Last updated on August 7th, 2024 at 04:28 pm
U.S. State Department spokesman Matthew Miller expressed shock and concern over a video circulating the internet purporting to show a wounded Palestinian man tied to the hood of an Israeli military vehicle and used as a human shield.
Al Jazeera correspondent Hamdah Salhut shared the video on Saturday, reporting Israeli forces had “tied an injured Palestinian man to the hood of their vehicle, using him as a human shield” during an armed raid in the West Bank city of Jenin.
JENIN: Israeli forces tied an injured Palestinian man to the hood of their vehicle, using him as a human shield during a raid in the Occupied West Bank city. pic.twitter.com/wht3rBVuhX
— Hamdah Salhut (@hamdahsalhut) June 22, 2024
Other videos have emerged of the man being paraded through a street on the hood of an army green vehicle.
قوات الاحتلال تنكل بشاب مصاب في جنين وتضعه على مقدمة آلية عسكرية pic.twitter.com/dfupaQJ3fA
— خبرني – khaberni (@khaberni) June 22, 2024
The Palestinian Red Crescent Society (PRCS) reported the Israeli forces prevent their personnel from immediately treating the man’s wounds, and continued to detain him for some time before eventually allowing the PRCS crew to retrieve the man and take him to a hospital.
“We saw that video, it was shocking,” Miller said. “The practice was absolutely unacceptable. Humans should never be used as human shields.”
Miller urged the Israeli military to “swiftly investigate” the alleged actions of its soldiers to determine what happened and “hold people accountable.” The State Department spokesman noted the Israeli military had already issued a statement that the actions in the video were inconsistent with the orders the soldiers had received and that the incident was being investigated.
In an emailed statement shared with FreeBase News, the Israeli military described the wounded Palestinian man as a terrorist suspect.
“During counterterrorism operations to apprehend wanted suspects in the area of Wadi Burqin, terrorists opened fire at IDF troops, who responded with fire. During the exchange of fire, one of the suspects was injured and apprehended,” the Israeli military statement read. “In violation of orders and standard operating procedures, the suspect was taken by the forces while tied on top of a vehicle.”
The Israeli military said the incident did not confirm to the Israeli military’s values and would be investigated and “dealt with accordingly.”
The Israeli military confirmed it handed the wounded man off to PRCS for medical treatment but declined to say whether they would take him back into their custody following his treatment.
The video footage comes about as accusations of combatants using human shields have proliferated the Israel-Palestine conflict for years, and more particularly in recent months amid the fighting in the Gaza Strip. The Israeli government has repeatedly directed blame at Hamas for civilian deaths in the Gaza Strip, accusing the Palestinian militant faction of treating the Gazan civilian population as human shields by placing mortars, rocket launchers, and command posts in, around, and under civilian infrastructure.
An Israeli military court handed down suspended sentences in 2010 to two soldiers in Israel’s Givati Brigade after they allegedly forced a nine-year-old Palestinian boy in the Gaza Strip to check bags for potentially explosive booby traps in January of 2009 during an Israeli military campaign in the territory known Operation Cast Lead. Both soldiers received a three-month suspended sentence in November 2010 and were demoted from staff sergeants to sergeants, avoiding the maximum possible penalty of up to three years in prison, the Guardian reported at the time. Human Rights Watch’s Middle East Director Sarah Leah Whitson said those sentences seemed “unjustifiably lenient” and faulted the Israeli government for not prosecuting and sentencing other Israeli soldiers for similar actions.
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