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I'm not going into a debate about the right or wrong in this matter. The Luftwaffe did now that the matte was in doubt. Also it must be remembered that the convention during the war are a somewhat different from today. In the old one as an example it was allowed to take hostages among the civilian population.
Junker
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The 1908 Hague Rules of Land Warfare, the 1940 British Army field manual for the administration of occupied territory and the U.S. Army Field Manual with amendments through 1943 that covers the same subject all allowed for the taking of civilian hostages as well as the executing of civilian hostages under certain circumstances. Read the main trial transcript (12,000 pages) for Nürnberg Case VII (the Southeast or Hostage Case) and you will find endless discussion and citations on this matter. Further, both the prosecution and defense exhibits are full of documentation on the subject, too.
If those interested will go to Freiburg and spend a week or two researching the OKW war crimes files, they will find numerous files on Allied war crimes committed in North Africa, at sea in the Mediterranean, on Sicily and in Italy. The intentional shooting up of clearly marked Sanitäts- Ju 52s and German ambulances marked with a huge red cross on the roof by RAF and USAAF aircraft was one of my favorites. There are also files there on the shooting down of the Seenot aircraft, too. Documented reference to all this in published format can be found in the several books by Alfred M. deZayas (run his name through ABA Books, Amazon and Google).
Larry