A 6-year-old Palestinian girl has been confirmed dead 12 days after the vehicle she was traveling in came under fire.
Before her death, the girl made a desperate plea to Gaza humanitarian workers for help. A two-person team was sent to rescue her, but they never returned, leaving the world to wonder what had become of them and the girl.
But what exactly happened?
Hind Rajab was evacuating her home in Gaza with six of her family members when their vehicle was suddenly attacked.
Hind's 15-year-old cousin Layan can be heard on a phone call telling emergency medical responders that there was a tank next to their car.
This is part of that call:
Layan: They are shooting at us. The tank is next to me.
Dispatch: Are you hiding?
Layan: Yes, in the car, we are next to the tank.
Dispatch: Are you inside the car?
Layan: *screams*
After losing contact with Layan, the Palestinian Red Crescent Society was able to speak to Hind, who it says stayed on the phone for more than 3 hours, begging for help:
Hind: Come take me; will you come and take me?
Dispatch: Do you want me to come and take you?
Hind: I'm so scared; please come.
The Red Crescent says it sent an ambulance to Hind's location and informed the Israel Defense Forces that the vehicle was on its way, but lost contact with the ambulance crew that evening.
This kicked off an almost 2-week search for both Hind, who was thought to be the sole survivor of the attack on her family's vehicle, and the ambulance team.
The Red Crescent has now revealed that both the ambulance team and Hind were killed.
Photos and videos shared by the group show that both the vehicle she was in and the ambulance were heavily damaged.
The Red Crescent has accused Israeli forces of "besieging" Hind's car, killing the family, and deliberately targeting its ambulance, despite the Red Crescent alerting the IDF that the emergency vehicle was en route.
Scripps News couldn't independently confirm that the damage to the vehicle and the ambulance was consistent with tank fire — or who attacked the vehicles in the first place.
Satellite imagery of the location from Planet Labs, a commercial satellite company, shows that on Jan. 29, the day the ambulance was dispatched, there were IDF vehicles near the gas station where Hind's family vehicle was found. Later imagery from Feb. 8 shows heavy IDF clearing activity in the area.
So far, Israel's military has yet to comment on the incident.
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