Red Crescent finds bodies, says its paramedics and Gaza rescue workers ‘handcuffed and executed’

Reports of summary execution confirmed after bodies located, says ‘devastated’ humanitarian medical organisation

The Palestinian Red Crescent (PRC) – part of the International Red Cross organisation – has said it is ‘devastated’ by the murder of eight of its paramedics in Rafah, southern Gaza, who were summarily executed by occupation forces while trying to carry out their humanitarian duties and respond to an emergency call to assist wounded victims following Israeli airstrikes. The PRC located their bodies at the weekend. A ninth paramedic remains missing and may have been detained. Seven Gaza Civil Defence workers were also executed.

According to colleagues who recovered the bodies, the eight had been handcuffed before they were shot, then dumped in an apparently pre-dug pit and buried.

The names of the ambulance crew members whose bodies have been found are:

٠ Mustafa Khafaja
٠ Ezzedine Sha’at
٠ Saleh Moammar
٠ Rifaat Radwan
٠ Mohammad Behloul
٠ Ashraf Abu Labda
٠ Mohammad Al-Hila
٠ Raed Al-Sharif

On Friday, the Israeli military admitted that it had “opened fire” on vehicles in Rafah that ‘turned out’ to be “ambulances and fire trucks”. However, the discovery of the bound bodies makes clear that this was no accidental or careless killing, but a deliberate execution.

If the killings had been the other way round, the outrage among politicians and media would be non-stop, as academic Dr Assal Rad has pointed out:

Throughout its genocide in Gaza Israel is known to have executed civilians, including women and children, and has constantly targeted paramedics, medical personnel, aid workers, rescue workers, journalists, schools, hospitals and food queues. It is now barely bothering to deny its crimes as the US, UK and other colluding governments and ‘mainstream’ media provide political cover, complicit silence and, in the case of the Starmer government, direct military and air support for genocide while Starmer wages a ‘lawfare’ war on UK journalists and activists who speak out against it.

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