Israel has acknowledged their mistake in identifying Gaza aid workers as a threat, following the release of phone footage showing a Palestinian medic, one of 15 individuals killed in southern Gaza, which raised doubts about the validity of their claims.
Among the 15 victims were eight medics from the Palestine Red Crescent Society (PRCS), whose bodies were found in a makeshift mass grave after the tragic incident, as reported by Jonathan Whittal, the head of the UN Office for Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs.
The emergence of a phone video featuring one of the Palestinian medics who lost their lives depicted the Red Crescent and Civil Defense teams moving slowly in their emergency vehicles with visible logos and flashing lights.
But as they stop to help an ambulance that had previously come under fire, the teams, who were not acting unusually or in a threatening manner, immediately come under a barrage of gunfire.
The barrage of bullets could be heard for another five minutes, whilst the owner of the phone praying to his mother amid the shooting: ‘Forgive me, mother. This is the path I chose, mother, to help people,’ he cried.
During the assault, he scrambles out of the car with his screen plunging into darkness with only audio to be heard as he continued to repeat: ‘There is no God but God and Muhammad is God’s prophet.’
This is a profession of the Islamic faith that Muslims say when they fear they are about to die. The medic repeated the phrase as shots repeatedly rang out as the medical staff were killed.
Eight Red Crescent personnel, six Civil Defence workers and a UN worker were killed in the shooting before dawn on March 23 by the Israeli troops in Tel al-Sultan, a district of the southern Gaza city of Rafah.
IDF soldiers then bulldozed over the medics bodies along with their mangled vehicles, burying them in a mass grave, with UN and rescue workers only able to reach the site a week later to recover their bodies.
Medic, Assaad al-Nassasra, who was also seen being blindfolded by Israeli troops by a surviving colleague, has been missing since the attack according to the Red Crescent, who have asked the military where they are holding its worker.
The Palestinian Red Crescent Society’s vice president, Marwan Jilani, said the phone with the footage was found in the pocket of one of its workers who died at the scene.
The IDF had originally stated that an investigation had concluded the vehicles appeared ‘suspicious’ due to a lack of headlights and emergency signals.
However the video obtained by the Associated Press via a UN diplomat and verified by a surviving paramedic, Munzer Abed, showed the vehicles clearly marked with flashing red lights.
Following the emergence of the footage, the IDF stated that Israeli soldiers had gunned down the medics as they believed they were ‘a threat’ and ‘were surprised by the convoy stopping on the road, next to the abandoned Hamas vehicle’.
‘The soldiers were unaware that the suspects were in fact unarmed medics,’ the statement continued.
‘The IDF acknowledges that its statement claiming that the ambulances had their lights off, was incorrect, and was based on the testimony from the soldiers in the incident.’
The Israeli military previously claimed it has opened fire on the vehicles because they were ‘advancing suspiciously’ on nearby troops without headlights or emergency signals.
Asked about the video, the Israeli military said the incident was ‘under thorough examination’.
It said ‘all claims, including the documentation circulating about the incident, will be thoroughly and deeply examined to understand the sequence of events and the handling of the situation’.
The IDF also acknowledged it was previously incorrect in its last statement and that the ambulances had their lights on and ‘were clearly identifiable’. They have since said they are launching a probe into the discrepancy.
They also added that aid workers being buried in a mass grave was a regular practice ‘…to prevent wild dogs and other animals from eating the corpses.’
The head of the Palestinian Red Crescent Society, Younes Al-Khatib, has since called for an independent investigation into the attack.
‘We don’t trust any of the army investigations,’ he told a briefing at the United Nations on Friday, as he claimed the men had been ‘targeted at close range’, with a post-mortem examination report to be released shortly.
Israel has accused Hamas of moving and hiding its fighters inside ambulances and emergency vehicles, as well as in hospitals and other civilian infrastructure, arguing that this justifies strikes on them.
Medical personnel largely deny these accusations.
Israeli strikes have killed more than 150 emergency responders from the Red Crescent and Civil Defence, most of them while on duty, as well as more than 1,000 health workers, according to the UN.
The Israeli military said after the shooting, troops determined they had killed a Hamas figure named Mohammed Amin Shobaki and eight other militants.
However, none of the 15 medics killed has that name, and no other bodies are known to have been found at the site, raising questions over the military’s claims they were in the vehicles.
The military has not said what happened to Mr Shobaki’s body or released the names of the other alleged militants.
Jonathan Whittall, interim head in Gaza of the UN humanitarian office OCHA, dismissed allegations that the medics were Hamas militants, saying humanitarian staff had worked with the same medics previously in evacuating patients from hospitals and other tasks.
‘These are paramedic crews that I personally have met before,’ he said. ‘They were buried in their uniforms with their gloves on. They were ready to save lives.’
