Description

Photos:
This photo provided by Breaking the Silence, a whistleblower group of former Israeli soldiers, shows two soldiers behind Palestinian detainees being sent into a Gaza City-area house to clear it in 2024. Credit: Breaking the Silence via AP.

An illustration based on a photograph from an operation. Illustration: Nadav Gazit

This photo provided by Breaking the Silence, a whistleblower group of former Israeli soldiers, shows two detainees used as human shields being held inside a house in the Gaza City area in 2024. Credit: Breaking the Silence via AP

A Gazan dressed in an IDF uniform next to Israeli soldiers in a home in Rafah in July. The photo has been blurred to remove identifying features. Credit: David Bachar

Mourners carry the bodies of Palestinians killed in Israeli strikes during the funeral, at Al-Ahli Arab Baptist hospital, in Gaza City, earlier this week. Credit: Dawoud Abu Alkas/Reuters

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The Israeli military strictly prohibits involving civilians in military missions as human shields. However, the AP spoke to former Israeli soldiers and detainees who said some IDF commanders weren't just aware of the use, some even gave orders to do so

The Associated Press
May 24, 2025

Several Palestinians and IDF soldiers told the Associated Press that Israeli troops are systematically forcing Palestinians to act as human shields in Gaza, sending them into buildings and tunnels to check for explosives or militants. The dangerous practice has become ubiquitous during 19 months of war, they said.

Israel's military, in response, said that it strictly prohibits using civilians as shields, and that it also bans coercing civilians to participate in operations. "All such orders are routinely emphasized to the forces," the IDF wrote in a statement to the AP.

The military also said that it is investigating several cases alleging that Palestinians were involved in missions, but wouldn't provide details. It didn't answer questions about the reach of the practice or any orders from commanding officers.

The AP spoke with seven Palestinians who described being used as shields in Gaza and the West Bank, and with two members of Israel's military who said they engaged in the practice, which is prohibited by international law.

'Do this or we'll kill you'
Ayman Abu Hamadan said he was detained in August after being separated from his family, and soldiers told him he'd help with a "special mission." He was forced, for 17 days, to search houses and inspect every hole in the ground for tunnels, he said.

Dressed in army fatigues with a camera fixed to his forehead, Ayman Abu Hamadan was forced into houses in the Gaza Strip to make sure they were clear of bombs and gunmen, he said. When one unit finished with him, he was passed to the next.

Soldiers stood behind him and, once it was clear, entered the buildings to damage or destroy them, he said. He spent each night bound in a dark room, only to wake up and do it again.

The only times the Palestinian man wasn't bound or blindfolded, he said, was when he was used by Israeli soldiers as their human shield. "They beat me and told me: 'You have no other option; do this or we'll kill you,'" the 36-year-old told The Associated Press, describing the two and a half weeks he was held last summer by the Israeli military in northern Gaza.

Rights groups are ringing the alarm, saying it's become standard procedure increasingly used in the war.

"These are not isolated accounts; they point to a systemic failure and a horrifying moral collapse," said Nadav Weiman, executive director of Breaking the Silence – a whistleblower group of former Israeli soldiers that has collected testimonies about the practice from within the military. "Israel rightly condemns Hamas for using civilians as human shields, but our own soldiers describe doing the very same."

Orders often came from the top, and at times nearly every platoon used a Palestinian to clear locations, said an Israeli officer, speaking on condition of anonymity for fear of reprisal.

A Haaretz investigation published in August 2024 uncovered similar practices, in which Gazans not suspected of terrorism are detained and sent as human shields to search tunnels and houses before IDF soldiers enter, with the full knowledge of senior Israeli officers.

In response to Haaretz, the IDF Spokesperson's Unit said: "The IDF's instructions and orders on the subject have been made clear to the forces. Upon receipt of the request, the allegations were forwarded to the relevant authorities for review."

Troops were ordered to 'bring a mosquito'
The two Israeli soldiers who spoke to the AP – and a third who provided testimony to Breaking the Silence – said commanders were aware of the use of human shields and tolerated it, with some giving orders to do so. Some said it was referred to as the "mosquito protocol" and that Palestinians were also referred to as "wasps" and other dehumanizing terms.

The soldiers – who said they're no longer serving in Gaza – said the practice sped up operations, saved ammunition, and spared combat dogs from injury or death.

Rights groups say Israel has used Palestinians as shields in Gaza and the West Bank for decades. Israel's Supreme Court outlawed the practice in 2005. But the groups continued to document violations.

Still, experts say this war is the first time in decades the practice – and the debate around it – has been so widespread.

The soldiers said they first became aware human shields were being used shortly after the war erupted on Oct. 7, 2023, when Hamas attacked Israel, and that it became widespread by the middle of 2024. Orders to "bring a mosquito" often came via radio, they said – shorthand everyone understood. Soldiers acted on commanding officers' orders, according to the officer who spoke to the AP.

He said that by the end of his nine months in Gaza, every infantry unit used a Palestinian to clear houses before entering. "Once this idea was initiated, it caught on like fire in a field," the 26-year-old said. "People saw how effective and easy it was."

He described a 2024 planning meeting in which a brigade commander presented to the division commander a slide reading "Get a mosquito" and suggested they might "just catch one off the streets."

