Israeli military fires deputy commander as it releases findings of investigation into deadly attack on aid workers
The Israeli military has said its investigation into the killing of aid workers in Gaza has found there were “several professional failures, breaches of orders, and a failure to fully report the incident”.
A commanding officer will be reprimanded and a deputy commander will be dismissed following the military investigation, the Israel Defence Forces (IDF) said.
Fifteen aid workers were shot dead by Israeli troops who opened fire on a convoy of vehicles, including ambulances, on 23 March.
They were then buried in a shallow grave where their bodies were found a week later by officials from the United Nations and the Palestinian Red Crescent.
The probe’s findings come after a Sky News investigation earlier this week revealed how the deadly attack unfolded, contradicting Israel’s official account of the killings.
At first, Israel claimed the medics’ vehicles did not have emergency signals on when troops fired their shots, but later backtracked.
Mobile phone footage which was recovered from one of the medics contradicted Israel’s initial account.
In a statement on Sunday, an IDF spokesperson said: “The Commanding Officer of the 14th Brigade will receive a reprimand, which will be recorded in his personal file, for his overall responsibility for the incident, including the procedure of combat and management of the scene afterward.
“The deputy commander of the Golani Reconnaissance Battalion will be dismissed from his position due to his responsibilities as the field commander in this incident and for providing an incomplete and inaccurate report during the debrief.”
Footage was released of the attack on 23 March
‘Poor night visibility’
The investigation found that the deputy commander did not initially recognise the vehicles as ambulances “due to poor night visibility”, according to the spokesperson.
“Only later, after approaching the vehicles and scanning them, was it discovered that these were indeed rescue teams,” they added.
Probe looked at ‘three shooting incidents’
The IDF said that about an hour before the attack on the convoy, Israeli troops fired at what they “identified as a Hamas vehicle” and the forces “remained on high alert for further potential threats”.
In the convoy incident, the IDF said the soldiers “opened fire on suspects emerging from a fire truck and ambulances very close to the area in which the troops were operating, after perceiving an immediate and tangible threat”.
“Supporting surveillance” had reported five vehicles approaching rapidly and stopping near the troops, with passengers quickly disembarking, according to the IDF.
It said the deputy battalion commander “assessed the vehicles as employed by Hamas forces, who arrived to assist the first vehicle’s passengers”, adding that: “Under this impression and sense of threat, he ordered to open fire.”
According to the IDF, six of the 15 killed were “identified in a retrospective examination as Hamas terrorists”.
But the Sky News investigation found no evidence to support this claim.
The IDF also said there was a third incident about 15 minutes later where “the troops fired at a Palestinian UN vehicle due to operational errors in breach of regulations”.
“The troops’ commander initially reported the event, and additional details emerged later in the examination.”
Bodies were buried in mass grave
Eight Red Crescent personnel, six civil defence workers and a UN staff member were killed in the shooting on the convoy by troops carrying out operations in Tel al Sultan, a district of the southern Gaza city of Rafah.
Troops then bulldozed over the bodies along with their mangled vehicles, burying them in a mass grave.
‘Decision to crush vehicles was wrong’
The IDF statement said that at dawn it was decided to “gather and cover the bodies to prevent further harm and clear the vehicles from the route in preparation for civilian evacuation”.
The body removal and vehicle crushing were carried out by field commanders, according to the military.
Removing the bodies was reasonable under the circumstances, but the decision to crush the vehicles was wrong, the investigation concluded, and “in general there was no attempt to conceal the event”.
The probe also found that “the [gun]fire in the first two incidents resulted from an operational misunderstanding by the troops, who believed they faced a tangible threat from enemy forces. The third incident involved a breach of orders during a combat setting”.
The Syrian presidency has announced it’s assembling a special taskforce to try to stop nearly a week of sectarian clashes in the southern Druze city of Sweida.
The presidency called for restraint on all sides and said it is making strenuous efforts to “stop the fighting and curb the violations that threaten the security of the citizens and the safety of society”.
By early Saturday morning, a ceasefire had been confirmed by the US special envoy for Syria, Tom Barrack, who posted on X that Syrian President Ahmed al Sharaa and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had agreed to a ceasefire supported by US secretary of state Marco Rubio.
The post went on to state that this agreement had the support of “Turkey, Jordan and its neighbours” and called upon the Druze, Bedouins, and Sunni factions to put down their arms.
Sky News special correspondent Alex Crawford reports from the road leading to Sweida, the city that has become the epicentre of Syria’s sectarian violence.
For the past 24 hours, we’ve watched as Syria‘s multiple Arab tribes began mobilising in the Sweida province to help defend their Bedouin brethren.
