מגינים אנושיים - ריכוז קישורים למסמכים משפטיים

Open-Fire Policy

Israeli soldiers shot and killed a pregnant woman, used her relative as a human shield, and killed another woman when they blew up her front door

On 27 January 2025, military, Border Police and Shin Bet forces raided the city of Tulkarm and nearby refugee camps as part of Operation Iron Wall, announced by Israel on 21 January 2025. The operation, which initially focused on Jenin, was expanded on 27 January 2025 to include Tulkarm and Tulkarm R.C., and about a week and a half later, on 8 February 2025, Israeli forces also raided nearby Nur Shams R.C.After hearing about what was happening in Tulkarm R.C. and Jenin R.C., some residents of Nur Shams decided to flee before the army forces actively expelled them. Eight-month-pregnant Sundus Shalabi (20), her husband Yazan Abu Shu’lah (26), and his brother Bilal (20) were among them. The three left their home at 3:30 A.M. on Sunday, 9 February 2025. They got into their car and soon came across a large number of soldiers. Yazan, who was driving, tried to back away, but the soldiers fired at the car, and he was shot in the head. Yazan lost control of the car, and it rolled down a slope until it came to a stop.Bilal and Sundus got out of the car, and moments later, soldiers approached, arrested Bilal and took him to where the other soldiers were standing. This was the last time Sundus Shalabi was seen alive. According to Bilal, she was not injured when the soldiers separated them. Haaretz reported that, according to an initial investigation by the army, Sundus managed to get out of the car and was then shot in the chest because soldiers became suspicious when she “looked suspiciously at the ground.” A hospital report indicates she was shot in the back. Due to military activity in the camp, Palestinian emergency crews were not able to access the site for several hours. By the time they arrived, Sundus was dead, and her fetus could not be saved. Yazan Abu Shu’lah was taken to the hospital in serious condition. As of 14 May 2025 he is still in the hospital.We got in the car, and my brother Yazan drove. We barely got 200 meters away from the house, when we suddenly found ourselves in front of a lot of soldiers – I estimate there were more than a hundred there. Yazan was shocked when he saw the soldiers. They pointed the laser sights on their rifles at our car. He tried to drive back, but barely managed to back up one meter before they started shooting at us. They fired about five to 10 bullets. One of the bullets hit Yazan in the head. It knocked him out, and he lost control of the car. He pressed hard on the gas pedal while the car was in reverse, and it rolled down the slope.From the testimony of Bilal AbuBilal Abu Shu’lah was held by the soldiers for about 20 hours, during which they used him as a human shield several times. Among other things, around noon he was taken to the home of the al-Ashqar family, where 17 family members were staying at the time due to the raid on the camp. The Israeli forces entered the yard and attached explosives to the door leading into the living room. Rahaf al-Ashqar (21) and her father Fouad al-Ashqar (51) were in the room at the time. When they noticed the soldiers in the yard and saw through the window the wires running to the door, they tried to escape to the back of the house, but before they could get away, the soldiers blew up the door. Rahaf sustained severe injuries all over her body. She managed to call for help once before passing. Her father, Fouad, was injured in the legs by fragments.The IDF Spokesperson claimed that the soldiers were told an armed operative was located in the house and that they called for the occupants to vacate the premises over a PA system before entering it. However, B’Tselem’s investigation indicates people inside the house never heard such a call. An article in Haaretz also noted that the military’s initial inquiry indicated the soldiers did not issue a call for residents to vacate. The military made the same claim in a previous incident in which soldiers fired at a home in Muthallath a-Shuhada, killing 2-year-old Layla al-Khatib, but as in this case, the family never heard a call to vacate the home. After the explosion, the soldiers ordered Bilal to go into the house and tell all the men to come out. The soldiers then entered the house and remained in it for about 15 minutes. While inside, they conducted a search and checked Rahaf’s pulse, but left without attempting to provide her or her father with any sort of medical attention, taking Bilal and Rahaf’s uncle with them. The uncle was later issued an administrative detention order for six months.sort of medical attention, taking Bilal and Rahaf’s uncle with them. The uncle was later issued an administrative detention order for six months.I went to peek out the window and saw wires running from the main gate to the front door. I also saw soldiers walking around the yard. I figured the wires were laid to blow up the front door with explosives. It all happened very quickly