World
Israeli troops killed 15 Palestinian medics and buried them in a mass grave, UN says
DEIR AL-BALAH, Gaza Strip (AP) — Palestinians held funerals Monday for 15 medics and emergency responders killed by Israeli troops in southern Gaza, after their bodies and mangled ambulances were found buried in an impromptu mass grave, apparently plowed over by Israeli military bulldozers.
The Palestinian Red Crescent says the slain workers and their vehicles were clearly marked as medical and humanitarian personnel and accused Israeli troops of killing them “in cold blood.” The Israeli military says its troops opened fire on vehicles that approached them “suspiciously” without identification.
The dead included eight Red Crescent workers, six members of Gaza’s Civil Defense emergency unit and a staffer from UNRWA, the U.N.’s agency for Palestinians. The International Red Cross/Red Crescent said it was the deadliest attack on its personnel in eight years.
Since the war in Gaza began 18 months ago, Israel has killed more than 100 Civil Defense workers and more than 1,000 health workers, according to the U.N.
Here is what we know about what happened.
Missing for days
The emergency teams had been missing since March 23, when they went at around noon to retrieve casualties after Israeli forces launched an offensive into the Tel al-Sultan district of the southern city of Rafah.
The military had called for an evacuation of the area earlier that day, saying Hamas militants were operating there. Alerts by the Civil Defense at the time said displaced Palestinians sheltering in the area had been hit and a team that went to rescue them was “surrounded by Israeli troops.”
“The available information indicates that the first team was killed by Israeli forces on 23 March,” the U.N. said in a statement Sunday night.
Further emergency teams that went to rescue the first team were “struck one after another over several hours,” it said. All the teams went out during daylight hours, according to the Civil Defense.
The Israeli military said Sunday that on March 23, troops opened fire on vehicles that were “advancing suspiciously” toward them without emergency signals.
It said “an initial assessment” determined that the troops killed a Hamas operative named Mohammed Amin Shobaki and eight other militants. Israel has struck ambulances and other emergency vehicles in the past, accusing Hamas militants of using them for transportation.
However, none of the dead staffers from the Red Crescent and Civil Defense had that name, and no other bodies were reported found at the site, raising questions over the military’s suggestion that alleged militants were among the rescue workers.
The military did not immediately respond to requests for the names of the other alleged militants killed or for comment on how the emergency workers came to be buried.
After a ceasefire that lasted roughly two months, Israel relaunched its military campaign in Gaza on March 18. Since then, bombardment and new ground assaults that have killed more than 1,000 Palestinians, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry. The ministry’s count does not distinguish between militants and civilians, but it says over half those killed are women and children.
Aid workers say ambulance teams and humanitarian staff have come under fire in the renewed assault. A worker with the charity World Central Kitchen was killed Friday by an Israeli strike that hit next to a kitchen distributing free meals. A March 19 Israeli tank strike on a U.N. compound killed a staffer, the U.N. said, though Israel denies being behind the blast.
Mass grave
For days, Israeli forces would not allow access to the site where the emergency teams disappeared, the U.N. said.
On Wednesday, a U.N. convoy tried to reach the site but encountered Israeli troops opening fire on people.
The convoy saw a woman who had been shot lying in the road. The dashboard video shows staff talking about retrieving the woman. Then two people are seen walking across the road. Gunfire rings out and they flee. One stumbles, apparently wounded, before he is shot and falls onto his face to the ground. The U.N. said the team retrieved the body of the woman and left.
On Sunday, the U.N. said teams were able to reach the site after the Israeli military informed it where it had buried the bodies, in a barren area on the edges of Tel al-Sultan. Footage released by the U.N shows workers from PRCS and Civil Defense, wearing masks and bright orange vests, digging through hills of dirt that appeared to have been piled up by Israeli bulldozers.
The footage shows them digging out multiple bodies wearing orange emergency vests. Some of the bodies are found piled on top of each other. At one point, they pull out a body in a Civil Defense vest out of the dirt, and it is revealed to be a torso with no legs. Several ambulances and a U.N. vehicle, all heavily damaged or torn apart, are also buried in the dirt.
“Their bodies were gathered and buried in this mass grave,” said Jonathan Whittall, with the U.N. humanitarian office OCHA, speaking at the site in the video. “We’re digging them out in their uniforms, with their gloves on. They were here to save lives.”
“It’s absolute horror what has happened here,” he said.
Funerals
A giant crowd gathered on Monday outside the morgue of Nasser Hospital in the southern city of Khan Younis as the bodies of the eight slain PRCS workers were brought out for funerals. Their bodies were laid out on stretchers wrapped in white cloth with the Red Crescent logo on it and their photos, as family and others held funeral prayers over them. Funerals for the seven others followed.
