Gaza Medic Missing Since Israeli Attack Is in Israeli Custody, Palestinian Group Says

A Gaza paramedic for the Palestine Red Crescent Society who has been missing since Israeli forces ambushed a group of ambulances and other aid vehicles in late March is in Israeli custody, the Red Crescent and the International Committee of the Red Cross said on Sunday.

Israeli forces killed 15 other rescue and aid workers in the same attack, buried their bodies in a mass grave and crushed their ambulances, their fire truck and a United Nations vehicle — actions that have drawn international condemnation and scrutiny.

Witnesses have said that Asaad al-Nasasra, 47, the paramedic who disappeared after the March 23 attack, survived but was detained and taken away by Israeli soldiers. But there had been no official word of his whereabouts until Sunday, when the Red Crescent said the I.C.R.C. had notified it that he was being held by Israel.

The Red Cross said in a statement that it had received information that Mr. al-Nasasra was being held “in an Israeli place of detention.”

Asked for comment, the Israeli military replied with a statement that it had released last week saying that it was still investigating the attack. It has said it will not comment further until the investigation is complete.

The Israeli military has offered changing explanations for why its troops fired on the emergency vehicles, first saying that they had been “advancing suspiciously” without their lights on until a video of the attack contradicted that account. It initially said nine of those killed had been operatives from Hamas or Palestinian Islamic Jihad, another militant group, before saying, without providing evidence, that six operatives were killed in the attack.

Nebal Farsakh, a Red Crescent spokeswoman, said the organization had been given no other information about Mr. al-Nasasra’s condition or why he remained in detention.

Mr. al-Nasasra, who has worked for the Red Crescent for almost 16 years, is married with six children, she said. He is from Rafah, Gaza’s southernmost city, but was living in a tent with his family after being displaced during the war, she said.

Mr. al-Nasasra was part of a convoy of emergency crews sent by the Red Crescent and Gaza’s Civil Defense, another rescue service, to search for a Red Crescent ambulance that had disappeared earlier in the morning of March 23. Israeli forces had opened fire on that first ambulance, killing two members of its crew and detaining the third, Munther Abed, according to both the Israeli military and Mr. Abed, who was later released.

When the rescue convoy arrived on the scene and paramedics got out to look at the first ambulance, Israeli soldiers began shooting again in a barrage that lasted about five minutes, according to the video of the attack, which was discovered on the cellphone of one of the paramedics who was killed, published by The New York Times and later released by the Red Crescent.

Soldiers found Mr. al-Nasasra alive after firing on the convoy and detained him alongside Mr. Abed, the survivor from the first ambulance, Mr. Abed told The Times in an interview. Two other witnesses who were held with the paramedics — Saeed al-Bardawil, a doctor, and his 12-year-old son, Mohammed, who had been detained as they headed to the beach to fish — confirmed Mr. Abed’s account.

Mr. al-Nasasra was stripped, handcuffed and blindfolded, Mr. Abed and Dr. al-Bardawil recalled.

The two paramedics spoke in whispers about the fate of their colleagues, Mr. Abed said. The Israeli soldiers detaining them later questioned the paramedics, asking them for their names, ages and ID card numbers, and appeared to scan their faces with a device Mr. Abed did not recognize, Mr. Abed said.

At some point, Mr. Abed and Dr. al-Bardawil recalled, Mr. al-Nasasra was taken elsewhere and they had no more contact with him.

In all, Israeli troops killed eight Red Crescent paramedics, six other emergency responders from the Civil Defense, and a United Nations worker who happened to drive by later that morning, according to the Red Crescent and the Civil Defense. Their bodies were not found for days.