Killing civilians is considered one of the major crimes under international humanitarian law, and protecting them is one of its most important pillars on which its structure of punishments, trials, and laws is built. Therefore, no state or army has the right to authorize the killing of civilians publicly, and therefore decision-makers are creative in finding justifications to explain the killing of civilians in wars.
In the midst of the Israeli aggression against Gaza now – which has been described by human rights activists as… GenocideThe occupation army tries every time to justify the killing and wounding of more than 75,000 Palestinians, and claims that their killing was not intentional or that they were merely collateral damage.
But the favorite argument of pro-Israel politicians and media professionals to justify the number of Palestinian civilians killed by the Israeli army and its missiles is to blame the Islamic Resistance Movement (agitation) and claiming that it turns the Palestinians into human shields against the Israeli army.
In statements to CNN, Karen Hagioff, a spokeswoman for the Israeli army, said, “As an army that adheres to international law and ethical standards, we allocate many resources to reducing the harm to civilians who have been forced by Hamas to play the role of human shields. Our war is against Hamas, not against the people of Gaza.” “.
Who is responsible?
The charge of human shields paints a brutal picture in the listener’s imagination of armed men using women and children to protect themselves, and thus justifies the necessity of continuing the fighting even if this leads to the killing of civilians. This picture is also an attempt to remove the responsibility borne by the attacker.
The term refers to any “civilian placed in front of a military target, such that the fact that he is a civilian deters the enemy from attacking that target.”
The protection of civilians is one of the foundations of international humanitarian law, and therefore a variety of legal instruments prohibit the use of human shields, including the 1949 Geneva Conventions. The International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia and the Rome Statute also make the use of human shields a war crime.
But what many people forget is that even if a party in a war resorts to the use of human shields, the attacking party is still obligated under international humanitarian law to adhere to the principles of precaution and proportionality, meaning that the attacking party must take all measures of precaution that will reduce the number of civilian casualties. The military advantage sought from the attack must be proportional to the destructive force of the attack and the resulting death toll.
If the attacking party finds that a military operation would do more harm than good, it must stop it and the attack becomes prohibited under international humanitarian law. This means that while the use of human shields is prohibited, an attack can be lawful if it is proportionate.
What does international law say?
Legally, there are two types of human shields, voluntary and involuntary. The first classification applies to civilians who expose themselves to danger to protect people, sites, or valuable things they have, while the other includes civilians who are used by a warring party to protect itself.
Articles of international law provide for the protection of civilians from the dangers of military operations unless they directly participate in actions that harm the enemy, but it does not clarify whether civilians making themselves voluntary human shields constitute direct participation in the conflict.
In the aggression against Gaza, Israel justified its attack on Al-Shifa HospitalBy saying that there is a Hamas leadership headquarters underneath it, and that the movement used civilians there as human shields, but after the Israeli army entered the hospital, it was found that the Israeli allegations did not provide convincing arguments to justify the attack, and the bombing and killing of civilians inside the hospital.
Israel has always harnessed the concept of human shields to legitimize its attacks, despite constant global criticism of this. Researcher Charles Anderson says that the British army used the Palestinians as human shields in its attempt to suppress them, and the Israeli army inherited the practice after that.
International certificates
If we examine the evidence, we find that the only party in the current conflict that has used human shields, as witnessed and documented by humanitarian, international, and human rights organizations, is Israel. Despite the endless stories of victims in every war launched by Israel against Gaza, it is difficult every time to collect evidence condemning the occupation, even though it is full. Websites, videos, books, and academic articles.
Israel made the use of human shields a declared military policy for its army during The second intifada Which broke out on September 28, 2000, and members of the occupation army were randomly entering homes and forcing their residents to help them achieve their military goals.
The practices included the Israeli army’s use of Palestinians as human shields in 2002, such as forcing them to enter the homes of those being pursued to confirm their presence, entering buildings suspected of being booby-trapped, making them a shield between themselves and the angry Palestinian masses to deter bullets or stones directed at them, hiding behind their backs and shooting, and imprisoning them in homes that… The army stormed it and took it as a headquarters to prevent the resistance from attacking, and forced them to pick up some items from the street suspected to be booby-trapped.
Circumventing and circumventing the law
After appeals and reports submitted by 7 human rights organizations, one of which was the B’Tselem human rights organization; The Israeli Supreme Court banned this policy, and Zahava Gal-On, a deputy from the left-wing Meretz party, commented: “The Supreme Court ruled that an army in a democratic state cannot behave like terrorist gangs.”
The Israeli army protested this ruling due to its desire to continue to make the Palestinians human shields, and resorted to changing the policy and making it voluntary, meaning that the heavily armed army could ask the population to volunteer to serve its interests.
The practice continued under a different legal cover, and although the Israeli Supreme Court prohibited the use of Palestinians in any military activity, the Israeli army did not pay attention to it.
Throughout the confrontations, clashes and wars waged by the Israeli occupation army against the Palestinians, whether in the West Bank or Gaza, international human rights bodies have recorded many cases in which the occupation soldiers used civilians as human shields.
On the other hand, the International Justice Organization published a lengthy report in which it said, “It did not find a single piece of evidence proving that Hamas used civilians as human shields, despite the accumulated charges leveled against the movement by Israel.”
Unguided bombs
During the current Israeli aggression on the Gaza Strip – according to American assessments – half of the munitions and bombs dropped on the Strip are unguided.
According to expert analyzes compiled by journalist Julia Frankel from the Associated Press, the Israeli war is considered one of the most deadly and dangerous wars among contemporary wars.
Frankel cited the conclusions of researchers Cory Shear and Jamon van den Hoek of New York University and the University of Oregon, who are experts in mapping to assess damage during wars.
The researchers found that Israel had destroyed two-thirds of the buildings in the northern Gaza Strip and a quarter of the buildings in the south of Khan Yunis, and they expressed their concern about Israel’s use of unguided bombs in a narrow, densely populated area, with the certainty that it would kill civilians.
Researcher Nev Gordon commented in an interview with the Middle East Research and Information Project group, saying that Israel, through its continuous claim that 20,000 civilians were human shields, is turning civilians from protected innocents into indirect participants in the war.
He added, “Including an entire people under the name of human shields violates many of the legal limits set to protect civilians, and expands the scope of the violence that Israel may use against the Palestinians.”
Human rights experts believe that calling 20,000 civilians “human shields” while continuing to bomb them with bombs not intended to kill them is an example of how some politicians use legal terminology to give an atmosphere of legitimacy to actions that violate international humanitarian law.
Others give an example of this, saying, “If a terrorist uses civilians as human shields in a building in the center of Paris or New York, for example, does it make sense to destroy the entire building in the center of the city? Or would any of the security personnel suggest such a solution? When asking these questions, the listener becomes clear to the extent “The strangeness and horror of the assumptions behind these justifications.”
