AN aid worker who went missing after his colleagues were killed and buried in a shallow grave by IDF soldiers is being held be Israeli authorities, the Red Cross has claimed.
Palestine Red Crescent Society paramedic Assad Al-Nsasrah went missing in late March after 15 humanitarian workers were killed in an attack by Israel.
The International Red Cross/Red Crescent said it was the deadliest attack on its personnel in eight years.
Phone footage was then released from one of 15 Palestinian medics killed, which contradicted Israeli claims that the medics’ vehicles did not have emergency signals on when troops opened fire on them in southern Gaza.
The footage shows the Red Crescent and Civil Defence teams driving slowly with their emergency vehicles’ lights flashing, with the logos visible, as they pulled up to help an ambulance that had come under fire earlier.
Hisham Mhana, the spokesperson for the ICRC in Gaza, has now confirmed the agency has received information that Al-Nsasrah was being held in an Israeli place of detention.
"As per standard practice, we informed the families immediately. In this case, we also informed the Palestine Red Crescent Society as they have special standing as a partner of the International Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement," he said.
In a post on Twitter/X, the PRCS demanded the immediate release of Al-Nsasrah, who it said was "forcibly abducted" while carrying out humanitarian duties.
The statement read: "We have been informed by the International Committee of the Red Cross that PRCS medic Assad Al-Nsasrah is being held by the Israeli occupation authorities. His fate had remained unknown since he was targeted along with other PRCS medics in Rafah.
"We call on the international community to pressure the occupation authorities to immediately release our colleague, medic Asaad, who was forcibly abducted while carrying out his humanitarian duties.
"He and his colleagues came under heavy gunfire, which led to the killing of eight of them — a grave violation of international humanitarian law."
The Israeli military previously said that a thorough inquiry into the incident was still underway and that it would provide further details only once the investigation is complete.
It added initial inquires showed that "the troops opened fire due to a perceived threat following a previous encounter in the area, and that six of the individuals killed in the incident were identified as Hamas terrorists", but provided no evidence for these claims.