and it was terrifying. Rahaf tried to escape from the living room to the rooms where the rest of the family were, but then there was a loud explosion. I saw my daughter fall. She didn’t make it out of the living room in time… I heard my daughter say: “Help me, help me,” and then she stopped talking and didn’t move anymore. –From the testimony of Fouad al-AshqarThat evening, Iyas al-Akhras (19), a Hamas military wing operative, was killed in a fire exchange between Israeli forces and armed Palestinians in the al-Manshiyah neighborhood in the center of the camp. His body was found a few hours later in an alley and taken to the hospital.The soldiers kept Bilal Abu Shu’lah until about 11:00 P.M., at which point he returned to his home in the camp. The next day, Israeli forces expelled all residents of the al-Madares neighborhood, where the Abu Shu’lah and al-Ashqar families live. As the military operation continued, Rahaf al-Ashqar was laid to rest nine days after she was killed. Senior Israeli officials have said military activity in refugee camps in the northern West Bank is expected to last a year, and residents will not be permitted to return to their homes. Refugee camp residents have been displaced to nearby villages and towns.B’Tselem field researcher Abdulkarim Sadi collected the testimonies.Bilal Abu Shu’lah, 20, said in his testimony on 12 March 2025:On Sunday, 9 February 2025, at around 3:30 A.M., I left the house with my brother Yazan (26) and his wife Sundus (20), who was eight months pregnant. Israeli forces raided the camp the night before, 8 February 2025, and we wanted to leave our neighborhood, al-Madares, which is southwest of the center of the refugee camp, to keep Sundus and the baby safe. We couldn’t wait for the new baby, whom we were going to name Seif. We were very worried because of what we heard happened during the raid on Tulkarm R.C., which started about ten days earlier. We were going to go to my sister’s house in Kafr a-Labad.We got in the car, and my brother Yazan drove. We barely got 200 meters away from the house, when we suddenly found ourselves in front of a lot of soldiers – I estimate there were more than a hundred there. Yazan was shocked when he saw the soldiers. They pointed the laser sights on their rifles at our car. He tried to drive back, but barely managed to back up one meter before they started shooting at us. They fired about five to 10 bullets.One of the bullets hit Yazan in the head. It knocked him out, and he lost control of the car. He pressed hard on the gas pedal while the car was in reverse, and it rolled down the slope. Luckily, I wasn’t hurt, because I managed to duck as soon as the soldiers opened fire. While the car was rolling down the slope, I heard Sundus scream and then she went silent. She passed out. I tried to wake Yazan up, but he didn’t wake up. I yelled and called out to Sundus until she woke up, but she was in a state of shock and anxiety. Then, Sundus and I got out of the car. Yazan remained unconscious behind the wheel. I called an ambulance.A lot of soldiers came to the spot where the car ended up and led me back to where they fired at us. Once we were there, they searched me and checked my ID card. Then they forced me to lie face down and started kicking me. The soldiers handcuffed and blindfolded me. After about 15 minutes, a local car drove by. The passengers must have also been trying to leave the camp. The soldiers ordered the driver to stop, and one of them took off my blindfold and sent me to the car. I was ordered to tell them to turn themselves in to the soldiers and to take the key from them and give it to the soldiers. I did it, and then the soldiers arrested the guy who was driving the car and ordered his mother and aunt, who were with him in the car, to walk home.The soldiers held me for about 20 hours. At first, they took me to Kamal a-Gharifi’s building, where they were holding other people. I was handcuffed and blindfolded most of the time. Around noon, they took me to the al-Ashqar family’s house. The soldiers attached explosives to the front door. I heard them counting down from 20 to 1. Before the explosion, they took off my blindfold and moved me about 15 meters away from the entrance to the house. After that, they forced me to go inside the house and tell the men to come out.When I went in, I found a young woman lying on the floor in a pool of blood. Her father was also injured. I told the men to turn themselves in to the army, and I went back out. I told the soldiers that there were two wounded people inside. The soldiers took the men from the family outside.Afterwards, the soldiers took me back to the a-Gharifi family home, which they used as a military post while the family members were still inside the house. The soldiers also brought a guy from the al-Ashqar family there, sat him down next to me, and one of the soldiers began to question him about weapons possession.Fifteen minutes later, the soldiers ordered me to accompany them to other houses. In one of those houses, they ate and drank. They