<\/p>\n
Mohammed Suleiman, chief paramedic of the Nabatiyeh Emergency Services, comforts his niece, Israa Jaber, at the service’s temporary center in Nabatiyeh, southern Lebanon, Friday, April 17, 2026.<\/p>\n
Hassan Ammar\/AP<\/p>\n
Members of Nabatiyeh Emergency Services inspect the damaged ambulance of their colleague who was killed on a rescue mission by an Israeli airstrike on Wednesday, in Nabatiyeh, southern Lebanon, Friday, April 17, 2026.<\/p>\n
Hassan Ammar\/AP<\/p>\n
A member of the Nabatiyeh Emergency Services looks inside a damaged ambulance stained with the blood of his colleague, who was killed during a rescue mission in an Israeli airstrike on Wednesday, in Nabatiyeh, southern Lebanon, Friday, April 17, 2026.<\/p>\n
Hassan Ammar\/AP<\/p>\n
An ambulance belonging to Hezbollah’s health unit lies amid the rubble of a medical center destroyed in an Israeli airstrike in Jibchit, southern Lebanon, Friday, April 17, 2026.<\/p>\n
Hassan Ammar\/AP<\/p>\n
Ali Fahos, a member of Hezbollah’s health unit, places portraits of colleagues killed during the previous war with Israel next to a building destroyed in an Israeli airstrike, in Jibchit, southern Lebanon, Friday, April 17, 2026, following a ceasefire between Israel and Hezbollah.<\/p>\n
Hassan Ammar\/AP<\/p>\n
NABATIYEH, Lebanon (AP) \u2014 It was late morning when two ambulances slowed to a stop outside of the village of Mayfadoun in southern Lebanon.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Having heard minutes earlier on Wednesday that Israel had attacked two other ambulances, hitting one and then the other after it showed up to help the first, they didn’t hesitate before rushing to the scene. They knew the danger, and they found a hellscape.<\/p>\n
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The first two ambulances were destroyed, their tires blown and windows shattered. Six of their eight crew members were covered in blood and lying in the road or the back of one vehicle. A paramedic in one of the driver\u2019s seats, blood pulsing from his abdomen, was cradling a colleague in his lap, pleading with him to stay conscious.<\/p>\n
\u201cI felt sick. I couldn\u2019t believe my eyes,\u201d Mohammed Jaber, 43, told The Associated Press on Friday from his emergency team’s headquarters in Nabatiyeh, where team members dozed on foam mattresses. A 10-day truce in the Israel-Hezbollah war delivered the exhausted team a rare respite from the drum line of explosions.<\/p>\n
Jaber said he and the others hurried to load the most critically injured into their working ambulances. As team leader Mahdi Abu Zaid ran to close the doors, they, too, were attacked.<\/p>\n
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The three strikes, which killed four paramedics and wounded six others, is the latest example of Israel’s willingness to target Lebanon’s health sector.<\/p>\n
Such attacks became a contentious issue during the 2024 Israel-Hezbollah war, as Israel accused Hezbollah, as it did Hamas in Gaza, of using Lebanese hospitals as cover for militant activities \u2014 a claim denied by Hezbollah and the Lebanese Health Ministry.<\/p>\n
The attacks haven\u2019t slowed, as humanitarian agencies report that an average of two health workers have been killed every day in this war before a truce took hold Friday.<\/p>\n
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Back-to-back-to-back strikes<\/p>\n
In response to questions about the Mayfadoun strikes, the Israeli army did not repeat its previous accusations about Hezbollah\u2019s use of health facilities. Instead, it said it was aware of reports about the ambulance attacks and \u201cthe incident is under review.\u201d<\/p>\n
The attack on the third team of ambulances to make a rescue attempt Wednesday happened as they were still assessing the first two crews\u2019 injuries, less than six minutes after their arrival.<\/p>\n
An Israeli drone smashed the vehicles’ windows and struck 30-year-old Abu Zaid, throwing him to the ground, his colleagues told the AP. Abu Zaid, who had a 4-year-old son and sold spices and nuts when he wasn\u2019t volunteering as a paramedic, was later proclaimed dead on arrival at al-Najda Hospital.<\/p>\n
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Their accounts of what happened match footage captured by a GoPro camera that was strapped on one of the paramedics. The video shows a barrage of fire hitting the ambulance as medical workers administered first aid to two colleagues in blood-soaked clothes, one taking shallow breaths through an oxygen mask.<\/p>\n
After the third attack, a fourth team of rescuers finally managed to reach the stranded medics and evacuate the wounded without being targeted.<\/p>\n
Risking their lives to save lives<\/p>\n
The attacks on the ambulances have drawn condemnation, including from the United Nations\u2019 human rights office, which said it was \u201cshocked” and warned that intentionally targeting medics constituted a war crime.<\/p>\n
