Israel killed 15 Palestinian paramedics and rescue workers one by one, says UN
Lorenzo Tondo
Fifteen Palestinian paramedics and rescue workers, including at least one United Nations employee, were killed by Israeli forces “one by one” and buried in a mass grave eight days ago in southern Gaza, the UN has said.
According to the UN humanitarian affairs office (Ocha), the Palestinian Red Crescent and civil defence workers were on a mission to rescue colleagues who had been shot at earlier in the day, when their clearly marked vehicles came under heavy Israeli fire in Rafah city’s Tel al-Sultan. A Red Crescent official in Gaza said that there was evidence of at least one person being detained and killed, as the body of one of the dead had been found with his hands tied.
The shootings happened on 23 March, one day into the renewed Israeli offensive in the area close to the Egyptian border. Another Red Crescent worker on the mission is reported missing.
Jonathan Whittall, head of Ocha in Palestine, said in a video statement: “Seven days ago, civil defence and PRCS ambulances arrived at the scene. One by one, they were hit, they were struck. Their bodies were gathered and buried in this mass grave.”
“We’re digging them out in their uniforms, with their gloves on. They were here to save lives. Instead, they ended up in a mass grave,” Whittall said. “These ambulances have been buried in the sand. There’s a UN vehicle here, buried in the sand. A bulldozer – Israeli forces bulldozer – has buried them.’’
Key events
The United Arab Emirates on Monday sentenced three people to death for the murder of an Israeli-Moldovan rabbi who was killed in November in the Gulf country, state news agency WAM reported.
The Abu Dhabi Federal Appeal Court ruled the murder of Zvi Kogan, 28, was committed by the defendants in pursuance of a “terrorist purpose,” according to WAM.
Kogan, who had been living in the UAE, was a representative in the UAE of Chabad, an Orthodox Jewish group that has chapters around the world and seeks to build links with non-affiliated and secular Jews or other sects of Judaism.
Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office had denounced Kogan’s killing as an “antisemitic terrorist act”.
Israel killed 15 Palestinian paramedics and rescue workers one by one, says UN
Lorenzo Tondo
Fifteen Palestinian paramedics and rescue workers, including at least one United Nations employee, were killed by Israeli forces “one by one” and buried in a mass grave eight days ago in southern Gaza, the UN has said.
According to the UN humanitarian affairs office (Ocha), the Palestinian Red Crescent and civil defence workers were on a mission to rescue colleagues who had been shot at earlier in the day, when their clearly marked vehicles came under heavy Israeli fire in Rafah city’s Tel al-Sultan. A Red Crescent official in Gaza said that there was evidence of at least one person being detained and killed, as the body of one of the dead had been found with his hands tied.
The shootings happened on 23 March, one day into the renewed Israeli offensive in the area close to the Egyptian border. Another Red Crescent worker on the mission is reported missing.
Jonathan Whittall, head of Ocha in Palestine, said in a video statement: “Seven days ago, civil defence and PRCS ambulances arrived at the scene. One by one, they were hit, they were struck. Their bodies were gathered and buried in this mass grave.”
“We’re digging them out in their uniforms, with their gloves on. They were here to save lives. Instead, they ended up in a mass grave,” Whittall said. “These ambulances have been buried in the sand. There’s a UN vehicle here, buried in the sand. A bulldozer – Israeli forces bulldozer – has buried them.’’
Haaretz in Israel reports that tyres burned by protesters are still blocking one lane of Highway 50 in Jerusalem. The protest group had earlier stopped traffic while calling for the release of the remaining hostages held by Hamas in Gaza.
Here are some of the latest images from the news wires showing Palestinians once again having to flee for shelter, after the Israeli military issued sweeping orders that people should leave Rafah in the south of the Gaza Strip. Many Palestinians have been displaced from their homes on multiple occasions during Israel’s bombardment of the territory.
Palestinian news agency Wafa reports that Israeli forces have fired rockets at a cave in Jenin in the Israeli-occupied West Bank.
It states that eyewitnesses reported Israeli security forces “deployed snipers on the roofs of several homes, while drones hovered over the town” while military reinforcements arrived.
The day so far
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The Israeli military issued sweeping evacuation orders covering most of the southern city of Rafah in the Gaza Strip on Monday morning.