lifted my blindfold and removed the zip ties from my hands. They stayed there for about three hours, during which some of them sat down to rest and some slept. Then the soldiers took me to another building. They kicked a family out of there and took over the building. Then they let me go.It was 11:00 P.M. by then. I didn’t know what happened to my brother Yazan, and I didn’t know then that Sundus, his wife, had been killed. The last time I saw her, when we were near the car and the soldiers took me, she wasn’t injured at all; she was just in shock. I later found out that a Palestinian ambulance came to where Yazan and Sundus were around 9:00 A.M., so almost six hours after the soldiers shot us.I got home completely exhausted. I slept until the next afternoon. Then, in the afternoon, my father and I called the Red Crescent to coordinate leaving the camp and to find out what happened to Yazan and Sundus. We were evacuated from the camp in a Red Crescent tuk-tuk [three-wheeled vehicle]. On the way out of the camp, soldiers checked our IDs and made sure our exit from the camp had been coordinated.We went to Thabet Thabet Hospital in Tulkarm and found out that Yazan had been transferred to a hospital in Nablus. We were told that Sundus was in the hospital morgue, and that she had been killed by gunfire. After that, we went to Kafr a-Labad.Yazan is still in the hospital. He’s now in the ICU at al-Istishari Hospital in Ramallah. His condition is serious, and it’s not looking good.Rahaf’s father, Fouad al-Ashqar, 51, a father of seven, said in a testimony he gave on 6 March 2025:On Sunday, 9 February 2025, I was with my family in our home in the al-Madares neighborhood in Nur Shams R.C. At that point, the Israeli army had already raided the camp with dozens of military vehicles and bulldozers. Israeli soldiers controlled all entrances to the camp and also climbed onto the roofs of tall buildings. There were no clashes in the camp at the time, only soldier raids on homes.Around noon, my daughter, Rahaf, 21, heard a noise in the yard. She looked out the window and saw soldiers opening the yard gate and laying wires on the ground. I went to peek out the window and saw wires running from the main gate to the front door. I also saw soldiers walking around the yard. I figured the wires were laid to blow up the front door with explosives.It all happened very quickly and it was terrifying. Rahaf tried to escape from the living roomto the rooms where the rest of the family was, but then there was a loud explosion. I saw my daughter fall. She didn’t make it out of the living room in time. She was seriously injured in the front of her body, face, abdomen and legs. I was injured in the thighs by fragments. I heard my daughter say: “Help me, help me,” and then she stopped talking and didn’t move anymore.The rest of the family came into the living room to see what happened, and my wife started screaming and crying. At about the same time, a group of soldiers entered the house. One of them checked my daughter, who was lying on the floor. The rest searched the house.About half an hour after the explosion, the Red Crescent managed to reach the house. They evacuated me along with Rahaf, who was already dead. Thabet Thabet Hospital was surrounded by soldiers, so they took us to another hospital in Tulkarm. At the hospital, the doctors removed the fragments from my body. I was kept in the hospital for three days.Rahaf’s mother, Kifah al-Ashqar, 53, a mother of seven, said in her testimony on 6 March 2025:On Sunday, 9 February 2025, I was in the children’s room in our house with my husband’s father. We have four bedrooms, a living room, and a yard, and because of the raid by Israeli forces on the camp, relatives were staying with us, so we were a total of 17 people.Around noon, I suddenly heard a loud explosion inside the house. I rushed to the living room, and before I even entered, I heard my daughter say: “Help me, help me.” When I went in, I saw her lying on the floor in a pool of her own blood. My husband’s legs were injured, and he was leaning on the sofa.Around that time, many Israeli soldiers entered the house. I yelled at them: “Why did you kill my daughter and my husband? What are they guilty of? What did they do?” No one answered me. The soldiers stayed in our house for 15-20 minutes, and in the meantime, I called the Red Crescent. They arrived a few minutes after the soldiers left and evacuated my wounded husband and my daughter Rahaf, who was already dead.The next day, the soldiers expelled the residents of our neighborhood, and it was only then that I managed to get to the hospital and visit my husband. After that, we moved to my daughter Riham’s house. She’s married and lives in Dahyat Kafa, south of Tulkarm.I don’t know why the soldiers blew up our front door like that. No one in the house has problems with the army or anyone else. My daughter Rahaf was laid to rest in the camp’s cemetery a full nine days after she was killed because of the long military operation in the city of Tulkarm and its refugee camps.

