Israel's Military Cites 'Professional Failures' in Killings of Gaza Medics
Israel’s Military Cites ‘Professional Failures’ in Killings of Gaza Medics
In a statement and a briefing summarizing its investigation into the deadly episode, the military said a deputy commander would be dismissed.
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/04/20/world/middleeast/israel-gaza-medics.html
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The shootings of the rescue workers, the military said, resulted from “an operational misunderstanding” by troops on the ground “who believed they faced a tangible threat from enemy forces.” The firing on the U.N. vehicle, the statement said, constituted “a breach of orders” in a combat setting.
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Bodies in white shrouds with a red crescent symbol on them are surrounded by a crowd of mourners.
Palestinians in Khan Younis, Gaza, mourning the medics killed by Israeli fire while on a rescue mission.Credit...Hatem Khaled/Reuters
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About an hour after the initial attack, the convoy came to look for the missing crew of the first ambulance. When the vehicles stopped and people began exiting them, General Har-Even said, the soldiers assumed that they too were Hamas operatives who had come to help their colleagues. The forces believed their position had been compromised, the general said, and feeling threatened, they opened fire.
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The commander of the brigade involved will receive a reprimand “for his overall responsibility for the incident,” it said, while the battalion’s deputy commander will be dismissed because of his responsibilities as the field commander at the time “and for providing an incomplete and inaccurate report during the debrief.”
The Israeli military’s first account also said that nine of those killed had been operatives for Hamas or another militant group, Palestinian Islamic Jihad. It later revised that count, saying that six of them were Hamas operatives, without providing evidence. The military acknowledged on Sunday that none of the 15 dead aid workers had been armed.
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Johnatan Reiss contributed reporting.
Isabel Kershner, a Times correspondent in Jerusalem, has been reporting on Israeli and Palestinian affairs since 1990.
There are so many errors, misstatements from IDF regarding this "action", including “several professional failures, breaches of orders, and a failure to fully report the incident,” IDF's own report concluded. These include the commander wearing night vision goggles and asserting his line of sight was obstructed in a way that obscured the emergency lights of the fire truck in front of him.
IDF also revealed “due to poor night visibility,” the deputy battalion commander, the most senior officer on the ground, the first to open fire on the convoy, “did not initially recognize the vehicles as ambulances.”
Initial interrogation of detainees in the field reinforced the troops’ contention that they had attacked a Hamas target. But in subsequent questioning later, after the attack on the following convoy, "it became apparent that the individual was not affiliated with Hamas."
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