Soldiers in civilian clothing shot at Palestinians who, thinking they were being robbed, sought to defend their property; one Palestinian killed

24 April 2012, updated 14 February 2017

Update: An MPIU investigation was launched on 24 April 2012. On 5 January 2014, the MAG Corps informed B’Tselem that the case was still under investigation. On 13 January 2015, the MAG Corps informed B’Tselem that the case had been sent to a military prosecutor for review. On 15 July 2015 the MAG Corps informed B’Tselem that the case was still under review.

Rashad Shukhah with his wife taghrid and their daughter On 27 March 2012 in the middle of the night, security forces in civilian clothing as well as uniformed soldiers entered Kafr Ramun, northeast of Ramallah, and shot three brothers from the Shawakhah family: Akram, age 36, Anwar, age 38, and Rashad, age 28. All three were wounded, each shot multiple times, and were taken by the soldiers to Shaare Zedek Hospital in Jerusalem where they were admitted to Intensive Care. On 2 April 2012, Rashad Shawakhah died of his wounds in the hospital.

The three brothers and their families live on the northeastern outskirts of Kafr Ramun. The brothers explained that in the wake of recent thefts in the village, they take turns guarding at night. Based on the testimony given to B’Tselem, at about 1:30 am on 27 March 2012, Akram Shawakhah woke up to do his guard duty. Through his window, he saw two people in civilian clothing about fifty meters from the house. Akram called his brothers Anwar and Rashad to wake them up, and the three of them, suspecting it was robbers, went out to the street and called out to the strangers to stop. Akram Shawakhah was holding a club, and Rashad and Anwar were each holding a knife.

When the brothers had came within a few meters of the strangers and demanded that they identify themselves, one of the strangers pulled out a gun, and shot Anwar Shawakhah in the neck. According to the testimonies given to B’Tselem, the other man then pulled a gun. The brothers responded by trying to attack the two men, who then fired several shots and wounded both Akram and Rashad in the abdomen.

Insofar as is known to B’Tselem, at this stage uniformed Israeli soldiers arrived from the southeast. Rashad and Anwar Shawakhah were already lying on the ground, and Akram, who was still standing despite his injury, described what happened next:

“Just then I saw a bunch of soldiers coming from below - from the direction of Abu Yusef’s house, and they were shouting: ‘Stop, stop.’ I felt somewhat relieved because I thought that the army would deter the armed men and detain them, whoever they were. The soldiers approached and one of them told me to stop and pointed his rifle at me. Of course I did not move and I already had my hands up to show that I was not violent. Then I began to tell him: ‘The thieves shot us, I am wounded in the abdomen, I am wounded.’ I tried to lower my hands to lift up my shirt so that he could see the wounds, and then the soldier shot in my direction and hit me with the third bullet on the right side of my abdomen and then I fell to the ground.’

Akram told B’Tselem that the same soldier approached him, cursed at him, kicked him in the leg and trod on his head. Akram also testified that another soldier fired several shots at his brother Rashad while Rashad was lying on the ground. When the shooting stopped, the brothers were given first aid by the army medic and taken in military vehicles to ambulances that took them to the Shaare Zedek Hospital in Jerusalem.

On 2 April 2012, Rashad Shawakhah died of his wounds at the hospital. The medical reports indicate that he was found to have four abdominal gunshot wounds, causing several tears in the intestine and piercing his spleen, along with another gunshot wound in his left arm. Rashad was operated on several times, but his condition deteriorated and he died.

According to the medical documentation, Anwar Shawakhah was injured by a bullet that penetrated his neck and exited on the left side of his back. He was treated in the surgical ward at the hospital and released on 8 April 2012. His brother Akram was diagnosed with four gunshot wounds to the abdomen and was released on 6 April 2012 after hospitalization in the surgical ward.

B’Tselem’s investigation raises grave concerns regarding the conduct of the soldiers and the army in this incident. The testimonies taken by B’Tselem indicate that the brothers did not understand that they were dealing with soldiers in civilian clothing and suspected that the men were thieves, and hence they went outside armed with a club and with knives. The investigation also found that the two men in civilian clothing ignored the brothers’ request to identify themselves, meanwhile taking out their firearms. Even if the soldiers were at risk once they were discovered by the brothers, the soldiers could still have identified themselves as such and issued a warning before opening fire. In addition, the testimony and medical reports indicate that the two undercover soldiers did not aim at the lower part of the three brothers’ bodies, but rather at their midsection and upper bodies.