18 May 2025

Human Shields

Border Police officers use members of Jenin family as human shields

On Friday, 13 May 2022, at around 6:00 A.M., Israeli troops, including Special Police Unit forces, entered the al-Hadaf neighborhood in Jenin. They stopped by the home of the extended Mer'eb family, blew up the door of Muhammad and Manal Mer'eb’s apartment on the first floor, and called for the couple’s son Mahmoud (20) to come out. The parents came out with three of their children – ‘Ahd (16), Fares (9) and 'Abd a-Rahman (4). Mahmoud stayed in the apartment. Two of Muhammad's brothers, their mother Khairiyah (64), and their wives and children – 12 people in total – stayed in their apartments on the top floor. Shortly after the family members came outside, armed Palestinians began firing at the forces. An exchange of fire ensued, in which Mahmoud Mer'eb also participated, firing from inside the apartment. After about three hours, the family members on the top floor also came outside, and then the forces fired at least six missiles at the house. One of the armed Palestinians, Daoud Zubeideh, a resident of Jenin Refugee Camp, and Special Police Unit commander Noam Raz sustained critical injuries in the exchange of fire. Both later died of their wounds. Testimonies collected by B'Tselem's field researcher indicate that during their attempt to draw Mahmoud outside, the forces used his parents, his sister ‘Ahd and his grandmother as human shields: they stood his father Muhammad and his sister ‘Ahd between the military jeeps and the armed Palestinians who were firing at them, leaving the two unprotected and exposed to gunfire; they ordered his mother Manal to go into the house – which was at the center of the exchange of fire – in order to persuade Mahmoud to come out and bring them the military robot they had sent towards the house; and finally, after Manal failed at the task they had assigned her, they ordered his grandmother to go inside, too, to try and convince Mahmoud to turn himself in. Using Palestinians as human shields, as the security forces did in this case, was once a routine part of the occupation and a matter of military policy: soldiers ordered randomly selected Palestinians to carry out military acts at real risk to their lives. Among other things, Palestinians were required to remove suspicious objects from roads, to order people to come out of their homes so soldiers could arrest them, and to stand in front of Border Police officers who fired behind their backs or used them to shield from Palestinian gunfire. In 2005, following an unusual Supreme Court ruling that barred the military’s instrumental use of Palestinians in this way, the policy changed. Such cases recurred nevertheless, albeit less frequently, and those responsible – including the officers who authorized them – were barely punished. The indifference towards these incidents is what enables, among other things, the continued illegal and immoral use of Palestinians as human shields. B'Tselem field researcher Abdulkarim Sadi collected the following testimonies from members of the family: In a testimony she gave on 22 May 2022, ‘Ahd Mer'eb (16) recalled the morning the military arrived at her home: We live on the first floor of a two-story building. My grandmother and my grandfather, who's in hospital, live next to us, and my uncles live with their families in the two apartments above us. On 13 May 2022, at around 6:00 A.M., I woke up in a fright from an explosion nearby. I heard someone outside the house say, "Mahmoud, turn yourself in. We are the IDF." They repeated it several times. I went out of the room and found my parents and my two younger brothers, Fares and 'Abd a-Rahman, already awake. Dad said we were going outside. When we went out, we didn't see any military vehicles or Border Police officers on the road. We only saw two Border Police officers standing behind the gate of the neighbors’ house opposite us. They ordered my dad to lift up his shirt and walk towards them. Dad went over to them, and then they took him away. After that, the Border Police officers told us to stand by the wall of the neighbors' house, about 15 meters away, and not move. After 10 minutes, one of the Border Police officers ordered us to move a few meters and sit on the edge of a concrete wall that belongs to one of the houses. We sat there for about 15 minutes, and then the military opened fire at our house. My younger brothers cried and screamed in fear. My mother asked one of the Border Police officers to let us move away so we could be safe and so she could calm my younger brothers down. I was also terribly scared of the shooting. Border Police officers surrounded the house on all sides. Only after my mother kept insisting, they allowed us to move away and go to the steps of the a-Sawity family's home, about 100 meters away. There was a military jeep with Border Police officers next to us. The shooting at our home continued, and my brothers kept on crying. After about half an hour, the Border Police officers allowed my mother to take Fares and 'Abd a-Rahman into the a-Sawity