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For the emergency workers involved, it was the latest example of Israel’s efforts to wreck southern Lebanon’s health system as its army extends security control to the Litani River, some 20 miles (30 kilometers) into Lebanese territory, in a bid to protect its northern towns from Iran-backed Hezbollah.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey should be targeting fighters, where the fighting is happening, at the border,\u201d said Jaber. \u201cWhy target medics and civilians? So that life becomes unbearable and people tell Hezbollah to give up?\u201d<\/p>\n
The Lebanese Health Ministry has recorded at least 100 medical workers killed since Israel launched its bombing campaign and ground invasion in Lebanon in retaliation for Hezbollah firing missiles across the border on March 2, after Israel and the United States began strikes against Iran.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis war is different than all the other wars,\u201d said Mohammed Suleiman, the chief paramedic for Nabatiyeh Emergency Services.<\/p>\n
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His own son, 16-year-old Joud \u2014 who had been tagging along and helping on missions since he was a young child \u2014 was killed with a fellow paramedic in an Israeli strike on their motorcycle on March 24 \u2014 the unit\u2019s first casualties since its founding in 2002.<\/p>\n
\u201cI always had my fears, but I believed that as a neutral organization with no connection to politics, we would be safe, off-limits,” he said.<\/p>\n
Israel pursues Hezbollah-linked civilian targets<\/p>\n
Apart from its armed wing, Hezbollah is one of Lebanon’s most powerful political parties and runs a sprawling network of civilian institutions including hospitals and schools.<\/p>\n
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The first two teams of paramedics attacked on Wednesday were dispatched by the Islamic Health Committee, a major health care provider affiliated with Hezbollah, and the Risala Scout Association, a paramedic group affiliated with Hezbollah’s ally, the Amal movement.<\/p>\n
Dozens of paramedics from both groups have been killed in these six weeks of war. The main Islamic Health Committee clinic in the village of Jibsheet, near Nabatiyeh, was destroyed by an Israeli airstrike last month, one of 59 primary health care centers shuttered due to Israeli attacks, according to the World Health Organization.<\/p>\n
The U.N. health agency also denounced Israeli strikes that twice in a matter of three days this week hit Lebanon\u2019s Tebnine Government Hospital, one of the region\u2019s busiest trauma centers, wounding 11 medical workers, damaging the emergency department and pharmacy and ruining critical equipment like ventilators and monitors.<\/p>\n
An ambulance \u2018to bear witness\u2019<\/p>\n
With the ceasefire in effect on Friday, the Nabatiyeh medics rented a tow truck and ventured back to the roadside in Mayfadoun where they had been attacked. The three ambulances sat there, peppered with shrapnel, and the asphalt was stained with blood.<\/p>\n
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They hauled Abu Zeid’s mangled ambulance to a public square in Nabatiyeh, where they said they hoped it would serve as a reminder.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe want this vehicle to bear witness,\u201d said Mahdi Sadeq, a coordinator for the service. \u201cTo bear witness to what happened, to what this war has done to our profession.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Mohammed Suleiman, chief paramedic of the Nabatiyeh Emergency Services, comforts his niece, Israa Jaber, at the service’s temporary…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":255609,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[1939,86199,96302,96303,96304,23681,59373,59371,86205,61262,82,84,83],"class_list":{"0":"post-255608","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-san-antonio","8":"tag-israel","9":"tag-lebanon","10":"tag-lebanon-israel-medics-hezbollah-war-ceasefire-gaza-ambulances","11":"tag-mohammed-jaber","12":"tag-mohammed-suleiman","13":"tag-package-100024-ap-online","14":"tag-package-100373-mc-complete-state-national","15":"tag-product-30598-ap-national-news-report-a-wire","16":"tag-product-32505-ap-online-middle-east-news","17":"tag-product-46986-ap-online-top-stories","18":"tag-san-antonio","19":"tag-san-antonio-headlines","20":"tag-san-antonio-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/255608","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=255608"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/255608\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/255609"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=255608"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=255608"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=255608"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}