The Israeli army has dismissed a commander and reprimanded another over an attack on aid vehicles last month in Gaza that killed 15 Palestinians, which it said resulted from the misidentification of some of the men as Hamas fighters.

Palestinian officials have called the March 23 incident — which involved three Palestinian Red Crescent Service ambulances, two Civil Defense fire trucks and a U.N. car on a road near southern Rafah — a war crime. It took place days after a truce between Israel and Hamas expired and fighting resumed.

The emergency services said 14 of the slain men were medics and rescue workers headed to tend to civilian casualties of an air strike, and that their vehicles were clearly marked. The 15th fatality was a U.N. relief staffer who arrived at the scene separately. The vehicles were later found crushed, while the men were buried in a mass grave.

The incident drew international scrutiny after the Israeli military’s initial claim that the vehicles had been advancing suspiciously without headlights or emergency signals was contradicted by video that later emerged. The IDF later called the account “mistaken.”

The IDF said on Sunday it learned retroactively that six of the dead were Hamas members. It didn’t immediately provide their names or dispute that they may have also been aid workers. None of the men in the convoy were armed, it added.

Hamas called Israel’s claim that some of the men were its members “baseless accusations without evidence,” Mahmoud Mardawi, an official with the militant group, told Bloomberg.

An IDF probe found that the ambulances and firetrucks were attacked due to “an operational misunderstanding by the troops, who believed they faced a tangible threat from enemy forces,” the IDF said, adding that the shooting at the U.N. car “involved a breach of orders during a combat setting.”

A deputy commander of an infantry reconnaissance battalion who had overall responsibility for the incident and who provided an incomplete and inaccurate report during the debrief will be dismissed from his position, the IDF said without elaborating. The brigade colonel above him who held command responsibility will receive a reprimand.

The findings will be submitted to the Military Advocate General’s Office, which could recommend further actions against the troops.

“The IDF regrets the harm caused to uninvolved civilians,” it said.

At dawn, a decision was made to gather and cover the bodies to prevent further harm and clear the vehicles in preparation for civilian evacuation that was to take place on the road, the IDF said.

“The examination concluded that removing the bodies was reasonable under the circumstances, but the decision to crush the vehicles was wrong,” the IDF said.

Mozer Abed, a survivor who was an ambulance crew volunteer with the PRCS, said the group was responding to a distress call by civilians in Tel el-Sultan, a Rafah neighborhood where the IDF has focused missions against suspected Hamas emplacements.

“As soon as we arrived at the location, we came under heavy and direct gunfire, so I had to lie down in the back of the ambulance. I didn’t hear a single word from my colleagues — I only heard their final gasps,” Abed, 27, told Bloomberg by telephone.

Abed said that, prior to being attacked, the ambulances were “lit from the inside and outside” — an account that was corroborated by the video. The IDF said that the troops, who were using night-vision goggles, didn’t see that clearly.

After the shooting, Abed said he was pulled out and detained for interrogation by the troops, which lasted 15 hours. He witnessed the burial of the bodies and vehicles. Another survivor was also detained and remains in IDF custody. An IDF officer briefing journalists wouldn’t give details on the detention but said the man would likely soon be freed.

Hamas, which the U.S. and European Union consider a terrorist organization, killed some 1,200 people and abducted 250 others in an Oct. 23, 2023 cross-border rampage, triggering the war in Gaza. The ensuing Israeli offensive has killed more than 51,000 Palestinians, including dozens of humanitarian workers, according to the Gaza health ministry, which doesn’t differentiate between combatant and civilian deaths. Israel has lost hundreds of soldiers in the fighting.

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(With assistance from Fadwa Hodali and Alisa Odenheimer.)

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