Thousands travelled from multiple different Syrian areas and had reached the edge of Sweida city by Friday nightfall after a day of almost non-stop violent clashes and killings.
“We have come to protect the [Arab] Bedouin women and children who are being terrorised by the Druze,” they told us.
Arab fighters said they had come to protect the Bedouin women and children
Fighters at a petrol station
Every shop and every home in the streets leading up to Sweida city has been burned or ransacked, the contents destroyed or looted.
We saw tribal fighters loading the back of pickup trucks and driving away from the city with vehicles packed with looted goods from Druze homes.
Shops and homes leading up to Sweida city have been burned or ransacked
Several videos posted online showed violence against the Druze, including one where tribal fighters force three men to throw themselves off a high-rise balcony and are seen being shot as they do so.
Doctors at the nearby community hospital in Buser al Harir said there had been a constant stream of casualties being brought in. As we watched, another dead fighter was carried out of an ambulance.
The medics estimated there had been more than 600 dead in their area alone. “The youngest child who was killed was a one-and-a-half-year-old baby,” one doctor told us.
Doctors said there had been a constant stream of casualties due to violence
The violence is the most dangerous outbreak of sectarian clashes since the fall of the Bashar al Assad regime last December – and the most serious challenge for the new leader to navigate.
The newly brokered deal is aimed at ending the sectarian killings and restoring some sort of stability in a country which is emerging from more than a decade of civil war.
Israel and Syria have agreed to a ceasefire, the US ambassador to Turkey has said.
Several hundred people have reportedly been killed this week in the south of Syria in violence involving local fighters, government authorities and Bedouin tribes.
As the violence escalated in the southern province of Sweida, Israel launched airstrikes, including attacks on Wednesday on the defence ministry in Damascus and a target near the presidential palace.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government said it aimed to protect Syrian Druze – part of a small but influential minority that also has followers in Lebanon and Israel.
In a post on X, the US ambassador to Turkey, Tom Barrack, said Israel and Syria had agreed to a ceasefire supported by Turkey, Jordan and others.
“We call upon Druze, Bedouins, and Sunnis to put down their weapons and together with other minorities build a new and united Syrian identity,” Mr Barrack said in a post on X.
The Israeli embassy in Washington and Syrian Consulate in Canada did not immediately comment or respond to requests for comment from the Reuters news agency.
The ceasefire announcement came after the US worked to put an end to the conflict, with secretary of state Marco Rubio saying on Wednesday that steps had been agreed to end a “troubling and horrifying situation”.
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Why is Israel bombing Syria?
After Israel warned it would destroy forces attacking Syrian Druze, Syrian President Ahmed al Sharaa told the minority group in a televised statement on Thursday that “we reject any attempt to drag you into hands of an external party”.
He then claimed Israel has “consistently targeted our stability and created discord among us since the fall of the former regime”.
It comes after the United Nations’ migration agency said earlier on Friday that nearly 80,000 people had been displaced in the region since violence broke out on Sunday.
It also said that essential services, including water and electricity, had collapsed in Sweida, telecommunications systems were widely disrupted, and health facilities in Sweida and Daraa were under severe strain.
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At least three people have been killed after a “horrific incident” at a Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department training facility, officials have said.
A spokesperson for the department said there was an explosion at the Biscailuz Center Academy Training in east LA.
The incident was reported at around 7.30am local time (3.30pm UK time).
Aerial footage from local channel KABC-TV suggests the blast happened in a parking lot filled with sheriff patrol cars and box trucks.
The training centre in east LA. Pic: NBC Los Angeles
Attorney general Pam Bondi wrote on X: “I just spoke to @USAttyEssayli about what appears to be a horrific incident that killed at least three at a law enforcement training facility in Los Angeles.
“Our federal agents are at the scene and we are working to learn more.”
California congressman Jimmy Sanchez said the explosion had “claimed the lives of at least three deputies”.
“My condolences to the families and everyone impacted by this loss,” he said.
Media and law enforcement officials near the explosion site. Pic: AP
The attorney general said in a follow-up post that agents from the FBI and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives are “on the ground to support”.
The mayor of Los Angeles, Karen Bass, said the LAPD bomb squad has also responded to the scene.
“The thoughts of all Angelenos are with all of those impacted by this blast,” she said.
California Governor Gavin Newsom has been briefed on the incident, his press office said in a post on X.
“The Governor’s Office of Emergency Services is in contact with the Sheriff’s Department and closely monitoring the situation, and has offered full state assistance,” it added.
The cause of the explosion is being investigated.
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