Israel/Gaza: Protect Civilians From Attack

(Jerusalem) - The escalation of fighting between Israel and Palestinian armed groups in Gaza should not come at the expense of civilians, Human Rights Watch said today. Attacks since April 7, 2011, by Hamas and Israeli forces appear to have targeted civilians or otherwise violated the laws of war, Human Rights Watch said.

"Hamas's targeting a school bus is simply horrendous," said Sarah Leah Whitson, Middle East director at Human Rights Watch. "But that is no justification for Israeli forces targeting ambulances or conducting indiscriminate attacks in Gaza. All civilians, Palestinian and Israeli, deserve protection from war."

Since April 7, Israeli forces have struck the Gaza Strip with at least 30 air strikes and scores of tank shells, according to Israeli government and media reports, killing at least five civilians and eight members of Palestinian armed groups. Media reports did not identify all of the fatalities. The attacks reportedly wounded more than 40 Palestinians in Gaza, including an unknown number of civilians.

Human Rights Watch investigated the two incidents in which Israeli forces apparently targeted a Palestinian ambulance crew and conducted an indiscriminate attack that killed a mother and daughter, and two others in which Israeli strikes killed Palestinian civilians in apparent violation of the laws of war.

In the first incident, on April 7, an apparent Israeli missile attack injured an ambulance crew member and damaged an ambulance marked as such while the crew was evacuating two men who had been wounded in an Israeli strike. The attacks occurred near the non-operational Gaza Airport, in the southeastern corner of Gaza, east of the city of Rafah and close to the Egyptian border. Reliable independent security reports said that an Israeli tank had previously fired at the area, wounding two men, and that a helicopter later fired missiles at the area.

"The sky was full of different kinds of military aircraft at the time, but we didn't hesitate, and the area was full of civilians when we arrived," he said. "We were several meters from an injured man and were just about to get out of the ambulance when an explosion hit next to us."

The attack injured Hassan al-Hela, 41, a member of the medical crew, in his right forearm, and blew out two of the ambulance's windows. The crew did not observe what fired at them, but the only Israeli fire reported in the area that afternoon and evening was from tanks and aircraft. There were no reports of Palestinian rocket or mortar fire in the area at the time. Human Rights Watch observed numerous small holes of between three and five millimeters in diameter in the side of the ambulance at the Red Crescent Center in Khirbat al-Adas, where the crew had taken it. The damage appeared consistent with shrapnel from a small missile. Human Rights Watch was not able to examine shrapnel from the strike, but the damage was consistent with small, cubic shrapnel from the aerial drone-launched missiles that Human Rights Watch examined during the 2008-09 Gaza conflict.

Customary laws of war provide that medical units, including paramedics and ambulances, must be respected and protected in all circumstances. Medical workers engaging exclusively in medical work in the presence of combatants do not forfeit their protected status, and only lose their protection if they commit, outside their humanitarian function, acts harmful to the enemy. A deliberate attack on a medical crew or an ambulance being used solely for medical transport would constitute a serious violation of the laws of war, amounting to a war crime.

"The laws of war have protected medical personnel from attack for nearly 150 years," Whitson said. "Israeli responses to Palestinian attacks cannot show reckless indifference to civilians."

In a second incident, on April 8 at around 12:30 p.m., an Israeli missile attack struck a home in the town of Abasan in southern Gaza, killing Najah Qudeih, 41, and her daughter Nidal, 19, and seriously wounding a second daughter, Nida'a, 17, who remains in a coma.

Nidal's uncle, Fayez Qudeih, 45, told Human Rights Watch that he heard three mortars fired by Palestinian armed groups from somewhere nearby at around 12:15 that afternoon, although he could not specify the precise area.

"After that everything was quiet," he said. "Nidal's father and two sons went to the mosque for Friday prayers, while the mother and four daughters were preparing lunch when the attack happened."

