A photo taken on 1 April, 2018, shows Palestinian medic Razan al-Najjar treating injured persons at an emergency medical tent during protests in Gaza near the boundary with Israel. Al-Najjar was fatally shot by an Israeli sniper as she was helping injured protesters near Khan Younis on 1 June, 2018. Ashraf Amra APA images.

By Middle East Eye Staff – Feb 27, 2025

Whenever an air strike targeted the southern Lebanese city of Nabatieh, Hussein Jaber’s response was always the same.

Wearing just a thin flak jacket over his T-shirt and trousers, the 30-year-old rescue worker would jump into the back of a war-battered ambulance and speed off towards the danger despite everyone else fleeing in the opposite direction.

For over 14 months, this was his daily routine.

He would spend day after day racing towards bombed-out buildings to try and save those who had survived, and recover the bodies of those who did not.

The work was dangerous. He and his team faced constant threats: from unexploded ordnances to the floor beneath them giving way after multiple Israeli aerial attacks.

But amongst the most significant threats they faced was one that would claim the lives of more than 200 other Lebanese healthcare workers.

In Under Fire: Israel’s War on Medics, a new documentary filmed before Israel and Hezbollah agreed to abide by a US-brokered ceasefire, several Lebanese paramedics, rescue workers, government officials and independent experts told Middle East Eye that they believe the disproportionately high death toll among Lebanese healthcare professionals was due to their specific and deliberate targeting by the Israeli military.

According to the United Nations and the Lebanese health ministry, aid and health workers accounted for at least 222 of the more than 4,000 people killed in Israel’s war on Lebanon.

Under international law, the targeting of any first responder or health worker not partaking in armed conflict is illegal, even if they’re funded or run by fighting groups like Hezbollah.

Jaber recalled one such incident to MEE, saying that during Israel’s relentless aerial campaign on the southern city of Nabatieh, several of his colleagues were injured – and one of them killed – when Israeli forces terrorised the area with so-called “double-tap” strikes.

A double-tap strike involves hitting a target, waiting a few minutes for the first responders to arrive, and then hitting the same spot again.

“It was 16 October and Nabatieh was hit by a series of heavy air strikes. The martyr [Najih Fahas] was checking the water supply [of a fire truck close to our civil defence offices]. Suddenly, we heard a loud bang and thick black smoke filled the air. We couldn’t breathe,” he said.

“We heard his (Najih’s) voice from a distance and rushed to him immediately. He was bleeding heavily.

“We started making our way to the hospital, but on the way, we were hit by another strike right next to us. The ambulance, it was a surreal sight, was thrown into the air and then crashed back down,” he said. “It was struck by a barrage of shrapnel and debris,” he added.

Nabatieh was among one of the hardest-hit areas in southern Lebanon and a frequent target of Israeli bombardment before a ceasefire went into effect on 26 November. Many of its apartment buildings, shops, and schools were destroyed and more than three months on, several of its neighbourhoods still remain cut off from basic services such as water and electricity.

Mohammed Amasha, a former rescue worker who was forced to retire and relocate to the capital Beirut after sustaining life-altering injuries in an Israeli air strike, struggled to hold back tears when recalling the day that four of his colleagues were killed.

“I remember my intestines were outside my body,” he said.

“There was no justification for bombing civil defence units or ambulances. We were in an open area – clearly visible – with the fire brigade and everything in plain sight. I don’t know why this happened.”

‘Central tenet of Israeli military doctrine’

Israel has never denied targeting emergency vehicles such as ambulances and fire brigades, but has instead repeatedly accused Hezbollah of transporting and hiding fighters and weapons inside such vehicles, a tactic the movement vehemently denies.

In October, the Israeli military’s spokesman for Arabic media, Avichay Adraee, posted an animated video on X showing an armed Hezbollah fighter inside an ambulance full of weapons, with a message urging civilians not to use certain emergency services.

He also warned medical teams against cooperating with Hezbollah and declared that “necessary measures will be taken against any vehicle transporting gunmen, regardless of its type”.

Speaking to MEE, Lebanon’s health minister, Firass Abiad, rubbished Israel’s claim that it never targets civilians or civilian infrastructure, saying: “When Israel boasts about its intelligence, that it really knows what’s happening, not only in streets, but even in apartments, it’s very difficult not to see in this a targeted attack.”

A growing body of international legal experts and jurists have alleged that Israel committed war crimes in both Lebanon and Gaza through its repeated attacks on medical personnel.

In 2006, during Israel’s last major war against Hezbollah, several international organisations had concluded that Israel targeted ambulances in Lebanon, clearly marked with Red Cross or Red Crescent symbols.

Ghassan Abu-Sittah, a plastic surgeon who worked in Gaza over the last year and is now in Beirut, said the attacks on medical workers were reminiscent of Israeli tactics in Gaza.

“It’s obvious that the destruction of the healthcare system is now a central tenet of Israeli military doctrine,” he said.

“Israel believes that you can only ethnically cleanse an area if you destroy the healthcare system – which is a critical component of life.”

On Wednesday, the Israeli rights group, Physicians for Human Rights Israel (PHRI), accused Israel of systematically targeting Palestinian healthcare workers in Gaza, arbitrarily detaining them without charge and submitting them to torture and abuse.

Healthcare workers told PHRI they had experienced sexual abuse, beatings, dog attacks, starvation, sensory overload and also had boiling water poured over them.

Israel is currently locked in trial proceedings at the UN’s highest court on genocide charges, and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and former Defence Minister Yoav Gallant have both been issued arrest warrants by the International Criminal Court (ICC) for alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity.

The Israeli military has not openly investigated any of the targeted strikes against emergency workers or medics in either Lebanon or Gaza.

MEE reached out to the Israeli military and foreign office for comment but received no response by the time of publication.

Source