“They were killed in cold blood by the Israeli occupation, despite the clear nature of their humanitarian mission,” Raed al-Nimis, the Red Crescent spokesperson in Gaza, told the AP.
Israeli troops have killed at least 30 Red Crescent medics over the course of the war. Among them were two killed in February 2024 when they tried to rescue Hind Rajab, a 5-year-old girl who was killed along with six other relatives when they were trapped in their car under Israeli fire in northern Gaza.
From Geneva, the head of the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies, Jagan Chapagain, said the staffer killed last week “wore emblems that should have protected them; their ambulances were clearly marked.”
“All humanitarians must be protected,” he said.
___
Keath and Khaled reported from Cairo
NEWYou can now listen to Fox News articles!
English police are facing mounting scrutiny after officers handcuffed an 18-year-old university student as he bled to death following a fatal stabbing, allegedly after believing the attacker’s false claim that he had been the victim of a racist assault.
The case has sparked outrage across Britain, fueled political debate over policing and prompted calls for the release of body-worn camera footage from the responding officers.
Alan Mendoza, executive director and co-founder of the London-based Henry Jackson Society think tank, told Fox News Digital that the case reflected broader failures in British policing culture. “The killing of Henry Nowak shows how far the rot of political correctness has set into the British policing mentality,” Mendoza said.
“The reflex attitude today appears to be to believe any and every claim that mentions racism,” he added. “It clearly trumped actual murder in this case as a dying Mr. Nowak was arrested on the say-so of his Sikh assailant without any facts being established by the officers attending.”
BRITISH POLICE RELEASE DETAILS ON SUSPECTS AFTER ‘SHOCKING’ TRAIN ATTACK, UPDATE ON VICTIMS
Freshman student Henry Nowak was stabbed many times by Vikram Digwa who used an eight inch ceremonial knife in December 2025. Digwa was found guilty of murder last week. (Hampshire police handout.)
Vickrum Digwa, 23, was convicted Thursday at Southampton Crown Court of murdering Henry Nowak, an 18-year-old finance student at the University of Southampton, during a confrontation on Dec. 3, 2025.
Officers arriving at the chaotic scene initially treated Nowak as the suspect after Digwa allegedly claimed he had been racially abused and attacked. Officers handcuffed Nowak before realizing the severity of his injuries. He later collapsed and died at the scene despite attempts to administer first aid, according to Sky News.
Following the verdict, Hampshire Constabulary publicly apologized and referred the case to the Independent Office for Police Conduct (IOPC), England and Wales’ police watchdog, for investigation. “I’m sorry that he was handcuffed and arrested in the moments before he lost consciousness,” Temporary Deputy Chief Constable Robert France said in a statement reported by Sky News.
Prosecutors told jurors Digwa stabbed Nowak multiple times using a 21-centimeter blade described in court as a Sikh kirpan-style weapon. Digwa claimed he acted in self-defense after being racially abused, but jurors rejected that argument and found him guilty of murder.
The case has since ignited fierce public debate online and in British media over whether police prioritized allegations of racism over basic investigative and medical procedures.
TEXAS PRESS CONFERENCE IN AUSTIN METCALF KILLING DEVOLVES INTO CHAOS OVER TRACK MEET STABBING
Handout photo issued by Hampshire Police of Vickrum Digwa who has been found guilty at Southampton Crown Court of the murder of university student Henry Nowak, who he stabbed to death with a Sikh kirpan ceremonial knife. Digwa told police a “wicked lie” that he was the victim of a racist attack after he stabbed finance student Henry Nowak, from Chafford Hundred, Essex, five times in the incident in Belmont Road, Southampton, on Dec. 3 2025. Issue date: Thursday, May 28, 2026. (Press Association via AP Images)
Speaking on GB News on Friday, Reform UK Member of Parliament Robert Jenrick called for the release of body-worn camera footage if the Nowak family consents.
“The officers chose to prioritize the accusation of racial abuse over saving the life of this young man,” Jenrick said. “I think that was a terrible mistake.”
Jenrick also criticized what he described as a muted response from Britain’s political establishment compared to reactions following the 2020 death of George Floyd in the United States.
“The Prime Minister says absolutely nothing. The Home Secretary says absolutely nothing.”
The killing has also raised concerns about hostility toward Britain’s Sikh community, which Sikh organizations have sought to distance from the crime.
In a public statement issued following the verdict, Sikh community organizations condemned the killing and stressed that the case should not be viewed as representative of Sikhism.
2 JEWISH MEN STABBED IN LONDON ATTACK CLASSIFIED AS TERRORISM
File of a police car in Derbyshire, England. (Derbyshire Constabulary via Facebook)
“Henry’s life has tragically been cut short by a moment of madness by an individual for which there can be no excuses,” the statement said.
The organizations also acknowledged that “the actions of police officers who handcuffed the victim just before he died” had intensified criticism of police and “unnecessarily stirred up community hatred.”