The uncle and Fathi Qudeih, a relative who lives across the street, as well as another resident interviewed separately, said there was no military action between the mortar fire and the time the house was struck about 10 or 15 minutes later. The men said that the women were killed while sitting on the steps of the house, which is about 1.4 kilometers from the Israeli perimeter fence.

Human Rights Watch observed numerous small holes caused by shrapnel in the walls of the building, and a circuit board and other debris indicating an attack from an air-launched missile.

The Israeli missile strike killing the two women in Abasan appears to have been conducted without distinguishing between fighters and civilians in violation of the international legal prohibition against indiscriminate attacks, Human Rights Watch said.

Residents of Shajaiya told Human Rights Watch that members of the armed wing of Islamic Jihad fired mortar rounds from a cemetery in the middle of the neighborhood, around 1.5 kilometers from the Gaza perimeter fence. Shortly after the mortar attack, at around 7 p.m., an Israeli strike hit the cemetery but caused no casualties, residents said. About 10 to 15 children from the area ran into the cemetery to look at the strike site. Five minutes later, residents said, a second strike hit the area, killing one of the children, Mahmoud Wael al-Jaro, and a member of Islamic Jihad named Bilal al-Areer.

A subsequent Israeli strike on the cemetery wounded an ambulance crew member. Rami Dababish, 28, a medical worker, told Human Rights Watch that he received an emergency call at around 7:30 p.m. to respond to injuries from an attack in the graveyard. Dababish said that he did not contact the International Red Cross to request coordination with the Israeli military because the cemetery was in the middle of a residential area far from the boundary. He said he arrived at the northern entrance to the cemetery around 7:35 p.m.

"There were no signs of military activity there at the time, and there were a large number of people and cars next to the cemetery," he said. The new strike hit after he entered the cemetery, injuring him and others. He said he believed it was a drone-launched missile. "If it weren't for the gravestones protecting us, many people would have been killed," he said.

Human Rights Watch observed Dababish's injuries, including numerous small wounds in the thigh, neck, face, and right arm, and a small hole that he said shrapnel tore in the bright orange ambulance-crew jacket he wore. Human Rights Watch was not able to examine shrapnel from the strike, but the injuries are also consistent with small, cubic shrapnel from the drone-launched missiles that Human Rights Watch examined during the 2008-09 Gaza conflict. There were no reports of Palestinian mortar or rocket attacks in the area at the time that could have gone astray.

Such violations do not justify Israel in attacking without regard for the presence of civilians. Israeli strikes on the cemetery that continued after children and a medical crew entered the area show a failure to take all feasible precautions to ensure only military objectives are attacked, and may have amounted to an indiscriminate attack, Human Rights Watch said.

In a fourth incident, on April 7, Israeli tank shells struck near the home in Shajaiya of Mahmoud Mansur al-Manasra, 55, killing him, and slightly wounding his son Fuad al-Manasra, 17, and his brother Nasser al-Manasra, 44. Human Rights Watch found no evidence to suggest that these men were Palestinian fighters, and Palestinian armed groups did not report any casualties from the Israeli attack.

"Two minutes after the rocket, I heard a shell hit my uncle's [Mahmoud's] house," said Kamal al-Manasra. "My uncle and his son and brother went over to check on the house, and while they were returning another shell fell on my uncle and killed him." Harazen gave a similar account, though he believed the Israeli response occurred less than one minute after the rocket launch.

Human Rights Watch observed shrapnel and entry and exit holes in the walls of Mahmoud al-Manasra's home - the closest building in the neighborhood to the Israeli perimeter fence, roughly one kilometer away - that are consistent with an attack with a shell fired from the main gun of a tank.

The legal justification for the Israeli attack is unclear. The laws of war require that a target be identified as a military objective before being attacked. In case of doubt, the people targeted must be assumed to be civilians. Further investigation is needed to determine whether all feasible precautions were taken prior to the attack and whether the tank crew failed to discriminate between combatants and civilians in serious violation of the laws of war, Human Rights Watch said.