Lebanese healthcare workers fearful as growing numbers killed in strikes

[WhiskeyGrinder]

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/oct/03/lebanese-healthcare-workers-fearful-as-growing-numbers-killed-in-strikes

snip

Paramedics say they began to notice a pattern with the strikes: whenever they arrived at a location to start rescue operations, they said Israeli airstrikes would follow. In one case, in the town of Suhmoor in the western Bekaa valley on Monday last week, an ambulance was struck directly after the team left the car. Pictures of the vehicle engulfed in flames circulated in Lebanese media.

Meanwhile, paramedics have begun receiving strange calls with a voice speaking Arabic on the other end, warning them to evacuate their medical centres, said Rabih Issah, a local commissioner of Islamic Kashafat al-Risala medical organisation that serves much of south Lebanon.

Last Wednesday, paramedics in two different villages received calls, forcing the workers to stop their work and evacuate, though the buildings were not bombed. Unlike the wave of Israeli calls that warned 80,000 Lebanese to distance themselves from buildings it alleged contained Hezbollah weapons ahead of Israel’s aerial campaign in south Lebanon the week before, these warnings were directed only at the medical workers.

Human rights experts have said that the targeting of medical workers and false calls for evacuations are forbidden under international law.

[WhiskeyGrinder]

1. kick

[AloeVera]

2. Imagine if this were happening to Israeli medics, targeted as they are helping the wounded.

At least 50 Israeli medics killed so far.

An Israeli medical centre bombed. At least 9 killed, 14 injured.

Several other Israeli hospitals damaged from bombing nearby.

Front-page news in the West. Cries of terrorism! Animals! War Crimes! Crush them!

Instead, we see a blind eye turned to the same cruel playbook that was used in Gaza, now inflicted on Lebanon. The attacks on hospitals and health care workers will accelerate as will Lebanon's destruction.

The hypocrisy and double standards no longer outrage me. Just a feeling of deep despair and disappointment at allowing this to go on. The racism, supremacy and Islamophobia are real. So are the costs of maintaining Western hegemony, hunger for oil and ME resources.

A year ago this would not have been accepted. A year of normalization and impunity and this is where we are, in a barbaric world where only might is right and IHL and commitment to human rights are a sad joke.

[Beastly Boy]

9. Apparently, you didn't finish reading the article.

In fact, you stopped reading in mid-parahraph.

Let me bring your attention back to what you missed: "Of the paramedics killed over the last two weeks, all have belonged to healthcare services affiliated with either Hezbollah or Amal, another Shia political party" Both are internationally recognized as terrorist organizations.

Now, imagine 50 affiliates of an internationally recognized Jewish terrorist organization being killed in combat with Jordanian armed forces as they put down their weapons to provide medical care to other members of that organization.

Something tells me you would be cheering and not paying any attention to Israeli medical center bombed or any hospitals nearby damaged.

Amazing how quickly certain narratives fall apart when viewed in the context of the principle of proportionality.

[maxsolomon]

3. The "Double Tap" method.

Used by the US in Iraq/Afghanistan, IIRC.

The theory is that the 1st rescuers will be fellow militants. It doesn't appear to work out that way.

[AloeVera]

5. I don't believe that.

That would make sense only if these were not strikes on clearly marked ambulances.

Of course in Gaza it's far more blatant. Do you know what happened to Hind Rajab, a 6-year old Palestinian girl trapped in a car with her relatives? She called the Red Crescent, reporting Israeli tanks nearby, her relatives killed. She was begging for help, and they sent an ambulance AND coordinated it with the IDF. Both the ambulance, 2 paramedics and the girl and were blown to pieces.

That's not a Double Tap. I don't believe the multiple strikes on Lebanese medics are either. I don't think a "mistake" is made 50 times or hundreds.

[maxsolomon]

7. That's what I said. It doesn't work out that way.

The IDF appears to be deliberately targeting Medics.

The US bolloxed it up in Iraq/Afghanistan regularly, i.e. hitting wedding parties twice, hitting non-combatant rescuers...

[AloeVera]

8. The U.S. had a policy of using Double Taps.

It was pretty questionable under IHL for distinction and proportionality. Mainly because the 2nd strike was carried out about 30 minutes after the first one. But it hit the same target, not ambulances or hospitals directly. Of course civilian rescuers and medics were killed nonetheless, likely being present for rescue.

What we saw in Gaza and now Lebanon is systematic targeting of medical facilities, ambulances and medics.

In my view, attributing this to any policy of "double tapping" - as if there were valid military reasons for it - is kind of watering down the criminality.

Though I appreciate what you are saying about the practice in general.

[Beastly Boy]

11. Did the article mention any "clearly marked ambulances"?

Where did that invention come from?

[Ping Tung]

4. Decorative medals are given and grand monuments are dedicated to those that kill.

Yet we like to praise ourselves as the pinnacle of evolution.

[malaise]

6. Bibi and his Western allies don't give an

FF.

[Beastly Boy]

10. They are no medical health workers.

from your article: "Of the paramedics killed over the last two weeks, all have belonged to healthcare services affiliated with either Hezbollah or Amal, another Shia political party"

Hamas and Amal aere internationally recognized as terrorist organizations.