AP reporting calls into question why and how Israel attacked a Gaza hospital

By SAM MEDNICK and SAMY MAGDY Associated Press TEL AVIV Israel AP Associated Press reporting into an Israeli attack on a Gaza Strip hospital that killed people including five journalists raises serious questions about Israel s rationale for the strikes and the way they were carried out Among those killed was Mariam Dagga who worked for AP and other news organizations Israeli forces struck a position well known as a journalists gathering point because a military official declared they assumed a camera on the roof was being used by Hamas to observe troops The official cited suspicious behavior and unspecified intelligence but the only detail given was that there was a towel on the camera and the person with it which the army interpreted as an effort to avoid identification Hamas has been designated as a terrorist organization by the United States Canada and the European Union AP has gathered new evidence indicating the camera in question indeed belonged to a Reuters video journalist who routinely covered his equipment with a white cloth to protect it from the scorching sun and dust The journalist Hussam al-Masri was killed in the initial strike This photo taken on Aug shows Reuters videographer Hussam Al-Masri in a white shirt standing next to his video camera covered with a towel on the outside stairs of Nasser Hospital AP Photo Mariam Dagga The evidence calls into question why Israeli forces went through with the strike Bystanders say Israel frequently observed the position by drone including about minutes before the attack giving an opportunity to correctly identify al-Masri AP s findings also reveal other troubling decisions from the Aug attack Soon after the first strike Israeli forces hit the same position again after health and urgency workers had reached the scene to treat the injured and as journalists including Dagga had rushed to cover the news The strike has raised accusations of a double tap a type of attack intended to kill those responding to casualties and which experts in international law say is a attainable war crime Troops used high-explosive tank shells to strike a hospital instead of more precise guided weapons that might have resulted in fewer casualties In all Israel struck the hospital four times the AP detected each time without warning The Israeli military refused to comment when appealed if it hit the wrong person and has presented no evidence for their indicates It says it is still inspecting but in their initial inquiry described gaps in how the attack was carried out Israel has explained none of the journalists killed were intended targets nor were they linked to Hamas Israeli fire has killed Palestinian reporters in Gaza according to the Committee to Protect Journalists Israel has barred foreign journalists from entering Gaza since the war erupted in October giving Palestinian journalists a critical role in covering the conflict The AP s analysis is based on information from current and former Israeli military leaders other bureaucrats and weapons analysts and accounts from nearly people who were in or near the hospital at the time of the strikes The attack has galvanized global anger as Israeli forces push ahead with a major offensive in famine-stricken Gaza City exposing its population to even greater danger from Israeli bombardment and military operations Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu called it a tragic mishap but stopped short of apologizing This frame grab taken from a video published by Al Ghad TV shows the outside stairs of Nasser Hospital shortly after the first of two rounds of Israeli strikes hit the site minutes apart in Khan Younis southern Gaza Strip Monday Aug Al Ghad TV via AP This frame grab taken from a video disclosed by Reuters shows a man holding a journalist s camera equipment at Nasser Hospital shortly after the first of two rounds of Israeli strikes hit in Khan Younis southern Gaza Strip Monday Aug Reuters via AP This frame grab taken from a video distributed by Al Ghad TV shows AP freelancer Mariam Dagga bottom left and other journalists rescue workers hospital staff and others as they arrive to document the scene and help the wounded at Nasser Hospital shortly after the first of two rounds of Israeli strikes hit in Khan Younis southern Gaza Strip Monday Aug Al Ghad TV via AP This frame grab taken from a video disclosed by Reuters shows several people trying to remove a body from the the outside stairs of Nasser Hospital shortly after the first of two rounds of Israeli strikes in Khan Younis southern Gaza Strip Monday Aug Reuters via AP People walk up stairs to the site of an Israeli strike at Nasser Hospital minutes before a second round of strikes hit the same spot in Khan Younis Gaza Strip Monday Aug This was one of the last photos taken by journalist Mariam Dagga who freelanced for The Associated Press and other outlets before she walked to the site and was killed AP Photo Mariam Dagga This frame grab taken from a video published by Al Ghad TV shows the second of two rounds of Israeli strikes hitting the outside stairs of Nasser