A video has emerged on social media of what appears to be an injured Palestinian, who was named as Mujahed Azmi by the Reuters news agency, being driven through the city of Jenin in the West Bank while strapped to the hood of an Israeli military vehicle, seemingly being used as a human shield.
The video was taken on Friday and is reportedly from the Jabariyat neighborhood. Israeli special forces were reportedly conducting a raid in the neighborhood while seeking out resistance fighters.
The outlet Mondoweiss spoke with the owners of the house that was raided. They say that Israeli forces injured several men during the raid, shooting at least some of them while they slept. In the video, one of these men can be seen strapped to the Israeli vehicle and driven through the streets. The Israeli vehicle passes several Red Crescent ambulances as it continues down the street. The man was reportedly handed over to Palestinian medical teams eventually, according to several pro-Palestinian Telegram channels.
Israeli forces reportedly arrested three men during the raid. Including at least one injured man, Majd Hussiniyya, whose family reportedly said that they have not heard from Israeli authorities about his condition or whereabouts.
Ra’fat Husseiniyya, the owner of the home, told the Mondoweiss that the three men were his brothers and claimed that they were not suspected to be part of the resistance. The Red Crescent said that they treated three people from Jabariyat suffering from gunshot wounds.
Hamas is not in control of the West Bank, though Jenin has been a central point of Palestinian resistance in the West Bank. The Jenin Brigade posted on its Telegram account that it discovered Israeli special forces in Jabariyat and engaged them using firearms and explosive devices. They claim to have caused casualties among the Israeli Defense Force (IDF).
In a statement, the Israeli military confirmed that they took fire during an operation in Jenin, saying they injured and then apprehended a suspect. It said that the soldiers violated protocol. “The suspect was taken by forces while tied on top of a vehicle,” adding that the “conduct of the forces in the video of the incident does not conform to the values” of the IDF and that it is investigating the incident.
This is not the first time the IDF has been caught on camera seemingly using a Palestinian as a human shield. In January, three IDF soldiers were caught on video using a Palestinian shop owner as a human shield.
This is not the first time the IDF has been caught on camera seemingly using a Palestinian as a human shield. In January, three IDF soldiers were caught on video using a Palestinian shop owner as a human shield.
In May, the human rights group Defense for Children International – Palestine, published three nearly identical interviews with Palestinian children aged 12, 13 and 14 who claimed that they were used as human shields while the IDF cleared apartment buildings in Gaza.
“The soldiers told me to knock on the doors of the apartments in the building, while they were standing behind me at a fairly short distance, and to ask the residents to come out, and this is what I did,” one of the children recounted. “When we reached the door of one of the apartments, there was no one inside, so the soldiers blew up the door and forced me to go inside alone and check and search it. After I told them that it was empty, they entered it, while I remained held by one of the soldiers at the door.”
The account matched up almost perfectly with a 2002 report by Amnesty International that said the IDF used Palestinians, including women, as human shields in Jenin and Nablus.
“Numerous testimonies show that IDF units frequently forced Palestinians to take part in operations by making a Palestinian camp resident enter a house first and then search it; they also used Palestinians as ‘human shields’ to shelter behind,” the report claimed, saying that the “large number” of cases revealed a “clear pattern” by the IDF.
In March, Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor said that it has “documented several consistent testimonies” of Israeli forces using Palestinians as human shields in and around the Shifa Medical Complex.
“Testimonies reveal that Israeli forces used civilians, including patients and displaced individuals inside the Shifa Medical Complex, as human shields, exploiting them to protect their military operations within the hospital, form barriers behind their forces and military vehicles, or send them under threat to residential homes and buildings surrounding the medical complex to evacuate them before the Israeli army raids, arrests some of the residents, and subsequently destroys many of these buildings," the report reads. [Emphasis added]
While Hamas has been accused of using human shields by Israeli and US officials, no strong evidence has been presented. Amnesty International noted that Hamas has positioned military targets close to civilians, but that is not considered the same thing as deliberately using civilians as protection from fire.
In previous conflicts with Israel, including in 2014, investigations by the Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International, and the UN Human Rights Council found Hamas guilty of other war crimes, but not of using human shields.
In 2005, an Israeli high court ruled that the IDF’s practice of using human shields during combat was illegal under international law. It also noted that the military’s claim at the time that it only utilized civilian “volunteers” was still unacceptable because it is unlikely anyone would do so voluntarily.