It used to be nonetheless darkish out when a gaggle of ambulances and a fireplace truck dispatched by means of Palestinian emergency reaction products and services slowed to a halt in Rafah, the southernmost town in Gaza, early on March 23. That they had been despatched to seek out their paramedic colleagues, who had headed out in an ambulance on a rescue undertaking previous that morning sooner than disappearing.Now the convoy stopped subsequent to the lacking ambulance, which stood by means of the facet of the street close to some U.N. warehouses. When paramedics were given out to appear, Israeli squaddies about 50 meters away opened fireplace on them, in keeping with two males who mentioned they’d witnessed the shootings.The 2 males noticed what took place, they mentioned, as a result of they have been being held by means of the similar Israeli troops.One of the vital two, Munther Abed, 27, a volunteer paramedic, mentioned he were detained after surviving an previous assault at the lacking ambulance that killed two different workforce contributors. The opposite guy, Dr. Saeed al-Bardawil, 55, a doctor, mentioned he were detained along Mr. Abed when he and his son have been stopped by means of Israeli troops on their solution to move fishing about 4:45 a.m.The New York Instances interviewed the 2 males one at a time in Gaza days after the United Countries mentioned it had discovered the our bodies of 15 rescue employees — 8 from the Palestine Crimson Crescent Society, six from Gaza’s Civil Protection and one from the United Countries — in a mass grave. Their ambulances, their fireplace truck and a U.N. automobile, which were overwhelmed, have been half-buried within sight. The United Countries has accused Israel of killing the 15 employees, discarding their our bodies and destroying the automobiles.The 2 males’s accounts seem to reinforce the ones accusations. Even if their tales may just now not be independently showed, the main points they gave additionally matched the collection of occasions in a video received and verified by means of The New York Instances, came upon at the cell phone of probably the most useless paramedics. That video presentations an intense barrage of gunfire hitting the convoy simply as break of day breaks.