Hospital minutes after the first in Khan Younis southern Gaza Strip Monday Aug Al Ghad TV via AP This frame grab taken from a video disclosed by Al Ghad TV shows the second of two rounds of Israeli strikes hitting the outside stairs of Nasser Hospital minutes after the first in Khan Younis southern Gaza Strip Monday Aug Al Ghad TV via AP This frame grab taken from a video published by Al Ghad TV shows a severely wounded person after the second of two rounds of Israeli strikes hit the outside stairs of Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis southern Gaza Strip Monday Aug Al Ghad TV via AP This frame grab taken from a video published by Al Ghad TV shows people fleeing after the second of two rounds of Israeli strikes hit the outside stairs of Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis southern Gaza Strip Monday Aug Al Ghad TV via AP FILE In this family handout photo a person shows the blood-stained camera that freelance journalist Mariam Dagga was carrying when she was killed in an Israeli strike on Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis southern Gaza Strip Monday Aug Family Handout via AP File Fragments of one of the projectiles from Israeli strikes that hit the outside stairs of Nasser Hospital are displayed at the site in Khan Younis Gaza Strip Monday Aug UGC via AP This satellite photo from Planet Labs PBC shows Israeli tanks and armored vehicles operating northeast of Khan Younis Gaza Strip Aug Planet Labs PBC via AP Show Caption of This frame grab taken from a video disclosed by Al Ghad TV shows the outside stairs of Nasser Hospital shortly after the first of two rounds of Israeli strikes hit the site minutes apart in Khan Younis southern Gaza Strip Monday Aug Al Ghad TV via AP Expand Covering a camera with a cloth Before the attack the Reuters journalist al-Masri was positioned with his video camera high up on an external stairwell of Nasser Hospital A photograph taken by Dagga in mid-August shows al-Masri on the same stairwell next to his camera with a white cloth draped over it In the weeks before the strikes al-Masri had broadcast live almost daily from the stairwell according to other journalists who worked there and hospital representatives Five journalists explained the AP that he often used the cloth It is common practice for video journalists around the world including in Gaza to use such high positions and to cover their cameras to protect them from the elements Nasser Hospital one of the scarce functioning hospitals in Gaza has been a vital location for Palestinian reporters It is a central point for reporting on dead and wounded from Israeli strikes shootings of Palestinians seeking aid and on malnourished people brought in daily The Wi-Fi signal offered a rare reliable link to transmit news Photographers and videographers used the building s external staircase for months to get a bird s-eye view of the city of Khan Younis and in the affair of global news agencies like Reuters and AP to supply live video footage to newsrooms around the world The AP had repeatedly informed the army that its journalists were stationed there An Israeli military official declared that several days before the attack Israeli forces spotted a camera on the roof and were tracking suspicious behavior which he did not specify The official explained the military assumed Hamas was using the camera to monitor its forces and disclosed the camera and the man operating it had what they described as a towel draped over them suggesting an effort at concealment The official spoke on condition of anonymity in line with regulations A second person was killed in the strike that hit al-Masri Hospital agents have identified all dead saying they were a mix of vitality and rescue workers journalists and relatives of patients But they announced they could not be certain which of them was the other person killed in the first strike since all the bodies were collected at the same time There has been no evidence of a second camera at the site where al-Masri was killed At about the same time as the first stairway was hit Israel struck another part of the hospital according to onlookers and video footage showing smoke rising from the location Israel has struck hospitals and journalists on repeated occasions throughout the war Both are supposed to be protected under international law but hospitals can lose those protections if they are used for military purposes and journalists can too if they are armed or take part in hostilities Israel has accused Hamas of operating in or around hospitals but has provided limited evidence During the war Hamas shield men have often been seen inside hospitals blocking access to particular areas of the facilities Based on analysis of the footage at the time of the attack and speaking to multiple eyewitnesses there is no evidence that anyone killed in the strikes was armed Double-tap strikes The Israeli military has given no explanation why it carried out a second round of strikes After the first attack a crowd of medics journalists and others made their way up the staircase Ibrahim Qannan a correspondent with Cairo-based Al-Ghad TV who was