Moreover, the results of the inquiry strongly suggest that the soldiers in uniform who arrived on the scene after the initial shootings, also fired at Akram and Rashad Shawakhah, even though both men were already wounded and Rashad was lying on the ground. There was no justification for this shooting and clearly if the brothers had represented any danger at that point, the danger could have been removed using other means.

The IDF Spokesperson has not yet addressed the details of the incident. Media reports have merely announced that an operational inquiry is underway and that its results will be conveyed to the Military Advocate General Corps. An initial media report on the incident on Army Radio on 27 March 2012 stated that terrorists had attacked an IDF soldier and stabbed him during a military operation. This version was disproved when the two Shawakhah brothers were released from the Israeli hospital without having been charged for an attack or any other crime. Subsequent media reports stated that the two people in civilian clothing were soldiers from the undercover Duvdevan unit, who had entered the village as part of a training exercise. According to one article, the soldier who beat one of the wounded men following the shooting was relieved of his position.

B’Tselem has warned in the past that the operational behavior of the undercover units, and particularly their open-fire regulations, are illegal. Soldiers from these units enter areas with hostile civilian populations disguised as civilians themselves, armed solely with guns. This carries a high risk of injury to civilians because if the undercover soldiers are discovered and endangered, they will have no non-lethal means of protecting themselves. Given the risk of a possibly fatal confrontation, sending soldiers to a civilian locality to train as undercover operatives is particularly serious – if in fact that is why the soldiers were in the village in this incident. Because a training operation serves a general purpose of improving the army’s operational abilities and no military necessity is attributable to such an action, it is unlawful. This mode of operating demonstrates a deep disdain on the army’s part for the lives of Palestinian civilians.

In the wake of this incident, B’Tselem contacted the office of the Military Advocate General (MAG) Corps and demanded that it immediately order a Military Police investigation into the circumstances. This process must include an examination of the behavior of the command echelon, which ordered the unit’s entry into the village. The most recent policy on military investigations, presented by the State Prosecutor to the High Court of Justice in April 2011, said that “Every incident in which a civilian is killed… as a result of an IDF operation in Judea or Samaria, will precipitate an immediate Military Police investigation,” except when a civilian is killed in an action “in the nature of a real combat operation.” Since that announcement, the MAG Corps has immediately ordered an investigation in each case in which a soldier killed a Palestinian in the West Bank. Today, 24 April 2012, B’Tselem was informed that the MAG corps has ordered the opening of an investigation into this case - about a month after the incident occurred.

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A Routine Founded on Violence

