Three people were killed and two others injured on Thursday morning after a bus collided with a private vehicle on Route 40 near Lehavim Junction in southern Israel.
According to an initial investigation, the accident appears to be a head-on collision between a bus containing no passengers and a private vehicle. An additional vehicle was also involved in the accident and hit a road sign.
Magen David Adom teams provided medical care to the wounded but were finally forced to determine the deaths of three men, aged 30.
The driver of the car, 40, and the bus driver, 50, were both critically injured in the accident. They were evacuated to Soroka Hospital in nearby Beersheva.
The additional driver, 70, was lightly to moderately wounded, and was also brought to the hospital after receiving treatment at the scene.
"This is a serious and shocking accident," MDA paramedics Omar Almakkawi and Yossi Avoharon said. "When we arrived we saw it had been an accident between the front sides of a bus and jeep. The jeep's right side was crushed completely."
"In the jeep were four passengers, men in their thirties. The driver was unconscious and suffered from multi-system organ failure, and the three passengers were unconscious, had no pulse and were not breathing. After a lengthy rescue process, we pronounced them dead."
Police have blocked traffic on the road in both directions, and the heavy buildup is being felt throughout the Negev region.