family's home. They wouldn't let me go in with them, so my mother took them inside and stayed with me. Then one of the Border Police officers ordered her to get into a military jeep that had drawn up, and they drove over to the entrance to our home. I stayed alone on the steps of the a-Sawitys' house, with a military jeep next to me. The shooting at our house continued, and missiles were also fired at it from a missile launcher. In a testimony he gave on 26 May 2022, Muhammad Mer'eb (46), a married father of five, recounted what happened after he was taken away by Border Police officers: One of the Border Police officers told me to go over to the gate they were hiding behind. Another officer tied my hands behind my back with plastic zip ties. They took me into the yard of the neighbors' house, which is exactly opposite our house. One of the officers started interrogating me about my son Mahmoud. That lasted a few minutes, until we heard Palestinian shots fired in our direction. There were also shots fired from inside my house. The shooting lasted about 20 minutes. One of the Border Police officers covered my eyes with a blindfold, and then they sat me behind the neighbors' car that was parked in the yard of their house. I heard loud blasts and later realized they were the missiles the Border Police fired at our house. One of the officers pressed a phone to my ear and told me I had a call. There was an ISA agent on the line. He wanted me to persuade Mahmoud to turn himself in and threatened that otherwise, they'd bring the house down on top of him. One of the Border Police officers removed my blindfold and led me to the street outside our house. There was a jeep standing on the road opposite the house, and the officer ordered me to stand between the jeep and our house and call out to Mahmoud to turn himself in. I saw that our building had already taken a lot of damage. I called out to Mahmoud for five minutes, until shots were fired again from inside our house towards the military jeep I was standing in front of. The officers quickly took me back to the neighbors' yard and opened a massive volley of fire at our house. That lasted a few minutes, and then an officer pressed a phone into my ear again, and I spoke with the ISA agent again. He told me again to persuade Mahmoud to turn himself in. After the call, they put me in a jeep that was standing opposite the house, and it backed up a short distance and stopped. I heard my wife's voice and realized she had been put in the jeep, too. The jeep drove back and stopped opposite our house. The officers led Manal and me outside, and I heard an officer tell her to go into our house, get Mahmoud and convince him to surrender. I heard him say, "When you come back, bring the robot that’s in the doorway with you." Manal came back without Mahmoud or the robot, which scared her. One of the officers ordered her to go back into the building and bring all the occupants out. At 9:30 A.M., everyone came out with Manal and we were all in the house and yard of the neighbors’ house, and then the Border Police fired more missiles at our house. I spoke on the phone again with the ISA agent. He threatened me that a military bulldozer was on the way and that it would destroy the building. He ordered me to go back into the house with my mother, Khairiyah, and persuade Mahmoud to turn himself in. Border Police officers led me, Manal and my mother outside. They ordered my mother to go into the house and persuade Mahmoud to surrender. They ordered Manal and me to stand in front of the military jeep. One of the Border Police officers stood behind me and propped the barrel of his rifle up on my shoulder. After about 20 minutes, my mother appeared in the doorway with her hands up. She told the Border Police not to shoot and that Mahmoud would turn himself in. They ordered her to approach slowly, until she came out of the door of the building. Meanwhile, my son Anas, who lives in a house nearby, also came out with his hands up. The Border Police officers ordered Manal, my mother and me to go into the neighbors' house. I heard the Border Police tell Mahmoud to strip. Meanwhile, the Palestinian gunfire intensified. In her testimony, ‘Ahd Mer'eb described what happened after her mother was taken away by the Border Police: At around 9:00 A.M., I also started hearing shots from the al-Jabriyat area, which is above our area. I understood they were Palestinian militants shooting at the Border Police officers who were surrounding our house. One of the officers in the jeep that was next to me ordered me in Arabic, and using hand gestures, to stand in front of the jeep, on its right side, and not move. I was terrified, especially when some bullets fired by the Palestinians hit the jeep, maybe five bullets. The shooting intensified, and I ducked because I was afraid of being hit, but the officer in the jeep shouted at me to stand up and raise my head. I stood like that for about two hours. The Border Police officers stayed in the jeep the whole time. The Border Police officers who were surrounding the house shot at it with rifles, and