Occupation routine: Four soldiers abuse residents of Silwad for three weeks

The town of Silwad, which lies northwest of Ramallah, is home to some 10,000 people. For three weeks, from mid-November 2020, four soldiers who were apparently stationed at a military watchtower near the main entrance to the town abused residents daily, attacking and intimidating them. Among other things, they set up checkpoints at the entrances to the town, searched people entering and leaving it, swore at residents and assaulted them. The soldiers also roamed the town’s streets, hurling stun grenades, firing tear gas canisters and vandalizing vehicles. In one case, they shot and wounded a 16-year-old.A.N., an employee at the al-Juneidi factory near Silwad, spoke with B’Tselem’s field researcher and described what happened in the town during those weeks:The soldiers throw stun grenades and fire tear gas canisters at night. They use “rubber” bullets and even live bullets. They harass residents, wake up adults and children and disrupt our daily lives. The situation has become so bad that I can’t describe it. Before they came, my wife and I would walk to the nearby grocery store in the evening to buy groceries or milk for the children. But now we don’t go there anymore because we’re afraid to run into the soldiers, and because the store owner doesn’t open in the evening anymore. He closes shop early, before the soldiers come and start making a mess. It’s starting to feel like we’re under night curfew or house arrest. People are starting to feel that they’re losing their sense of security. It feels like chaos.For three weeks, four Israeli soldiers made the lives of Silwad residents miserable with no one to stop them. None of their superiors prevented the abuse. Based on years of experience, it is highly unlikely that any action will be taken against them retroactively, either. The painful fact is that their conduct serves the occupation regime and enables it to continue. After all, the only way to enforce this regime is to use force, while ensuring that no one will be held accountable — whether the perpetrators themselves or the entire regime.Below are testimonies collected by B’Tselem field researcher Iyad Hadad regarding two grave incidents that took place during this period: the injuring of Ramzi Hamed (16) and the beating and humiliation of five employees of the al-Juneidi dairy products company who were on their way to work in the town:Ramzi Hamed injured, 28 November 2020:On Saturday, 28 November 2020, at around 8:30 P.M., Ramzi Hamed and ‘A.’A., two 16-year-old friends from Silwad, were on their way home from the town center. On the way, they encountered a group of boys who warned them there were soldiers further along the road. The two continued walking. After they had gone several dozen meters and were about 100 meters away from the soldiers, the latter fired a tear gas canister at them. The teens continued walking, and then the soldiers fired two more tear gas canisters. Immediately after that, one soldier fired two live rounds, one of which hit Hamed in the chest. Hamed and ‘A.’A. turned back instantly and a private car passing by took them to a local clinic. Within minutes, an ambulance picked them up from there and took them to hospital in Ramallah. About a week later, Hamed was discharged with the bullet still in his body.In a testimony he gave on 30 November 2020, Hamed recounted what happened that evening:I work at a barbershop in the town center. For the past two weeks, since the soldiers started standing at the western entrance to the town, I’ve been finishing working earlier, at around 7:00 or 8:00 P.M., because it’s not safe to walk around the town. On Saturday, I was waiting for my friend ‘A.’A. to walk home together, in case the soldiers provoked us.We set out at around 8:20 and saw a group of kids at the square. We asked them if something was going on and they said, “Those soldiers are by the gas station.” We didn’t take it seriously because the kids were sitting quietly, and we didn’t see anyone throwing stones. We decided to go ahead and thought that if the soldiers blocked our path, we’d tell them we were on our way home, which is nearby.We continued walking west on the road for several dozen meters. Suddenly, we saw the soldiers coming towards us. They fired a tear gas canister from about 100 meters away, and then another grenade that I think was a stun grenade. We kept walking, even though we were scared because there have been a lot of such incidents lately. We relied on the fact that the soldiers could see us and that we hadn’t done anything. We walked on for another several dozen meters. The three soldiers were wearing masks of some kind. Two of them were carrying rifles and the third was holding a club.Suddenly, for no reason, even though we’d done nothing suspicious, one of them fired two live bullets, one of which hit me in the chest. I realized I’d been hit because I felt nauseous and dizzy. I put my hand where I’d been hit and felt blood.I said to my friend, “I’ve been hit! I’ve been hit!” I tried to run away so the soldiers wouldn’t grab me, but after a few steps I almost fell over. My friend helped me and we kept running. I was running slowly and barely made it to the square, which is more than 50 meters away. When we got there, my friend stopped a private car that was passing and it took me to a clinic in the town. After I was checked and given first aid, an ambulance took me to hospital in Ramallah.Hamed was hospitalized in Ramallah for a week. Due to the sensitive location of the bullet in his chest, the doctors decided not to operate for the time being and left it inside.In a testimony he gave by phone to B’Tselem field researcher Iyad Hadad on 20 December 2020, Hamed described his condition now: I’m constantly worried and stressed. I’m afraid that any movement I make will shift the bullet and endanger me. The fact that I have a bullet inside my body keeps the shooting always on my mind, and it’s one of my most horrible memories. It’s as if my life is intertwined with the bullet inside me. I missed the first semester’s mid-term exams and have a lot of schoolwork to catch up on. I haven’t gone back to school or online classes yet, because I’m still in a bad way, medically and mentally.Because of the injury, I can’t work as a barber’s assistant in the town, either. Since my father is unemployed and I’m the eldest son, the burden of providing for the family falls on me. I use to earn 50 to 70 shekels (~15-21 USD) a day. It was a minimum income that kept us from begging. I don’t know when I’ll be able to get back to the job that I love and specialized in for two years, because I have to stand on my feet all day long. The injury has made me short of breath and I’m exposed to strong smells and perfumes at work. The problem is that we won’t be able to withstand several months without an income. I’m confused and desperate. I pray that God will help me. Two employees of the al-Juneidi company assaulted, 13 November 