What happened in Mayfadoun and how Israel targeted paramedics in triple-tap strikes
The Israeli military killed four Lebanese rescue workers and wounded six others in three consecutive, targeted strikes Wednesday, paramedic groups said, a stark illustration of the human cost of the Israeli military campaign in southern Lebanon a day after Lebanon and Israel held historic talks in Washington.
The back-to-back Israeli attacks on the southern village of Mayfadoun, near the bigger town of Nabatiyeh, hit the first group of medics responding to a distress call from wounded civilians, a second group trying to assist their wounded colleagues and a third group rushing to aid the first two teams that had been targeted.
The Lebanese Health Ministry condemned the attacks as a "blatant violation" of international law.
Abou Haidar Hayya, an official with the Islamic Health Committee involved in the rescue operation, said he feared such direct targeting of medics meant that "there are no more red lines in this war."
"Ambulances are protected under all international laws and conventions. It is forbidden to target them. And when those prohibitions collapse, we have nothing left," he said by phone from the health center in Nabitiyeh.
Since the Israel-Hezbollah war began on March 2, at least 91 Lebanese medical workers have been killed by Israel, the ministry said, underscoring the intensity of the ongoing strikes and strain on Lebanon's health system. The overall death toll from the war in Lebanon jumped to 2,167 on Wednesday.
Israel first struck a team from Lebanon's Islamic Health Committee, a major healthcare provider that is affiliated with Hezbollah's political movement, killing two paramedics, the group said. A second team from the committee headed to the site and was struck in another Israeli attack that wounded three medical workers, the ministry reported.
The Nabatiyeh Emergency Services as well as the Islamic Risala Scout Association, a paramedic group affiliated with the Amal movement, a Hezbollah ally, mounted a third rescue attempt. They were hit by a strike that killed two more medics.
Most of the wounded medics remain in moderate condition except for one medic in serious condition after being hit in the chest by shrapnel, the Islamic Health Committee said.
Footage captured by the Nabatiyeh Emergency Services shows the second team of medics wearing their uniforms and riding in clearly marked emergency vehicles struggling to pull their bloodied colleagues out of wrecked ambulances that had veered onto the side of the road.
Rescue workers are seen administering aid to two wounded colleagues on stretchers in the back of an ambulance when an Israeli strike smashes into the vehicle, blowing out its windows and sending glass shattering everywhere. The camera shakes, and the medic who was treating his colleagues screams in pain. The video then shows a third team arriving to help the others before being attacked.
Hayya, from the Islamic Health Committee, said he doesn't regret dispatching one team after another into the line of fire. "We went in three times because we refuse to leave our paramedics behind, even if it costs all of us our lives," he said.
He promised that the Islamic Health Committee and other paramedic groups would continue to carry out their duties in southern Lebanon despite the increasingly impossible conditions.
Source: Associated Press
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