After 18 months of slaughter, it is still possible to be shocked by events in Gaza. More than 50,000 people have been killed, according to Palestinian health authorities. More are starving because Israel has cut off aid. The offensive is intensifying again – with 100 children killed or maimed each day since Israel resumed heavy strikes last month, the UN reports.
Even so, Israel’s killing of 15 Palestinian paramedics and rescue workers is particularly chilling. Though they died on 23 March, it took days for Israel to grant access to the site, the UN said. Another man was last seen in Israeli custody. Two grounds for seeing this not only as tragic but as a war crime stand out. The first is that the UN says the men were shot “one by one”, and a forensic expert said that preliminary evidence “suggests they were executed, not from a distant range”, given the “specific and intentional” locations of bullet wounds. Two witnesses said some of the bodies had their hands or legs tied. Prisoners are protected by the Geneva conventions. The second is that medics also enjoy specific protections.
Though the vehicles were clearly marked, the Israel Defense Forces claim that they were “advancing suspiciously” without headlights or emergency signals, a claim disputed by the sole located survivor. They also allege, without providing evidence, that Hamas and Islamic Jihad militants were among those killed. What is indisputable is the broader pattern of attacks on rescue and health workers. More than 1,000 medics have been killed across Gaza, according to a Guardian investigation, and hospitals reduced to ruins. The World Health Organization says about 300 medical staff have been detained. Several have subsequently described torture, beatings, starvation and humiliation. Doctors who have volunteered in Gaza see a systematic assault upon healthcare and the respected community figures working in the sector.
None of this appears of great concern to Benjamin Netanyahu, Israel’s prime minister. The international criminal court (ICC) has issued a warrant for his arrest on war crimes charges, but as he visited Hungary on Thursday, Budapest announced it was withdrawing from the court. Donald Trump has emboldened all of those who see the ICC as an enemy and law itself as optional.
The president’s plan for the US to “take over” Gaza, dependent on the ethnic cleansing of Palestinians, made it all the easier for Israel’s defence minister, Israel Katz, to say that it will “seize large areas” of the territory. The right has long wanted a land grab. Israel has already extended buffer zones dramatically since the murderous Hamas raids of October 2023 triggered this war.
That Mr Katz’s warning came in a week where Mr Netanyahu testified again in his corruption trial, and gave evidence to police (though not as a suspect) over a separate scandal involving alleged links between his aides and Qatar, was striking. The prime minister’s political survival remains linked to an endless war, to the despair of the families of the remaining Israeli hostages, as well as Palestinians.
The Israeli military says it is investigating the 23 March killings, but only an independent inquiry will suffice. David Lammy, the foreign secretary, described Gaza as the deadliest place on Earth for humanitarian workers and rightly said that those responsible must be held accountable. In an age where impunity flourishes, crimes will multiply. Those who believe in justice must redouble their support for the embattled international institutions seeking to uphold it.
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