filming from below stated another journalist Moaz Abu Taha waved to to him and shouted down to him Hussam was martyred Within minutes two more loud blasts struck the staircase Video analysis revealed the flashes of two projectiles and the booms of two explosions Among those killed was Dagga who had just snapped her last photos before heading up the stairs and Abu Taha Dagga s brother Sediq had spent the previous night with her and saw her filming from the stairs moments before she was killed I rushed upstairs and recovered her body he noted Double-tap strikes which hit crowds that move into areas to rescue casualties from initial strikes have notoriously been used by al-Qaida and other extremist groups as well as Russia s military and forces loyal to former Syrian President Bashar Assad First responders and other civilians are often harmed in such attacks Experts in international law say multiple aspects of this attack could point to expected war crimes including targeting a hospital without warning and the double-tap strategy that puts civilians in danger Israel Ziv a retired general who once led the Israeli army s operations directorate announced a double-tap strike would violate the army s rules of engagement Raed al-Nims head of the Palestinian Red Crescent s media department in Gaza stated double tap strikes have happened multiple times in the war hitting the group s ambulances and personnel after the arrive at the scene of attacks Israel declined to comment citing the ongoing scrutiny Tank fire was not supposed to have been used AP analyzed videos of the attack and determined that Israel fired tank shells in the strikes which the Israeli military established following their initial inquiry Ziv mentioned less deadly and more precise options than tank fire were available There is no good explanation for that he stated An official with knowledge of the attack reported the tank wasn t supposed to have been used but was unable to say what the original plans were The official spoke to AP on condition of anonymity to discuss the ongoing assessment A munitions expert who analyzed photos of shrapnel from the hospital obtained by AP disclosed it came from high-explosive shells fired by a tank The remnants show parts of at least three fin-stabilized tank gun projectiles consistent with those used by Israel commented N R Jenzen-Jones director of Armament Research Services an Australian consulting firm Satellite imagery from the afternoon of the day of the strike shows Israeli tanks and armored vehicles operating about kilometers miles northeast of the hospital The same brigade that carried out these strikes the Golani Brigade was involved in the March shooting of an ambulance convoy in southern Gaza that killed Palestinian medics An initial probe of that attack by Israeli forces located a chain of professional failures and a deputy commander was fired Discrepancies over Israeli suggests of fighters A day after the strikes Israel gave the names of six men who it disclosed were combatants killed in the attack But this announcement also raised troubling discrepancies It provided no evidence and one man on its list Omar Kamel Shahada Abu Teim does not appear on the hospital s list of casualties obtained by the AP Doctors and morgue workers mentioned no one by that name was killed and unlike with the other five Israel did not provide a picture Another person named Jumaa al-Najjar was a fitness care worker employed by Nasser Hospital according to the morgue list Another Imad al-Shaer was a driver for Gaza s Civil Defense first responders The other three names appear on the casualty list but no other details about them were right now available Israel also did not say if any of the six were killed in its initial strike on the camera Preponderance were killed in the second round of strikes and administrators have not mentioned whether they were identified among the crowd on the stairwell before troops struck it The Physical condition Ministry and the Civil Defense are part of the Hamas-run establishment Israel has in the past claimed that certain urgency responders were fighters That was the scenario in the March attack that killed medics A joint letter from the AP and Reuters expressed outrage at the strikes and demanded answers Unfortunately we have detected the Israeli military s willingness and ability to investigate itself in past incidents to rarely end in clarity and action raising serious questions including whether Israel is deliberately targeting live feeds in order to suppress information they commented In the past Israel has acknowledged targeting and killing journalists it accuses of being combatants assertions denied by them and their employers The military says it tries to avoid harming civilians and blames their deaths on Hamas because it operates in densely populated areas Jody Ginsberg the CEO of the Committee to Protect Journalists announced journalists are civilians and must never be targeted in a war To do so is a war crime she announced Magdy communicated from Cairo Associated Press reporters Melanie Lidman and Angela Charlton in Jerusalem and Jon Gambrell in Dubai contributed