Rescue mission turns into a second strike
Lebanon says three emergency workers were killed in a second Israeli strike in the southern town of Majdal Zoun after they went to help people injured in an initial attack on a building. The Ministry of Health said the double strike killed five people in total, including the three civil defence personnel.
Prime Minister Nawaf Salam described the killing of the rescue workers as a heinous crime and accused Israel of committing a new war crime. President Joseph Aoun also condemned the attack, saying it was the latest in a series of strikes against relief and first-aid workers and an example of violations of international law that protects civilians and humanitarian personnel.
According to the Lebanese Civil Defence, the three rescuers were initially trapped under rubble by the second strike and later confirmed dead. The Lebanese army said two of its soldiers were wounded in the same strike while escorting the rescue mission. Media reports cited by Al Jazeera said the army patrol was accompanying the civil defence team at the scene of the original strike, which underscores how quickly the area remained under threat after the first hit.
The episode came as Israeli strikes continued across southern Lebanon despite a US-mediated ceasefire. Al Jazeera reported that attacks on Tuesday killed at least eight people across the country, while the death toll from Israeli attacks since March 2 had risen to 2,534, with 7,863 wounded, according to Lebanon’s Health Ministry. Those figures show how the conflict has continued to exact a heavy toll even when the ceasefire has remained formally in place.
Majdal Zoun has now become part of a wider pattern in which emergency workers are drawn into the aftermath of strikes before the scene is fully secure. That creates a particularly dangerous environment for civil defence teams, who move toward rubble and smoke while armed violence may still be ongoing. The Lebanon government’s language suggests it sees the attack not as a tragic accident but as a direct breach of humanitarian protections.
The Israeli military position was not included in the supplied excerpt, and no independent battlefield assessment was available in the packet. What is clear from the verified reporting is that the sequence of two strikes left five dead, including the workers who had arrived to rescue others.
For Lebanon, the case adds to the burden of trying to shield civilian and medical personnel while hostilities continue in the south. For rescue crews, it is another reminder that the most dangerous call can be the one that comes after the first blast.