The statement further emphasized that legal protections allowing Sikhs in Britain to carry ceremonial kirpans for religious purposes do not apply if the blade is used violently.
“We understand in this case the weapon that may have been used was not the normal Kirpan worn by fully practicing Sikhs,” the statement read.
Mendoza stressed that Britain’s Sikh community broadly condemned the murder and supported the investigation.
“It’s legal for Sikhs to carry ceremonial knives in the U.K. but they are almost always tiny ones that religious authorities have ordained are sufficient to fulfil the obligation,” Mendoza told Fox News Digital. “He had one of those, plus his [8 inch] blade.”
CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD THE FOX NEWS APP
A member of the London Met Police stands guard outside Westminster Abbey. (BEN STANSALL/AFP via Getty Images)
He also described Digwa as “a weapons nut,” referencing evidence presented during the trial that prosecutors said showed the defendant had a fascination with knives and weapons.
The IOPC investigation into the officers’ actions remains ongoing. Fox News Digital reached out to Hampshire & Isle of Wight Constabulary for comment but did not receive a response before publication.
Defence Minister Shinjiro Koizumi accuses China of lacking military transparency and stresses the importance of dialogue for regional stability.
Published On 31 May 2026
Japanese Defence Minister Shinjiro Koizumi has dismissed claims that Tokyo is pursuing “new militarism” and accused China of rapidly expanding its military with limited transparency.
China continues to increase its defence spending at a high level, Koizumi said on Sunday at the Shangri-La Dialogue in Singapore.
list of 3 itemsend of listRecommended Stories
“China’s external approach and military activities are matters of serious concern for Japan and the international community at the same time,” he added.
“Think about it. There’s a country that has a huge arsenal of nuclear weapons and strategic bombers. Japan has neither of such weapons, and yet Japan is labelled ‘new militarism’?”
Koizumi said Japan’s record since World War II “speaks for itself”, citing its adherence to international law and commitment to the United Nations Charter alongside efforts to uphold a “free and open international order”.
In May, China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs called on Asia Pacific countries to be vigilant and “jointly resist the reckless actions of Japan’s neo-militarism”.
At the Singapore forum, Chinese delegate Major General Meng Xiangqing criticised Japan.
“I deeply doubt whether a country that has not thoroughly eradicated the toxic legacy of militarism is qualified to talk extensively about defence cooperation on international occasions and whether it can win the trust of the international community, especially the Asian countries it once invaded,” he said.
Ties between Japan and China sank to their worst level in years after Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi warned in November that a hypothetical Chinese attack on Taiwan could draw a Japanese military response.
China claims Taiwan as its own territory over the objections of the island’s government.
Koizumi said transparency comes from “discussion and dialogue” and lamented that China had not sent its defence minister to the conference, but he insisted Japan remains open to engagement.
“We keep the door open,” he said, reaffirming Japan’s commitment to dialogue with China and other regional players to foster stability.
As China has been rapidly expanding and modernising its military, Japan has been reshaping its own defence policy. Last month, Takaichi’s cabinet scrapped a ban on lethal weapons exports, a major change in its post-war pacifist policy.
Japan pushes for unity
Separately on Sunday, Koizumi praised US Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth for his commitment to the Asia Pacific but at the same time stressed the continued need for strong coalitions globally.
“Division weakens deterrence. Unity strengthens deterrence,” he told the conference in Singapore.
“If gaps emerge among the United States, Europe and allies and like-minded countries, forces which take it as an opportunity will surely come in,” he said.
“We must prevent such a situation. We must keep our cooperation going on. Now is the time to make our cooperation even stronger.”
US President Donald Trump has been harsh about fellow members in NATO, and the comments at the Shangri-La conference came the day after Hegseth again chided Western European allies at the forum for not devoting enough resources to defence.
-
Detroit, MI18 minutes agoDetroit Grand Prix father-daughter volunteers help make winner’s circle moments shine
-
San Francisco, CA26 minutes agoTony Vitello just lost the only Giants allies he has left
-
Dallas, TX33 minutes agoFatal crash on LBJ Freeway in Dallas leaves 1 dead, multiple people hospitalized, police say
-
Miami, FL36 minutes agoDeputies searching for 2 men accused of shooting man during attempted robbery in SW Miami-Dade
-
Boston, MA41 minutes agoFriend of Worcester woman killed in Virginia I-95 crash ‘cannot believe she is gone.’ – The Boston Globe
-
Denver, CO48 minutes agoDenver hockey’s Johnny Hicks wins DU Pioneers’ Male Athlete of the Year
-
Seattle, WA51 minutes agoVikings stealing Nolan Teasley from Seahawks might be even worse than it appears
-
San Diego, CA56 minutes agoDining Out — series Part 1: A look at the evolution of La Jolla’s restaurant scene