fired six or seven missiles from a missile launcher. I saw the walls had collapsed and a fire had broken out on the top floor. In a testimony he gave on 26 May 2022, Anas Mer'eb (22), a married father of one, spoke about that morning: Luckily, my wife was at her family's house with our daughter that morning. I heard the shooting and hid in our bedroom from the bullets that came in through the windows. At around 10:00 A.M., the shooting intensified and I was terrified. I called our neighbors' house, where the Border Police were holding my family. I asked them to tell the Border Police I wanted to come outside. The neighbors must have called the Palestinian DCO, and somebody there called me. He told me the Border Police agreed for me to come out and that I had to describe the clothes I was wearing to him. After I described the clothes, he told me to come out of the house with my hands in the air. I went outside and saw about 20 Border Police officers aiming their weapons at me. One of them told me to lift my shirt up and turn around. I did that and then stood still for about five minutes, until the Border Police officers came over, tied my hands behind my back and covered my eyes. Just before that, I saw Grandma and Mahmoud leave the house and the Border Police knock Mahmoud to the ground. Then they put Mahmoud and me into a military vehicle, beating and kicking us. The clashes between the militants and the forces continued and intensified, and the jeep drove off quickly because of the shooting. Then the jeep drove back and stopped outside our house, and the Border Police let Mahmoud and me out in the neighbors' yard, where the rest of my family was being held. They threw us there in the yard, handcuffed and blindfolded. At around noon, the forces started withdrawing from the area, taking Mahmoud with them. Only then did my family and neighbors leave the house and take off my handcuffs and blindfold.

19 June 2022

Human Shields

Border Police raid home of Beit Ummar resident, order her to stand by them on roof while stones were thrown at them, and force her to carry military equipment

On Friday afternoon, 30 July 2021 , Shawqat Za'aqiq, a resident of Beit Ummar in Hebron District who was fatally shot by Israeli security forces, was laid to rest in the village. During the funeral, security forces attacked the participants, who threw stones at them. Manal 'Awad, a village resident, was standing on the roof of her home overlooking the village's main street and observing the clashes. When she saw soldiers and Border Police officers approaching her house, she hurried back inside. Her five children, aged 2 to 13, where in the house. The officers forced broke their way into her home and ordered her to go up to the roof with them. Manal’s frightened children were left inside by themselves. Upon reaching the roof, the officers ordered Manal to stand next to them as they fired tear gas canisters and rubber-coated metal bullets at residents on the street, who were throwing stones at them. 'Awad was held at the scene for an hour in the middle of the confrontation without any protection and was required to carry objects up the stairs for the forces. The military openly practiced a policy of using Palestinian civilians as human shields during the second intifada. Soldiers ordered Palestinians – chosen at random – to perform military tasks involving a genuine risk to their lives, such as removing suspicious objects from roads, ordering people to come out of their homes so the military can arrest them, standing in front of soldiers while the latter fired behind their backs, and more. In 2005, in an unusual decision , Israel’s High Court of Justice ruled that any use of Palestinian civilians during military operations is forbidden. Soldiers, have, however, continued to occasionally use Palestinians as human shields – as indicated by this case. Coercing a person to protect another person – certainly a soldier of the occupation army – is always immoral and unlawful. In a testimony she gave B'Tselem field researcher Musa Abu Hashhsash on 2 August 2021, Manal 'Awad (39), a mother of five, recounted what happened that day: On Friday, 30 July 2021, at around 1:30 P.M., after the Friday prayers, I was standing on the roof of the house to watch the funeral of the martyr Shawqat 'Awad (22), who was killed the day before. I saw large military and Border Police forces starting to attack the participants with stun grenades and "rubber" bullets. Many of the participants fled, and the soldiers chased them and advanced into the village, near my home. I immediately got off the roof and closed the main door. I barely managed to get into our apartment on the second floor, and I could hear glass shattering below and shouts, "Open up, open up." I went down quickly to open the front door of the building and saw two male Border Police officers and one female officer holding crates. One of them ordered me to close the door and go up to the roof with them as he pointed his weapon at me. I went up to the second floor and reached my apartment door, where my five young children