An ambulance from the Islamic Health Committee, affiliated with Hezbollah, heading to the site of an Israeli strike in Tyre, on October 21, 2024. (Photo AFP / BILAL KASHMAR)
Lebanon's outgoing Health Minister, Firas Abiad, stated on Friday that 163 rescuers and healthcare workers have been killed in Israeli strikes across the country, just over a year after cross-border exchanges between Hezbollah and Israel began.
The total number of healthcare workers and rescuers killed "has so far reached 163," with "an additional 272 wounded," Abiad said at a press conference dedicated to the "damage caused by Israeli attacks on the health sector in Lebanon." He described these attacks as "direct and intentional," labeling them a "war crime."
He also reported "Israeli attacks" on 55 hospitals, 36 of which were "directly targeted," resulting in the "forced closure of eight hospitals."
Unretrieved Bodies
According to him, the bodies of eight rescuers killed in Israeli attacks on their three ambulances have yet to be retrieved near border villages where heavy fighting is ongoing between Iranian-backed Hezbollah and the Israeli army, which is conducting ground incursions. "The Israeli enemy even refuses to let us retrieve the bodies, which have remained there for two weeks," Abiad lamented. Additionally, six firefighters remain buried under rubble in another southern Lebanese locality, he added.
Israel has also targeted 158 ambulances, 57 fire trucks, and 15 rescue vehicles, according to the minister.
The Israeli military accuses rescuers from the Islamic Health Committee, affiliated with Hezbollah, of transporting fighters and weapons in their ambulances, a claim the group denies. Rescuers, active mainly in southern and eastern Lebanon and in the southern suburbs of Beirut, Hezbollah strongholds that have been heavily bombarded, have repeatedly been targeted by Israeli strikes, resulting in dozens of casualties among their paramedics.
Following nearly a year of cross-border fire, Israel launched a broad bombing campaign across Lebanon on Sept. 23, entering into open war with Hezbollah, which it says it aims to neutralize. Since then, Israeli strikes in Lebanon have killed at least 1,580 people, according to an AFP tally based on Lebanese Health Ministry data, and have displaced over a million people throughout the country.
