Israeli military launches criminal probes into killings of Hind Rajab and Palestinian paramedics

JERUSALEM (AP) — Israel's military on Wednesday announced its first criminal investigations into troop conduct in the war in Gaza, focusing on the killings of 5-year-old Hind Rajab and her family and of 15 Palestinian paramedics.

The military said it would not launch criminal investigations into three other attacks that killed aid workers from World Central Kitchen and Doctors Without Borders. Its statement said it had completed reviews of 150 incidents of troop conduct in Gaza and made decisions on the five cases.

The military statement did not mention the many other high-profile killings that Israel has pledged to investigate throughout the war, such as the Israeli strikes on a hospital in southern Gaza that killed five journalists in August 2025, including Mariam Dagga, a visual journalist who freelanced for The Associated Press and other news organizations.

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Both the killing of Rajab and her family, trapped in a vehicle and pleading for help by phone in February 2024, and the killing of 15 medics in May 2025 drew international outcry. Independent experts from the U.N. Human Rights Council have said Rajab's killing might constitute a war crime. Rights groups have filed war crimes complaints to the International Criminal Court and requests to indict soldiers they identified as involved in the killing.

Rajab's grandmother, also named Hind Rajab, told the AP by phone that the Israeli investigation is not enough, and called for an international probe into the killing of her granddaughter and all of the hundreds of children killed in Gaza during the war.

"An international investigation is required to uncover the truth and hold all those responsible accountable," she said. "We call for justice, not only for Hind, but for all Gaza children."

The military's statement comes nearly three years after the war began. Israeli strikes continue in Gaza despite a fragile ceasefire.

The 5-year-old was the last alive in a stranded car

The military admitted to firing at the family car carrying Rajab, four of her cousins and her aunt and uncle as they fled an Israeli invasion of Gaza City.

As gunfire sprayed around them, Rajab's cousin, 15-year-old Layan Hamada, called the Palestinian Red Crescent paramedic center, telling them that a tank was approaching and her family had been killed. Seconds later, more gunshots were heard, and Layan's screaming stopped, according to the Red Crescent recording of the call.

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Palestinian paramedics dispatched an ambulance to rescue Rajab, the sole survivor, and stayed on the line until contact was lost. Rajab, her five relatives and two medics from the ambulance were found dead 12 days later.

The military admitted Wednesday that troops had fired toward that ambulance, killing the two medics.

The 15 paramedics had been trying to reach casualties

In the other killing, Israeli troops opened fire on the vehicles of the 15 paramedics as they drove in the southern city of Rafah. The military said one deputy commander had been directed to step down.

Troops shot at an ambulance that was driving to retrieve casualties from an Israeli offensive, then fired on several other emergency vehicles that went out to look for the first one, according to phone footage and the sole survivor of the shootings.

Troops then bulldozed over the bodies and vehicles, burying them in a mass grave. U.N. and rescue workers were only able to reach the site a week later to dig out the bodies.

At the time, U.N. humanitarian chief Tom Fletcher called for "justice and answers."

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"They were killed in their uniforms. Driving their clearly marked vehicles. Wearing their gloves. On their way to save lives. This should never have happened," said Jonathan Whittall, a U.N. official who helped recover the bodies.

The Israeli military initially said it opened fire because the vehicles were "advancing suspiciously" on nearby troops without headlights or emergency signals. But it backtracked from that account after the footage emerged, showing the Red Crescent and Civil Defense teams driving slowly with their emergency vehicle lights flashing and logos visible.

"We are not obligated to prove the truth because it is already proven to the whole world," Eid Azizi, a Palestinian Red Crescent spokesperson, told the AP in a phone call. "We shouldn't have reached this point if they respected and followed the international humanitarian law."

Israel will not criminally probe World Central Kitchen strike

The military said it had decided not to open a criminal investigation into the April 2024 airstrikes that hit a convoy of World Central Kitchen vehicles, killing seven staffers of the U.S.-based aid group, which has distributed food in Gaza throughout the war.

The aid group at the time said it had coordinated with the military over the movement of its cars. The vehicles, which had the group's logo on their roofs visible from the air, were left incinerated and mangled, indicating multiple targeted strikes.

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Wednesday's military statement said it had mistakenly identified several individuals in the vehicles as armed Hamas military operatives, and that the convoy deviated from the previously coordinated route. But it concluded that "the decisions of the commanders did not raise reasonable suspicion of criminal misconduct." At the time, two officers were removed from their positions and three others reprimanded.

The military also decided not to take criminal action over the killings of four staffers from Doctors Without Borders in two separate instances in November 2023 and February 2024. Israel later barred the medical charity from operating in Gaza.

The war's toll keeps growing

The war began on Oct. 7, 2023, when Hamas-led militants killed 1,200 people, mostly civilians, in southern Israel and abducted 251 others. Israel's ensuing war against Hamas in Gaza has killed more than 73,000 people, according to Gaza's Health Ministry.

That includes at least 1,273 people killed in Gaza since a fragile ceasefire took effect in October, according to the ministry. The ministry, part of the Hamas-led government, maintains detailed casualty records that are seen as generally reliable by U.N. agencies and independent experts. It does not give a breakdown of civilians and militants but says women and children constitute about half of the dead.