Eyewitnesses recount three deadly Israeli strikes on medics in southern Lebanon

Mohammed Suleiman, chief paramedic of the Nabatiyeh Emergency Services, comforts his niece, Israa Jaber, at the service's temporary center in Nabatiyeh, southern Lebanon, Friday, April 17, 2026. (AP Photo/Hassan Ammar) 2026-04-18T09:30:32Z Nabatiyeh, Lebanon (AP) — It was late morning when two ambulances slowed to a stop outside of the village of Mayfadoun in southern Lebanon. Having heard minutes earlier on Wednesday that Israel had attacked two other ambulances, hitting one and then the other after it showed up to help the first, they didn’t hesitate before rushing to the scene. They knew the danger, and they found a hellscape. The first two ambulances were destroyed, their tires blown and windows shattered. Six of their eight crew members were covered in blood and lying in the road or the back of one vehicle. A paramedic in one of the driver’s seats, blood pulsing from his abdomen, was cradling a colleague in his lap, pleading with him to stay conscious. “I felt sick. I couldn’t believe my eyes,” Mohammed Jaber, 43, told The Associated Press on Friday from his emergency team’s headquarters in Nabatiyeh, where team members dozed on foam mattresses. A 10-day truce in the Israel-Hezbollah war delivered the exhausted team a rare respite from the drum line of explosions. Jaber said he and the others hurried to load the most critically injured into their working ambulances. As team leader Mahdi Abu Zaid ran to close the doors, they, too, were attacked. The three strikes , which killed four paramedics and wounded six others, is the latest example of Israel’s willingness to target Lebanon’s health sector . (