fire on the vehicles because they were “advancing suspiciously” on nearby troops without headlights or emergency signals.
The initial account of the vehicles not having emergency lights on was mistaken, an Israeli military official told journalists on Saturday evening, speaking on condition of anonymity in line with regulations.
The head of the Palestinian Red Crescent Society, Younes al-Khatib, called for an independent investigation.
“We don’t trust any of the army investigations,” he told a briefing at the UN on Friday.
Packed crowds in India celebrating their cricket team’s victory ended in a deadly stampede on Wednesday, with 11 mainly young fans crushed to death, the local state’s chief minister said. Joyous cricket fans had come out to celebrate and welcome home their heroes, Royal Challengers Bengaluru, after they beat Punjab Kings in a roller-coaster Indian Premier League (IPL) cricket final on Tuesday night. However, the euphoria of the vast crowds in the southern tech city of Bengaluru ended in disaster, with Indian Prime Minister Narendra calling it “absolutely heartrending.” Karnataka Chief Minister Siddaramaiah said most of the deceased are young, with 11 dead
By 2027, Denmark would relocate its foreign convicts to a prison in Kosovo under a 200-million-euro (US$228.6 million) agreement that has raised concerns among non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and residents, but which could serve as a model for the rest of the EU. The agreement, reached in 2022 and ratified by Kosovar lawmakers last year, provides for the reception of up to 300 foreign prisoners sentenced in Denmark. They must not have been convicted of terrorism or war crimes, or have a mental condition or terminal disease. Once their sentence is completed in Kosovan, they would be deported to their home country. In
Brazil, the world’s largest Roman Catholic country, saw its Catholic population decline further in 2022, while evangelical Christians and those with no religion continued to rise, census data released on Friday by the Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics (IBGE) showed. The census indicated that Brazil had 100.2 million Roman Catholics in 2022, accounting for 56.7 percent of the population, down from 65.1 percent or 105.4 million recorded in the 2010 census. Meanwhile, the share of evangelical Christians rose to 26.9 percent last year, up from 21.6 percent in 2010, adding 12 million followers to reach 47.4 million — the highest figure
LOST CONTACT: The mission carried payloads from Japan, the US and Taiwan’s National Central University, including a deep space radiation probe, ispace said Japanese company ispace said its uncrewed moon lander likely crashed onto the moon’s surface during its lunar touchdown attempt yesterday, marking another failure two years after its unsuccessful inaugural mission. Tokyo-based ispace had hoped to join US firms Intuitive Machines and Firefly Aerospace as companies that have accomplished commercial landings amid a global race for the moon, which includes state-run missions from China and India. A successful mission would have made ispace the first company outside the US to achieve a moon landing. Resilience, ispace’s second lunar lander, could not decelerate fast enough as it approached the moon, and the company has
RSS