UNITED NATIONS: The mass grave in Rafah where the bodies of 15 medics were found after the Israeli army fired on ambulances illustrates the “war without limits” that Israel is leading in Gaza, a UN aid official said Wednesday.
“It was shocking” to see medical workers “still in their uniforms, still wearing gloves, killed while trying to save lives,” said Jonathan Whittall, head of the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) in the Palestinian territories.
“The ambulances were hit one by one,” he said in a video conference after a mission to Gaza uncovered the mass grave. Of the 15 bodies, eight were members of the Palestinian Red Crescent and one was from the United Nations.
UN chief Antonio Guterres also expressed revulsion Wednesday at the killings.
“The secretary-general is shocked by the attacks of the Israeli army on a medical and emergency convoy on March 23 resulting in the killings of 15 medical personnel and humanitarian workers in Gaza,” spokesman Stephane Dujarric told a briefing.
OCHA said Tuesday that the first team of first aid workers was killed by Israeli forces on March 23, and that other emergency and aid teams were hit one after another over several hours while searching for their missing colleagues.
After several weeks of ceasefire in Gaza, Israel resumed its bombardments on March 18 and announced Wednesday the extension of its military operations to seize “large areas” of the territory.
Whittall said 64 percent of Gaza is under displacement orders, and that 200,000 people have been uprooted since the end of the ceasefire.
He said the 25 bakeries run by the UN’s World Food Programme have been closed since Tuesday.
“It’s an endless loop of blood, pain, death and Gaza has become a death trap,” he said. “What is happening here defies decency, it defies humanity, it defies the law.”
Gaza mass grave underscores ‘war without limits’, UN official says
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Gaza mass grave underscores ‘war without limits’, UN official says
- “It was shocking” to see medical workers “still in their uniforms, still wearing gloves, killed while trying to save lives,” said Jonathan Whittall, OCHA’S head
- “The ambulances were hit one by one“
Israel’s hostage forum releases AI-generated video of last Gaza captive
- The Gaza ceasefire, which came into effect in October, remains fragile with both sides alleging violations, and mediators fearing that Israel and Hamas alike are stalling
JERUSALEM: An Israeli group representing the families of Gaza hostages released on Tuesday an AI-generated video of Ran Gvili, the last captive whose body is still being held in the Palestinian territory.
The one-minute clip, created whole cloth using artificial intelligence, purports to depict Gvili as he sits in a Gaza tunnel and appeals to US President Donald Trump to help bring his body back to Israel.
“Mr President, I’m asking you to see this through: Please bring me home. My family deserves this. I deserve the right to be buried with honor in the land I fought for,” says the AI-generated image of Gvili.
Gvili was 24 at the time of Hamas’s October 7, 2023 attack on Israel.
He was an officer in Israel’s Yasam elite police unit and was on medical leave when he learnt of the attack.
He decided to leave his home and brought his gun to counter the Hamas militants.
He was shot in the fighting at the Alumim kibbutz before he was taken to Gaza.
Israeli authorities told Gvili’s parents in January 2024 that he had not survived his injuries.
The AI clip was released by the Hostages and Missing Families Forum, the main group representing those taken captive to Gaza.
The Forum said it was published with the approval of Gvili’s family.
“Seeing and hearing Rani speak in his own voice is both moving and heartbreaking. I would give anything to hear, see and hold him again,” Gvili’s mother Talik said, quoted by the Forum.
“But all I can do now is plead that they don’t move to the next phase of the agreement before bringing Rani home — because we don’t leave heroes behind.”
The Gaza ceasefire, which came into effect in October, remains fragile with both sides alleging violations, and mediators fearing that Israel and Hamas alike are stalling.
In the first stage, Palestinian militants were expected to return all of the remaining 48 living and dead hostages held in Gaza.
Since the ceasefire came into effect on October 10, militants have released 47 hostages.
In the next stages of the truce, Israel is supposed to withdraw from its positions in Gaza, an interim authority is to govern the Palestinian territory instead of Hamas, and an international stabilization force is to be deployed.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is expected to meet Trump in Florida later this month to discuss the second phase of the deal.