2020On 13 November 2020, at midnight, the four soldiers set up a checkpoint at the southern entrance to Silwad, detaining vehicles and randomly checking the passengers. In two separate incidents, within a short space of time, five employees of the al-Juneidi dairy products company arrived at the checkpoint and the soldiers assaulted and humiliated them. Among other things, they kicked and beat them, and damaged one worker’s vehicle.In a testimony he gave B’Tselem, A.’A (25) from Beit ‘Ur a-Tahta recalled:Late at night on Friday, 13 November 2020, I hitched a ride with my friend to work at the al-Juneidi factory in Silwad. I’ve been working there factory for six months. When we got to the ‘Ein Yabrud-Silwad bridge, we saw four soldiers blocking traffic at the intersection.The soldiers were standing next a military jeep, without masks. One of them motioned us to stop with a flashlight he was holding. Two of them stood in front of the car and blocked our way. We stopped and one of the soldiers ordered my friend to roll down the window. He did, and the soldier ordered him to roll down the rear window, too. He asked my friend in Hebrew, “Where are you from?” My friend answered, “Deir Jarir.” The soldier asked, “Do you speak Hebrew?” My friend said he didn’t. Then the soldier asked, “How come you don’t speak Hebrew? You answered when I asked you which village you were from.” At that point, he ordered my friend to switch the engine off and get out of the car. The soldiers didn’t ask us for our ID cards or anything else.My friend got out of the car and two of the soldiers made him stand next to it. One of them was tall and skinny, with dark skin and a medium-length beard. The other was blond and short. They told me to turn my head around and not look. Then they went over to my friend and I heard him say to one of them, “Talk to me in Arabic. Don’t talk to me in Hebrew.” I heard one of the soldiers order him to place his hands on the car, and then the soldier with the short beard started hitting him between the legs, patting him down and searching him. The soldier spoke to him in Hebrew, and my friend told him, “Talk to me in Arabic. I don’t speak Hebrew." The soldier said, “Okay, so how come you understood when I asked you where you lived? You understood me.” My friend said, ”I happened by chance to understand.” The soldier kept repeating, “Do you speak Hebrew or not.”Then the blond one took out a telescopic baton and opened it to scare us. He ordered my friend to get back in the car and ordered me to get out. He told me to stand facing the car with my hands up and my legs spread. He demanded that I spread them further, even after I couldn’t anymore. Then he started hitting me in the legs. He patted me down and found a pen I had on me. He asked, “What’s this? and I said, “It’s a pen.” I tried to take it out, but he told me to keep my hands in the air and I obeyed. He asked me, “How old are you? and I told him. Then he hit me really hard in the waist with the baton. The other soldier, the bearded one, joined in and started kicking me hard in the groin. My testicles hurt. After that, the blond soldier hit me on the back of the neck with his rifle butt, and it really hurt.The blond soldier started asking me, “Where’s your weapon?” I told him, “I don’t have a weapon.” He said, “Where’s the gun?” I answered, “Man, where would I get a gun? Do you see people with guns here every day?” Then he him me again on the right side of my waist with the metal baton. I felt like I’d been tazed and fell down, it hurt so much. I writhed in pain and couldn’t speak at all.It was after midnight, and if we’d tried to argue or even ask them why they were attacking us, they would have abused us even more. The soldier ordered me to get back in the car and told us to leave. We drove to the factory and told the other workers what had happened to us. They called our colleagues who were on their way and warned them not to take the same route. Later, I understood that they had also encountered the soldiers. From the description they gave, it sounded like the same soldiers.I started working at the factory six months ago, and this is the first time something like this has happened to me. I suffered from pain in my waist for 10 days from the beating.S.Z. (24) from Hebron works at the al-Juneidi factory in SilwadOn 13 November 2020, around midnight, I was driving with my friends, B.M. and his brother S.M. to our job in the Silwad branch of the al-Juneidi company. I was driving the company car. When we reached the Silwad-‘Ein Yabrud bridge under Route 60, about 200 meters away from the factory, four soldiers blocked our way. They were armed and weren’t wearing masks. One of them was tall and skinny, with a thin beard and dark skin, and then the other was short with a medium build, blond hair and blue eyes. I don’t remember the other two.They motioned us to stop, and then the tall one approached us. First, he ordered B., who was sitting next to me, to get out of the car. B. got out and the soldier asked him why he’d been throwing stones and Molotov cocktails. B. of course answered that he hadn’t thrown anything. Then the soldier started kicking him and hitting him with his rifle butt. B. screamed and yelled and repeated that he hadn’t thrown anything. Three of the soldiers beat him for several minutes and then ordered him to get back in the car. He got back in, exhausted and in pain. When the tall soldier saw his difficulty getting into the car, he grabbed him by the shirt, shook him and asked him again why he’d been throwing stones. B. told him, “I’m going to work,\ and I don’t throw stones.” The soldier let him be and ordered S. to get out of the car. He got out, and it repeated itself — they accused him of throwing stones and Molotov cocktails, and he denied it. They slammed his head against the windshield, and he screamed. It went on like that for about five or six minutes, and then they ordered him to get back in the car.Then it was my turn. The tall soldier stepped over to my side and tried to pull me out of the car through the window. I opened the door and it hit him in the leg. He ordered me to get out, and then he told me to raise my hands and spread my legs. He started kicking me until I fell over. Every time I fell, he ordered me to get up again, asking the same questions and swearing at me. After about two minutes, he told me, “Listen, you’re from Hebron. We want to fuck you.” Then he ordered me to get back in the car and leave. I drove for about 30 meters, and the soldiers ran after us. They reached us and banged on the rear window with their rifles. Luckily, they didn’t break it but only damaged the chassis. The soldier asked me why I’d driven off, and I said they’d ordered me to go. He said, “Enough. Don’t repeat it.” Then they left.We drove to the warehouse, where we met other workers who told us the soldiers had also blocked their way and beaten them near the southern entrance to Silwad. By the sound of their description, it was the same soldiers.

