It should be outrageous enough when the Israeli military, or any military for that matter, launches strikes on a hospital. The world has allowed that to become routine in Gaza, however, to our great shame. But what the Israeli military did Monday morning before the rolling cameras of Gaza’s heroic journalists somehow managed to reach a new depth of evil for the entire world to see.
Moments after the Israeli military struck the Nasser Medical Complex in southern Gaza, itself a war crime, heroic Palestinian first responders rushed to the scene as they have done day in and day out for two years of genocide to try to rescue victims of the strike and dig survivors out of the rubble. Heroic Palestinian journalists, putting their life on the line day in and day out as well, documented the scene, broadcasting the rescue operation live.
That is precisely when the second Israeli missile hit the same spot, killing the journalists, the medics, and others who may have survived the first strike. “Double-tap” strikes are designed for maximum killing and specifically aimed at wiping out not just those targeted by the first missile, but those that come to the rescue like medics and those who come to document it like journalists. Israel is no longer just carrying out war crimes in Gaza, but layers and layers of war crimes at a time.
This op-ed was published by The New Republic on August 25, 2025. To read more, click here
Featured image credit: Shutterstock/Anas Mohammed