Earlier this month, Israel ended a ceasefire and renewed its air and ground war against the Hamas militant group. As Associated Press reports, Israel launched a major operation in Rafah, on the border with Egypt, last May, leaving large parts of it in ruins. -
Suspected US airstrikes struck around Yemen’s rebel-held capital overnight, attacks that the Iranian-backed Houthis said killed at least three people. The full extent of the damage was not immediately clear, AP reported. The attacks into Monday followed a night of airstrikes early on Friday that appeared particularly intense compared to other days in the campaign that began on 15 March. The strikes around Sana’a, Yemen’s capital held by the Houthis since 2014, and Hajjah governorate also wounded 12 others, the rebels said.
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A senior Hamas official on Monday called on supporters worldwide to pick up weapons and fight US president Donald Trump’s plan to relocate more than two million Palestinians in Gaza to neighbouring countries such as Egypt and Jordan. “In the face of this sinister plan – one that combines massacres with starvation – anyone who can bear arms, anywhere in the world, must take action,” Sami Abu Zuhri said in a statement.
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The EU wants a resumption of negotiations between Israel and Hamas as it is the only way forward, a EU spokesperson said on Monday. “A return to the ceasefire is essential, leading to the release of all hostages and a permanent end to hostilities,” the spokesperson said.
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Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu picked former navy commander Eli Sharvit to head the domestic security agency, his office said Monday, despite the supreme court freezing the dismissal of the current Shin Bet chief, Ronen Bar.
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The Israeli military said on Monday that an inquiry had found that on 23 March, troops opened fire on a group of vehicles that included ambulances and fire trucks when the vehicles approached a position without prior coordination and without headlights or emergency signals. It said several militants belonging to the militant groups Hamas and Islamic Jihad were killed.
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Associated Press are just reporting that Israeli police have arrested two suspects linked to the investigation into ties between Qatar and Benjamin Netanyahu. The case is under a sweeping gag order and police did not name the suspects in their announcement on Monday.
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Critics who opposed Ronen Bar’s dismissal as Shin Bet chief in court said its timing raised concern that it was meant to scupper an ongoing investigation announced into possible links between aides to Benjamin Netanyahu and Qatar. Netanyahu, who is on trial over a separate series of corruption charges which he denies, has rejected the accusations regarding his aides and Qatar as “fake news” and a politically motivated campaign against him.
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Iran has responded to a letter sent by US President Donald Trump wrote to its supreme leader in an attempt to jump-start talks over Tehran’s rapidly advancing nuclear programme, rejecting the option of direct talks. The decision leaves open the possibility of indirect talks with Washington, but such talks have made no progress since Trump in his first term unilaterally withdrew the US from Tehran’s nuclear deal with world powers in 2018.
Suspected US airstrikes struck around Yemen’s rebel-held capital overnight, attacks that the Iranian-backed Houthis said killed at least three people.
The full extent of the damage was not immediately clear, AP reported. The attacks into Monday followed a night of airstrikes early on Friday that appeared particularly intense compared to other days in the campaign that began on 15 March.
The strikes around Sana’a, Yemen’s capital held by the Houthis since 2014, and Hajjah governorate also wounded 12 others, the rebels said.
Their Al-Masirah satellite news channel aired footage of broken glass littering homes in Sana’a after the concussive blast of the bombs, but continued not to show the targets of the attacks – suggesting the sites had a military or intelligence function.
Strikes there killed one person, the rebels said. Another strike targeting a pickup truck in Hajjah killed two people and wounded a child, the Houthis said.
Return to ceasefire between Israel and Hamas is essential, EU says
The EU wants a resumption of negotiations between Israel and Hamas as it is the only way forward, a EU spokesperson said on Monday.
“A return to the ceasefire is essential, leading to the release of all hostages and a permanent end to hostilities,” the spokesperson said.
“Humanitarian aid access and distribution, as well as the supply of electricity to Gaza, must be resumed immediately,” they said, adding that “Palestinians and Israelis have suffered immensely in the last year and a half. It is time to break the cycle of violence”.
A senior Hamas official on Monday called on supporters worldwide to pick up weapons and fight US president Donald Trump’s plan to relocate more than two million Palestinians in Gaza to neighbouring countries such as Egypt and Jordan.
“In the face of this sinister plan – one that combines massacres with starvation – anyone who can bear arms, anywhere in the world, must take action,” Sami Abu Zuhri said in a statement.
“Do not withhold an explosive, a bullet, a knife, or a stone. Let everyone break their silence.”
Abu Zuhri’s call comes a day after Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu offered to let Hamas leaders leave Gaza but demanded that the Palestinian militant group disarm in the final stages of the war in Gaza, AFP reported.
Hamas has expressed a willingness to relinquish Gaza’s administration, but has warned its weapons are a “red line”.
