Fifteen emergency and aid workers from the Red Crescent, Palestinian Civil Defense and the United Nations have been recovered from a grave in the sand in the south of the Gaza Strip, UN officials said.
UN aid chief Tom Fletcher said in a post on X that the bodies were buried near “wrecked & well-marked vehicles”, adding: “They were killed by Israeli forces while trying to save lives. We demand answers & justice.”
Israel’s military did not comment directly on the deaths of the Red Crescent workers.
In a later statement to Reuters, it said that it had facilitated the evacuation of the bodies from the area, which it described as an active combat zone. It did not specifically respond to questions about why the bodies were retrieved beneath the sand nor why the vehicles were found crushed.
Philippe Lazzarini, head of the UN agency for Palestinian Refugees (UNRWA), said on social media platform X on Monday that the bodies had been “discarded in shallow graves – a profound violation of human dignity”.
Lazzarini said the deaths brought the total number of aid workers killed since the onset of the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza to 408.
In a statement late on Sunday (Mar 30), the International Committee of the Red Cross said it was “appalled” at the deaths.
“Their bodies were identified today and have been recovered for dignified burial. These staff and volunteers were risking their own lives to provide support to others,” it said.
