On January 7, 2009, as I and a Spanish human rights advocate accompanied Palestinian medics to retrieve the body of a man shot earlier by invading Israeli forces, we were also shot at as the medics carried the body towards the ambulance. It was in Dawwar Zimmo, eastern Jabaliya, near the area which has been occupied by Israeli soldiers since the land invasion began. It’s an area where 10s are thought to have been seriously injured by bombing and shooting from the Israeli army, and where many, many more will lie dead, uncollected for days, or weeks, out of reach of the medics whose duty is to retrieve them. Hassan al-Attal and Jamal had gotten out of the ambulance, a clearly-marked 101 ambulance, and approached the corpse lying in the middle of the street. They wore their PRCS uniforms –Hassan’s was bright red with reflective tape, Jamal’s bright orange and white, also with reflective tape –and approached slowly, hands free of all but a stretched to take away the body. Arce filmed as the medics picked up the dead man, put him on the stretcher and began the retreat towards the ambulance. Arce was still filming when the shots cracked out, rapidly but evidently a targeted sniper’s shot, not a machine gun. Incredibly, Hassan and Jamal continued to try to evacuate the body, running with the dead man, before finally dropping the stretched and fleeing for their lives. It was about 1:30 pm, it was the first day of Israel’s self-declared “cease-fire” and the sniper was aiming at the medical personnel. The ambulance’s siren was still screaming, the driver had been moving quickly away from the sniper, to avoid further hits on us or himself, and we were frantically scouring to see Hassan and Jamal. In the days prior to this attack, 7 medics had been killed since the start of Israel’s air and ground assault on Gaza’s population. Tens more had been injured, and Hassan was to join their ranks. A sniper’s bullet caught his thigh, and as he scrambled into the ambulance, the blood seeping through his pants alerted us to his injury. These medics are all too aware of, many all too familiar with, the mortal risks of their job in the face of invading Israeli soldiers with, apparently, no regard for the Geneva Conventions which should allow and oblige medics to reach the injured and the dead, without fire from the invading army. It was frightening. I thought we’d lost them both, and they are both young, wonderful men doing a job worthy of medals. The 10-15 seconds it took before Hassan and Jamal could jump into the ambulance and pull down its back door were a painfully long stretch, during which I’d feared the worst. As we pulled away, a final bullet caught the back door of the ambulance. Medics worked quickly on Hassan’s thigh injury: the bullet had penetrated from the inside of his upper left thigh, digging into muscle, and exiting a couple of inches from the entry wound. He was impressively brave about it, though obviously in a great deal of pain. The other volunteer’s video footage caught the incident, and is testimony to what we’ve seen, what medics have told us they’ve long endured, and what Israeli authorities belligerently continue to deny: Israel is targeting medical personnel, as Israeli forces target journalists, civilians, and these days in Gaza anything that moves. No sanctuary, no safety, no guarantee of medical service. https://ingaza.wordpress.com/2009/01/12/israeli-sniper-targets-uniformed-medics-what-i-witnessed-in-gaza/ See also: https://ingaza.wordpress.com/2009/01/05/israeli-army-kills-palestinian-medic-with-dart-bomb/ https://ingaza.wordpress.com/2009/03/16/ensuring-maximum-casualties-in-gaza/ https://ingaza.wordpress.com/2010/01/21/rescuers-targeted-one-year-on/

Telesur journalist Alejandro Kirk spoke to me about these weapons and vehicles that have been captured by the DPR and LPR forces, noting the many foreign made weapons sold to Ukraine. Western countries continue selling weapons to Ukraine. On March 20, journalist Alexander Rubinstein wrote of the West’s exorbitant shipping of billions of dollars in weapons to Ukraine over the years. He noted: “At least 32 countries have announced their intention to ship billions of dollars in weapons into Ukraine for use against Russian forces in Ukraine. Photographic evidence shows that these weapons have already ended up in the hands of neo-Nazi paramilitaries – units which have already received training and arms the US and its NATO allies. All of this builds on $3.8 billion in military aid from the United States to Ukraine, the training of 55,000 Ukrainian soldiers by Canada and the United Kingdom, and a longstanding CIA program aimed at cultivating an anti-Russian insurgency. …weapons furnished by NATO allies have been placed in the hands of the Azov Battalion, a neo-Nazi former paramilitary organization incorporated into the Ukrainian National Guard. The governments of Canada, the United States and the United Kingdom have presided over a massive program to train and equip Ukrainian soldiers for a full-scale war with Russia. Trainees have included top commanders of the Azov Battalion. In late February, the European Union opened the floodgates of weapon shipments to Ukraine, approving financing through the aptly-named “European Peace Facility” to reimburse countries sending weapons to the country to the tune of $500 million USD. Another $55 million USD is earmarked for non-lethal military aid. This February, the State Department announced $350 million in additional military aid to Ukraine, bringing “the total security assistance the United States has committed to Ukraine over the past year to more than $1 billion.” Another $200 million was sent in early March, and following Zelensky’s March 16 appeal to Congress for more weapons, Biden is reportedly set to dole out another $800 in military aid including 800 Stinger anti-aircraft systems, 9,000 anti-tank systems, 5,000 rifles, 1,000 pistols, 400 machine guns, 400 shotguns, 400 grenade launchers, 20 million rounds of ammunition, 100 tactical drones, 25,000 sets of body armor and 25,000 helmets. But that’s just the tip of the iceberg. These figures add to the $2.5 billion in military aid the US delivered between 2014 and the summer of 2021, bringing the total to $3.8 billion.” https://thegrayzone.com/2022/03/20/us-neo-nazi-ukraine-afghan-insurgency/ ... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5kq5dhWFIqc