The Palestinian Crimson Crescent, which misplaced 9 of its employees within the March 23 Israeli assault, referred to as killings one of many battle’s ‘darkest moments’.
New proof means that a few of the 15 Palestinian assist staff killed by Israeli forces in Rafah final week had been shot at shut vary in what gave the impression to be execution-style killings – an assault the Palestine Crimson Crescent Society (PRCS) has described as “one of many darkest moments” of the battle.
Forensic analyst Ahmad Dhaher, who personally examined 5 of the our bodies at Khan Younis’s Nasser Hospital, mentioned the proof pointed to close-range gunfire.
“Preliminary evaluation suggests they had been executed, not from a distant vary, because the places of the bullet wounds had been particular and intentional,” Dhaher informed The Guardian newspaper.
“One remark is that the bullets had been aimed toward one particular person’s head, one other at their coronary heart and a 3rd particular person had been shot with six or seven bullets within the torso.”
He cautioned that the state of decomposition made it troublesome to attract definitive conclusions.
The help staff disappeared on March 23 throughout a rescue mission in Rafah’s Tal as-Sultan neighbourhood after it got here beneath assault by Israeli forces. The group included 9 PRCS medics, six civil defence staff and one United Nations worker.
In accordance with the UN Workplace for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), after the primary rescue group was killed, different emergency crews looking for them had been repeatedly struck over a number of hours.
Per week later, 15 bodies were discovered buried within the sand, which OCHA described as a “mass grave.” One PRCS employee stays lacking.
That is “one of many darkest moments on this battle that has shaken our shared humanity to its core,” PRCS President Younes al-Khatib informed the UN Safety Council on Thursday.
Al-Khatib additionally mentioned PRCS dispatchers overheard a dialog in Hebrew between Israeli forces and a few of the assist staff, indicating that no less than some had been nonetheless alive whereas in Israeli custody.
Israel’s navy claimed that 9 Hamas and Islamic Jihad fighters had been contained in the rescue crews’ ambulances however mentioned it was launching an investigation into the incident.
“The presence of these terrorists places everybody’s lives in danger,” claimed Israel’s ambassador to the UN Danny Danon.
Humanitarian staff have been repeatedly focused in the course of the Gaza battle, with 408 killed to date, together with 280 UN employees, in keeping with the UN.
UN Excessive Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Turk mentioned the help staff’ killing raises “additional considerations over the fee of battle crimes by the Israeli navy”.
Talking at a UN Safety Council assembly in New York, Turk referred to as for an “unbiased, immediate and thorough investigation” into their killing.
“There may be clearly rising consensus inside the council that it should do extra to carry Israel accountable,” stories Al Jazeera’s Gabriel Elizondo from the UN headquarters in New York.