were. I wanted to go in, but then the officer shouted at me to go up to the roof and stand beside them at the edge that overlooks the road. They started shooting "rubber" bullets and tear gas canisters at the stone-throwers around the house. The youths threw stones at soldiers and Border Police officers on the street and those on our roof. Some stones landed next to me, and I was terrified that I'd get hurt. I stood there for over 10 minutes and didn't know what to do. One of the officers noticed that I was scared and told me to stand to the side, at the entrance to the roof, and not move. I asked to go down and get into my house. I explained that my kids were afraid and that my youngest son was crying. Even though the officer heard him crying, he refused to let me go. I asked both him and the female officer several times, but they refused. I kept standing there for over an hour. The officers fired, and the young men threw stones. At around 3:00 P.M., my husband called me, saying that my mother-in-law and a relative of ours were waiting downstairs and trying to get into the house. I told the officer, and he told me to wait. After a few minutes, he received a call. I assumed it had to do with my mother-in-law and the relative who had come with her. He ordered me to come down with him to open the front door for them. We went downstairs, and I opened the door, and then we went upstairs, and I went with them into our apartment on the second floor to my children. The officer must have returned to the roof. Manal's mother-in-law, Fatmeh (58), came to the house during the clashes on the street along with a relative, Khitam (56), after her grandchildren told her on the phone that there were Border Police officers in their house and that their mother was with the officers. They were forced to wait amid the confrontation and only after an argument with a Border Police officer stationed at the building's entrance were they allowed in. An officer came down from the roof along with Manal and escorted them to the family's apartment, where the children were waiting. About 40 minutes after they arrived, an officer knocked on 'Awad's door holding a large crate and rudely ordered her to carry it downstairs to the ground floor. The two then returned, and the officer took the crate from her and went up to the room. About ten minutes later, the officer came back and demanded she go down with him to the ground floor to carry another crate upstairs. 'Awad estimates that the crate contained equipment and ammunition intended for the forces on the roof, who continued firing at the young men on the street. In a testimony she gave B'Tselem field researcher Manal al-Ja’bari, Khitam 'Awad (56) described how the soldier forced Manal to carry the crates: I went with Fatmeh to Manal’s house, and as soon as we got there, we saw Border Police officers and journalists near the house. There were some young guys there who were throwing a lot of stones at the Border Police officers on the rooftop. The stones landed close to us. The officers responded with fire and stun grenades. The journalists fled, and Fatmeh and I argued with the officers and insisted on going into the house. We heard Manal’s voice from the roof. She told us the forces were holding her there and not letting her open the door for anyone. We waited for a few minutes and talked to one of the officers at the entrance, who spoke good Arabic. We told him that we wouldn’t leave until we saw the children. At first, the officer refused and said they were taking care of the children better than us. Despite that, he asked the officers on the roof to open the door. Manal opened the door for us with a Border Police officer who accompanied her. We went up with them to the second floor, where the kids were locked up in the apartment. They were crying and shaking with fear. Manal also looked pale and frightened. An officer ordered us to stay in one of the rooms and not move. Then he left and apparently went up to the roof. We heard stones landing on the roof and the shooting of “rubber” bullets and tear gas from the room we were in. After about 40 minutes, the officer came back holding a metal crate. He ordered Manal to take it to the front door of the building. Manal asked him what was in the crate, and he replied, “Pick it up and shut up!” Manal lifted the crate and went down with the officer. They returned after about 15 minutes with her carrying the crate. The officer took it from her, ordered us to sit and not move, and went up to the roof. Manal returned to the apartment, hugged her young children and calmed them down. Then the officer came back and ordered Manal to escort him again to the front door of the building. Manal went down with him and came back about 10 minutes later holding a crate. I didn’t know what was inside. The officer took the crate from her and went up to the roof. They kept us locked up there for about two and a half hours. We kept hearing stone-throwing and shooting. Then the officers left the building. I also left and went home even though there were still troops around.

14 September 2021