2 February 2021

Open-Fire Policy

New video footage from killing of Yassin a-Saradih in Jericho reveals that soldiers beat and abused him as he lay wounded, and did not offer him the necessary medical aid

Update: On 23 February 2018 media reports stated that an MPIU investigation had been launched. On the night of 22 February 2018, at approximately 1:00 A.M., about twenty Israeli soldiers entered the city center of Jericho in the West Bank. According to the military, they were on a mission to carry out arrests in the city. Some fifteen minutes later, several soldiers entered a home and searched it, while others waited at the entrance to the alley where the house was located. The soldiers’ presence led to clashes in which Palestinians threw stones at the soldiers. At some point, Yassin a-Saradih (35) ran with an iron bar attached to a car wheel rim towards the soldiers who were standing at the entrance to the alley, in an attempt to attack them. In video footage captured by security cameras of nearby stores, a-Saradih is seen running towards the soldiers with the bar. A soldier then shoots him in the lower body at point blank range. After the shooting, three other soldiers emerge from the alley and all four forcefully kick a-Saradih, who is lying on the ground. The soldiers are seen beating him with their rifles and dragging him into the alley. There, they continue to drag him along face down and then lean over him, shine flashlights on him, kick him lightly and move him with their feet. After about ten minutes, during which time they offer the wounded man no medical assistance, one of the soldiers fires a tear-gas cannister at the entrance to the alley. The soldiers are then seen dragging a-Saradih into the alley, out of the cameras’ range, apparently to avoid the tear gas that drifted their way. About fifteen minutes later, the soldiers are seen again outside the alley, this time carrying a-Saradih by his arms and legs. They hoist him onto a military jeep that drives up and he is driven away. Edited video. Links to full documentation at the bottom The IDF Spokesperson’s Unit changed its version of the event several times. In its first response, the unit stated that a-Saradih had attacked the soldiers, armed with a knife, and had attempted to grab their weapons, and that during his arrest he had sustained an injury and received first aid. In a second announcement issued later that day, the unit stated only that he had tried to attack the force, which “responded with gunfire, confronted the terrorist from close range and managed to stop him”, and that a knife had later been found on a-Saradih’s body. The next day, the military claimed that he had apparently died from tear gas inhalation. According to the autopsy results published that day by the media, a-Saradih was shot with live ammunition in the abdomen and may have died of blood loss. Nevertheless, the military continued to claim that the paramedics who treated him saw no sign of bullet entry. This is a particularly grave incident: The soldiers forcefully kicked a severely wounded man lying on the ground and beat him with their rifles in the head, upper body and groin. Then they dragged him along an alleyway as though he were not a human being and did not offer him crucial medical aid for more than thirty minutes. In light of this unacceptable conduct, the attempts made by the IDF Spokesperson’s Unit to justify the incident with one excuse or another are equally disturbing – as is the resounding silence of military and civilian officials. The absence of a firm, unequivocal statement by the military that such conduct will not be tolerated effectively condones the soldiers’ actions, allowing such incidents to recur in the future. The announcement that a Military Police investigation has been launched, as reported by the media, is meant merely to create the illusion that the military is treating the incident with all seriousness. Based on years of experience, the investigation is unlikely to result in any indictment of the persons responsible for the killing and ill-treatment of a-Saradih – certainly not among the higher ranks. Update: On 23 February 2018 media reports stated that an MPIU investigation had been launched. On 26 August 2019, B’Tselem learned that the case had been closed without any indictments. Links to full video footage: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qtatiw0ELxc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q2pRbKG-YyU https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d-LDGmQTbzk https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nsMtuLsk5o4

28 February 2018