Latest news with #childdeaths
Associated Press
2 days ago
- Associated Press
Investigators narrow search for ex-soldier wanted in deaths of 3 young daughters in Washington state
LEAVENWORTH, Wash. (AP) — Authorities in Washington state are focusing their search for an ex-soldier wanted in the deaths of his three young daughters in an area south of where their bodies were discovered more than a week ago. The Chelan County Sheriff's Office issued an alert Monday night for an area near Ingalls Creek and the Valleyhi community, a small neighborhood about 10 miles (16 kilometers) south of Leavenworth. The alert remained in effect Tuesday. Authorities did not specify what prompted them to focus on that area, beyond saying 'he is believed to potentially be in this area.' 'Residents and visitors are urged to secure homes and vehicles, remain vigilant, and report any suspicious activity to 911,' the alert said. 'A heightened law enforcement presence will persist as a precautionary measure.' Investigators have been looking for Travis Caleb Decker, 32, since the night of May 30, when he failed to return the girls to their mother's home in Wenatchee, about 100 miles (160 kilometers) east of Seattle, after a scheduled visit. Three days later, a sheriff's deputy discovered the bodies of 9-year-old Paityn Decker, 8-year-old Evelyn Decker and 5-year-old Olivia Decker down an embankment at the Rock Island Campground west of Leavenworth. The site is about 11 miles (18 kilometers) from the Pacific Crest Trail, which runs from the U.S.-Mexico border to the U.S.-Canada border, and it is connected to the newly focused search area by backcountry trails. Decker was an infantryman in the U.S. Army from March 2013 to July 2021 and deployed to Afghanistan for four months in 2014. He has training in navigation, survival and other skills, authorities said. He once spent more than two months living in the backwoods off the grid. Officials have searched hundreds of square miles, much of it mountainous and remote, by land, water and air. Last September, his ex-wife, Whitney Decker, wrote in a petition to modify their parenting plan that his mental health issues had worsened and that he had become increasingly unstable, often living out of his truck. She sought to restrict him from having overnight visits with the girls until he found housing. An autopsy on Friday determined the cause of death to be suffocation, the sheriff's office said. The girls had been bound with zip ties and had plastic bags placed over their heads.
Sky News
25-05-2025
- Health
- Sky News
Humanitarian chief talks of Gaza 'catastrophe' after doctor's nine children killed
A medical charity chief has spoken out about the deaths of a doctor's nine children in an Israeli airstrike in Gaza, and the "almost impossibility" of providing care in the region. Warning: This article contains graphic details of child deaths Chris Lockyear - the secretary general of Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF), or Doctors Without Borders - told Sky News' Sunday Morning With Trevor Phillips the bodies of nine of paediatrician Alaa al Najjar's 10 children arrived at the Nasser Medical Complex, in the city of Khan Younis, while she was on shift. The attack in southern Gaza on Friday also left her husband, Hamdi al Najjar, severely wounded, and her only surviving son, Adam, aged 11, in a critical condition. The dead brothers and sisters ranged in age from seven months to 12 years old. Mr Lockyear, who has been in contact with some of the MSF team working in the hospital, said: "Our team on the ground were saying that not only were the bodies of her children delivered to her while she was on shift, not only were they burnt, but they were describing them as charcoaled." He continued: "And this hospital, which is one of the very few partially remaining in Gaza to this day, has been subject to three airstrikes in the last two months - at one point killing two people in the surgical ward, which is just an illustration of the complexity, almost impossibility, of providing humanitarian services in Gaza at the moment." Hospitals in Gaza have repeatedly come under attack during the war. The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) claims Hamas has been hiding in them or in tunnels underneath. Four major hospitals have had to suspend medical services in the past week or so due to their proximity to hostilities and attacks, the World Health Organization (WHO) has said. There were 28 attacks on healthcare in Gaza during this period and 697 attacks in total since October 2023. Almost all of the 36 hospitals in the Gaza Strip are damaged or destroyed, according to the WHO, and only 19 remain operational. In total, the bodies of 79 people killed by Israeli strikes were taken to hospitals in a 24-hour period, Gaza's Hamas-run health ministry said on Saturday - a toll that does not include hospitals in the battered north, which it said were now inaccessible. 