The Israeli military has acknowledged for the first time that its troops fired on the car carrying five-year-old Palestinian girl Hind Rajab and six members of her family in Gaza in January 2024, announcing it has ordered a criminal investigation into the killings. The admission, made on Wednesday, ends more than two years of official denial and comes alongside separate investigations into the deaths of 15 Palestinian emergency workers in March 2025.

Hind died after a desperate three-hour phone call to the Palestinian Red Crescent on 29 January 2024, in which she pleaded to be rescued. The family's car had been struck as they tried to flee an Israeli offensive into Gaza City; all other passengers were killed. The military also confirmed on Wednesday that its troops had fired on the ambulance dispatched to save her, killing paramedics Yousef al-Zeino and Ahmad al-Madhoun — the last communication from the crew came as they reported being close to Hind's location, just before Israeli forces were said to be checking them. The bodies of Hind, her relatives, and the two medics were not recovered until 12 days later, when Israeli troops withdrew from the area. The IDF had initially denied any of its forces were present in the neighbourhood of Tel al-Hawa where the incident occurred, but investigations by journalists and human rights organisations had already found strong evidence implicating nearby Israeli tanks. The military now says troops fired on a vehicle "moving contrary to prior notice" issued in a military evacuation announcement, and cited "alleged failures in the coordination" of the ambulance's movement as grounds for opening a criminal inquiry.

The announcement is part of a broader release of reviews into five high-profile incidents from the Gaza conflict. The military also said it would open a criminal investigation into the killing of 15 Palestinian medics, civil defence workers, and a UN employee in Rafah, in southern Gaza, on 23 March 2025, when Israeli forces fired on clearly marked emergency vehicles responding to a call. The bodies were found a week later buried in shallow graves alongside destroyed vehicles. The IDF initially claimed the convoy was driving in darkness without lights or emergency signals, but later retracted that account after footage recovered from a killed paramedic's phone showed lights and logos clearly visible. However, the military decided against criminal investigations in three other cases, including the April 2024 airstrike on World Central Kitchen vehicles that killed seven aid workers — among them Australian humanitarian worker Zomi Frankcom — and the deaths of four Médecins Sans Frontières staff in late 2023 and early 2024. On the World Central Kitchen case, the military said commanders had mistaken passengers for armed Hamas operatives and that the convoy had deviated from a pre-agreed route, but concluded there was no "reasonable suspicion of criminal misconduct."

The admissions have been met with scepticism by human rights organisations and the families of victims. Hind's grandmother, also named Hind Rajab, told reporters she had no faith in Israel's judicial system. "Everyone knew Hind was an innocent child, and she asked for help, but nobody helped. The Israeli soldiers killed her deliberately," she said, calling for any accountability process to be part of an international mechanism. Rights group Yesh Din, which monitors Israeli military law enforcement, noted that over the past decade only a tiny proportion of criminal investigations into soldiers' conduct had resulted in indictments, and that sentences handed down in the rare cases of conviction were disproportionately lenient. A UN report published earlier this year described "a pervasive climate of impunity" in Israeli military conduct in occupied Palestinian territory.

The case of Hind Rajab became one of the most widely known individual tragedies of the Gaza conflict, prompting international outcry and inspiring a documentary film, "The Voice of Hind Rajab," which was nominated for an Academy Award. The IDF said its review process reflects obligations under both international law and Israeli domestic law to examine "exceptional incidents that occurred during combat," noting it has been operating across multiple fronts for over a thousand days. Critics, however, argue the investigations are designed primarily to forestall international legal proceedings — in particular from the International Criminal Court — rather than deliver genuine accountability. The Gaza war began after Hamas's 7 October 2023 attack on southern Israel, which killed approximately 1,200 people and saw 250 taken hostage. Israel's subsequent military campaign has killed more than 73,000 people in Gaza, according to the Hamas-run health ministry, figures the UN considers credible.