Killed Gaza medic ‘loved helping people’

Rifaat Radwan’s family describe their sorrow at losing their son, in this AFP report.

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Umm Rifaat Radwan, the mother of a Gaza medic killed alongside 14 colleagues by Israeli soldiers, had hoped her son’s body would not be among those retrieved after the attack.

Rifaat Radwan was part of a team of medics and rescuers from the Palestine Red Crescent Society and Gaza’s civil defence agency who were shot dead on March 23 near Rafah as they responded to calls for help after an Israeli air strike.

Their deaths sparked international condemnation and renewed scrutiny over the risks aid workers face in Gaza, where war has raged since Hamas's Oct 7, 2023 attack on Israel triggered Israel's military campaign.

Israel’s army chief, Lt Gen Eyal Zamir, has ordered an investigation into the March 23 incident.

The bodies of the 15 emergency personnel were discovered buried in the sand days later, and were recovered in two separate operations, the United Nations and the Red Crescent said.

“They began pulling them out two by two” from a hole, Umm Rifaat, 48, told AFP, describing how the bodies were retrieved from what rescuers called a “mass grave”.

“I thought maybe he wasn’t among them — perhaps he had been detained. I even prostrated after the afternoon prayer in gratitude.

“Then my husband told me that Rifaat had been found inside the hole,’ she said.

The 23-year-old Rifaat and his family hailed from Rafah, but had been displaced during the war to the central Gazan city of Deir el-Balah.