The Israel Defence Forces’ arbitrary use of violence against Palestinian children, including forcing them to act as human shields in military operations, has been exposed by veteran soldiers in detailed statements chronicling dozens of brutal incidents.
The most disturbing trend that emerges from the soldiers’ testimonies relates to the wounding and killing of children in the West Bank and Gaza by either targeted shooting or by failing to protect minors during military operations, according to the report from Breaking the Silence, an organisation of veteran Israeli soldiers.
»There was an ambush where a kid coming up with a Molotov cocktail had his leg blown off. They laid ambush exactly at that spot. Kids came, the soldiers were there, the kids lit a bottle, and they were shot in the leg, » one former soldier states.
Keeping the peace … Israeli troops restrain two Palestinian girls after their mother is arrested for protesting against Jewish settlers in the village of al-Nabi Saleh. Photo: AFP
The release of the testimonies follows the publication of two damning reports – one from a group of eminent British lawyers who visited Israel’s military courts and the other from the human rights organisation Defence for Children International – that detail multiple violations of international law by Israel in its treatment of children.
These include Israel’s practice of holding Palestinian children in solitary confinement and denying them legal representation, as well as its use of physical violence, shackles and coerced confessions in interrogations.
»It is crucial that people in Israel are confronted about what it means for Palestinian children to live under military occupation, » says Yehuda Shaul, a founder of Breaking the Silence.
The incidents detailed in the report occurred in what Israel admits was a »quiet period » – from 2005 to 2011, after the violence and suicide bombings of the second Palestinian intifada in which at least 972 Israelis and 3315 Palestinians died.
Israeli soldiers and Palestinian children come into regular conflict as Israel seeks to maintain control over areas of the West Bank where 300,000 settlers live across the 1967 Green Line in contravention of international law. Children throw stones as a form of resistance, to protest the presence of soldiers and settlers, sometimes with deadly consequences, soldiers say.
But Shaul says that does not excuse the use of excessive force against children or the military’s consistent arbitrary invasion of villages and homes as part of a campaign to suppress the Palestinian population of the West Bank.
»Every soldier who has served in the occupied territories has these images of breaking into a house in the middle of the night, little children are crying, you wake up the family, » he says.
»That is 24 hours a day, seven days a week you have patrols that bump into random houses and disrupt the life of people – that is the idea – it is what we call in the military ‘Litzur tchushat nirdafaut’ or ‘to create the feeling of being chased’. »
Shaul says only once soldiers have finished their active duty and begin to think as civilians can they see the military’s actions in a different light – and the order to shoot to kill a child 200 metres away and not threatening anyone stops making sense.
»This is what our society is made of, you cannot ignore it, you cannot just run away from it – this is who we are … this is something we should face. »
But according to the Israeli government, Palestinian children pose a grave threat to the country’s security.
»We have seen Palestinian minors involved in violence against Israeli civilians, whether it is throwing rocks at cars, whether it is throwing petrol bombs, » says Mark Regev, the spokesman for the Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu. »We have established a parallel system to deal with minors because we recognise minors have special needs and … we are trying to do this in a manner that is as sensitive as possible in very difficult conditions. »
It was unfortunate, Regev said, that militant Palestinian organisations chose to put minors »on the front line ».
He urged anyone with a complaint against the Israel Defence Forces to come forward.
»We have a very strict code of behaviour under which our soldiers are allowed to act and if there are violations of that code of behaviour, soldiers face discipline and they can go to jail.
»There is an independent part of the military that investigates all such allegations … I don’t think it is the norm but in any large system there are aberrations and we have to stamp them out. »
Sixteen-year-old Anan Tamimi has been arrested three times by the Israel Defence Forces, and released each time without charge. He lives in the West Bank village of al-Nabi Saleh, where there are weekly clashes between the army and residents, who are protesting against attempts by Israelis from the Halamish settlement and its outposts to take over the al-Qawas Spring and the surrounding land.
Two human rights organisations – B’Tselem and the Association for Civil Rights in Israel – have consistently expressed grave concerns about the behaviour of the IDF at al-Nabi Saleh.
The first time Anan was taken by the IDF, the soldiers came at 3am. His mother, Boshra Tamimi, says at one point there were more than 30 soldiers, some with dogs, on the second floor of the family’s home.
The soldiers had a photograph and were searching Anan’s closet and drawers to try to find clothes that matched the person in the photograph, Mrs Tamimi told the Herald. They found nothing to link her son to the photograph but they took him anyway.
»When they took me outside the house … they turned my hands back to my back and they tied my hands with this plastic tie and blindfolded my eyes immediately, » Anan says.
»I spent 17 hours in the settlement here, then another three hours in Binyamin for interrogation, then they transferred me to Ofer [Prison] … on the fourth day, they took me to the court and … I was released. »
The second time he was arrested, he was again taken to the nearby settlement of Halamish, where after several hours he was released, still with his hands tied tightly behind his back and blindfolded, and left on the side of the road, Anan says.
Soon after, using the same photograph that had been found by the IDF’s own military court to have no link to Anan, he was again arrested. This time the 16-year-old spent 15 days in prison before he was released without charge.
With the quiet bravado of a teenage boy, he says he is not worried about whether the Israeli army will raid his house again at night and take him away.
»If I am frightened of the soldiers, I will not live my life, so it is better not to be afraid. »
The most common offence children are accused of is throwing stones, says Gerard Horton, head of Defence for Children International in Palestine.
»But in many cases, it is very difficult for the army to actually identify who was throwing the stones … so the modus operandi of the army appears to be that when an incident of stone-throwing does occur, someone has to be punished for that, even if you cannot identify who the perpetrator is.
»The army needs to maintain control in the West Bank and they need to provide protection to 300,000 settlers who are living in the West Bank, contrary to international law.
»In order to do that, they need to make sure that any form of resistance, no matter what form that takes, has to be crushed. »
The IDF spokesman, Major Arye Shalicar, defends the military’s actions.
»In the end, if you compare it to 10 years ago, we have had a decline in suicide attacks, » he says. »We had hundreds of suicide murders in 2002 and none in 2012. It shows that there is some kind of effectiveness in the actions of the security establishment and its co-ordination with the Palestinian security forces. »
If there is maltreatment of Palestinian children, it is important that the IDF investigates the claims, he says.
He expresses frustration that Breaking the Silence does not provide the IDF or other relevant bodies with the information to launch an investigation.
But Shaul says it is important to protect the identity of its sources, many of whom are breaching IDF policy to expose the system of abuse.
