Hometown mourners commemorate Polish aid worker killed in Gaza

WARSAW (Reuters) – As dusk set over the southeastern Polish city of Przemysl on Thursday, mourners gathered to hold a vigil for the Polish aid worker who was killed by the Israeli army in Gaza this week.

Przemysl-native Damian Sobol, 35, was in Gaza with the World Central Kitchen (WCK) charity to provide aid to Palestinans when he was killed in an Israeli airstrike along with six other WCK workers on Monday.

The mourners, numbered at several hundred by PAP news agency, gathered near the Przemysl train station to commemorate Sobol. They lit candles at the place where he had begun his relief work path when he volunteered to help Ukrainians fleeing their country after Russia invaded Poland’s eastern neighbour in Feb.2022.

“There is no consent for killing innocent people, let’s remember this and let’s remember that Damian was helping so that other people would not die of hunger,” said Waldemar, a local aid worker who had helped Ukrainian refugees alongside Sobol at Przemysl station, speaking to TVN private broadcaster. He declined to give his surname.

“We started here as volunteers. Damian set off further on the volunteering path and unfortunately was murdered by Israeli services.”

Israel said it mistakenly killed the aid workers and promised a full investigation and adjustment to its tactics.

Polish authorities called for an international investigation into the killing as well as an apology from Israel and compensation for Sobol’s family.

News of Sobol’s death “was like a blow to the head,” said his fellow local aid worker Stefan Moskowicz, also speaking to TVN.

“There is a saying that help given comes back twofold, but in many cases it doesn’t work that way.”

Sobol had also volunteered in Ukraine and in Turkey, his childhood friend Krzysztof Butra told Reuters on Wednesday.

More than 33,037 Palestinians have been killed and 75,668 have been injured in Israel’s military offensive on Gaza since Oct.7, the Gaza health ministry said in a statement on Thursday.

Israel’s bombardment and invasion Gaza has decimated large swathes of the densly populated Palestinian territory, after a Hamas-led attack on Israel killed some 1,200 Israelis and foreigners with more than 250 abducted into Gaza as hostages, according to Israeli tallies.