3:22 Mr Lockyear told Sky News there are "no public hospitals open in the north anymore", and added: "We're seeing the weaponisation of humanitarian assistance. "We're seeing the restriction of the basic essentials of life, such as water and electricity, preventing and further increasing the intolerable situation of this deliberate humanitarian catastrophe which is ongoing in Gaza." Israel says around 300 aid trucks have been allowed through since it lifted an 11-week blockade on Monday, but UN secretary general Antonio Guterres called it a "teaspoon" of what is needed with only about a third of the trucks having been transported to warehouses within Gaza due to insecurity. Uncle tells of fight to save children Ali al Najjar, the uncle of the nine children killed, was involved in trying to save them. "We started to get them out, one by one," he told Sky News. "We got out the third child. Of course, we couldn't identify the children. "They were charred. They had no clothes, no face. They were remains." Two British doctors working at Nasser Hospital described the attack as "horrific" and "unimaginable" for Dr Najjar. The IDF told Sky News: "An IDF aircraft struck a number of suspects who were identified operating from a structure adjacent to IDF troops in the area of Khan Younis. "The Khan Younis area is a dangerous war zone. Before beginning operations there, the IDF evacuated civilians from this area for their own safety. "The claim regarding harm to uninvolved civilians is under review." The war in Gaza began when Hamas-led militants attacked southern Israel on 7 October 2023, killing some 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and kidnapping 251 others. Israel's military response has flattened large areas of Gaza and killed more than 53,000 Palestinians, mostly women and children, according to Gaza's Hamas-run health ministry, which does not differentiate between civilians and combatants in its count.
Sky News
24-05-2025
- Health
- Sky News
Nine of Gazan doctor's 10 children killed in Israeli strike on Khan Younis
Nine of a doctor's 10 children have been killed in an Israeli missile strike on their home in Gaza, which also left her surviving son badly injured and her husband in a critical condition. Warning: This article contains details of child deaths Alaa Al Najjar, a paediatrician at Al Tahrir Clinic in the Nasser Medical Complex, was at work during the attack on her home, south of the city of Khan Younis in southern Gaza, on Friday. Graphic footage shared by the Hamas-run Palestinian Civil Defence shows the bodies of at least seven small children being pulled from the rubble. Rescuers can be seen battling fires and searching through a collapsed building, shouting out when they locate a body, before bringing the children out one by one and wrapping their remains in body bags. In the footage, Dr Al Najjar's husband, Hamdi Al Najjar, who is also a doctor, is put on to a stretcher and then carried to an ambulance. The oldest of their children was only 12 years old, according to Dr Muneer Alboursh, the director general of Gaza's health ministry, which is run by Hamas. "This is the reality our medical staff in Gaza endure. Words fall short in describing the pain," he wrote in a social media post. "In Gaza, it is not only healthcare workers who are targeted - Israel's aggression goes further, wiping out entire families." British doctors describe 'horrific' and 'unimaginable' attack Two British doctors working at Nasser Hospital described the attack as "horrific" and "unimaginable" for Dr Al Najjar. Speaking in a video diary on Friday night, Dr Graeme Groom said his last patient of the day was Dr Al Najjar's 11-year-old son, who was badly injured and "seemed much younger as we lifted him on to the operating table". The strike "may or may not have been aimed at his father", Dr Groom said, adding that the man had been left "very badly injured". Dr Victoria Rose said the family "lived opposite a petrol station, so I don't know whether the bomb set off some massive fire". 'No political or military connections' Dr Groom added: "It is unimaginable for that poor woman, both of them are doctors here. "The father was a physician at Nasser Hospital. He had no political and no military connections. He doesn't seem to be prominent on social media, and yet his poor wife is the only uninjured one, who has the prospect of losing her husband." 2:21 He said it was "a particularly sad day", while Dr Rose added: "That is life in Gaza. That is the way it goes in Gaza." Israel's war against Hamas in Gaza began when the militant group stormed across the border into Israel on 7 October 2023, killing some 1,200 people, most of them civilians, and abducting 251 others. Israel's military response has flattened large areas of Gaza and killed more than 53,000 Palestinians, mostly women and children, according to Gaza's Hamas-run health ministry, which does not differentiate between civilians and combatants in its count.