The officer wrote two incident reports to the brigade commander detailing the use of human shields, reports that would have been escalated to the division chief, he said. The military said it had no comment when asked whether it received them.

One report documented the accidental killing of a Palestinian, who he said troops didn't realize another unit was using him as a shield and shot him as he ran into a house. The officer recommended that the Palestinians be dressed in army clothes to avoid misidentification.

He said he knew of at least one other Palestinian who died while being used as a shield, after he passed out in a tunnel.

Convincing soldiers to operate lawfully when they see their enemy using questionable practices is difficult, said Michael Schmitt, a distinguished professor of international law at the U.S. Military Academy at West Point.

Israeli officials have long blamed Hamas for using civilians in Gaza as shields, as it embeds itself in communities, hiding fighters in hospitals and schools. Many cite the practice as the reason behind the civilian death toll in Gaza since the start of the offensive, which has killed tens of thousands of Palestinians.

"It's really a heavy lift to look at your own soldiers and say you have to comply," Schmitt said.

Another soldier told the AP his unit tried to refuse to use human shields in mid-2024 but were told they had no choice, with a high-ranking officer saying they shouldn't worry about international humanitarian law.

The sergeant – speaking on condition of anonymity for fear of reprisal – said the troops used a 16-year-old and a 30-year-old for a few days. He said that the boy shook constantly, and both repeated "Rafah, Rafah" – Gaza's southernmost city, where more than 1 million Palestinians had fled from fighting elsewhere at that point in the war. The sergeant said it seemed they were begging to be freed.

I have children and want to reunite with them
Masoud Abu Saeed said he was used as a shield for two weeks in March 2024 in the southern city of Khan Yunis. "This is extremely dangerous," he recounted telling a soldier. "I have children and want to reunite with them."

The 36-year-old said he was forced into houses, buildings and a hospital to dig up suspected tunnels and clear areas. He said he wore a first-responder vest for easy identification, carrying a phone, hammer and chain cutters.

During one operation, he bumped into his brother, used as a shield by another unit, he said. They hugged. "I thought Israel's army had executed him," he said.

Palestinians also report being used as shields in the West Bank. Hazar Estity said soldiers took her Jenin refugee camp home in November, forcing her to film inside several apartments and clear them before troops entered.

She said she pleaded to return to her 21-month-old son, but soldiers didn't listen. "I was most afraid that they would kill me," she said. "And that I wouldn't see my son again."
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Gazans: IDF Used Us as 'Human Shields' During Offensive

Soldiers reportedly forced I'zbet Abbed Rabbo to search house occupied by Hamas gunmen.

by Amira Hass for Haaretz
February 19, 2009

GAZA - The question "Who is it?" was answered with: "The Israel Defense Forces." Majdi Abed Rabbo, 39, who is a Palestinian Authority (Ramallah) employee and a member of its intelligence apparatus, went down to open the door. Standing there was the son of his neighbors, Mahmoud Daher, and behind him a soldier whose rifle was jammed into Daher's back. The soldier pushed Daher aside and aimed the rifle at Abed Rabbo.

"He ordered me to pull down my pants. I pulled them down. He demanded that I raise my shirt. I raised it. That I turn around. I turned around," Abed Rabbo related. And then the room filled up with soldiers. "Twelve, or something like that."

This was in the morning of Monday, January 5, 2009, about 40 hours after the start of the Israeli ground offensive in Gaza.

The soldiers had already taken over Daher's house on Sunday evening, located in I'zbet Abed Rabbo, an eastern neighborhood of Jabaliya city. First they gathered the family on the ground floor. Gunfire rang out around the house. Then they moved the family up to the first floor. The family wondered why the soldiers had taken them upstairs, to the cold, uncomfortable room - parents, children, two infants and an elderly mother. But they could not refuse, and they did not yet know that the move upstairs brought them closer to the range of fire. Only later did they learn about the three fighters from Iz al-Din al-Qassam, Hamas' military wing, positioned in the empty house to the northeast of them. The regular occupants of the house, owned by their neighbor Abu Hatem, had long since gone abroad. Abed Rabbo's tall house stood next to Abu Hatem's narrow, empty one.

At about 7 A.M. on Monday, the soldiers took Shafiq Daher - a 53-year-old financial manager who gets his salary from the PA in Ramallah - as well as Mahmoud and two other sons from their home, and then separated them from each other.

The soldiers took the elder Daher to the house of his neighbor to the east, Jaber Zeydan. The door had already been broken, and the neighbors were huddled in one room. The search here, as in the four other homes Daher was forced to enter that day, was conducted in the same way: He entered first, with the soldiers behind him. One soldier placed his rifle on Daher's right shoulder, and pressed down on his left shoulder. The members of the Zeydan family were taken into the adjacent house, owned by Tawfiq Katari. The hands of all the men, including boys of 14 and 16, were tied, some behind the back, some in front.

Protecting soldiers
The soldiers also took over Katari's house on Sunday night, January 4. The Kataris, too, were rounded up and taken to the ground floor. There was shooting all around. The soldiers took up positions on one of the upper floors and turned the northeast window, close to the Abu Hatem home, into a firing position. "There was one nice soldier who told us that where we were sitting was dangerous and moved us next to an inner wall," one of the women related.

At about 9 A.M. on Monday, the soldiers took Katari's son Jamal from the house. During the next four days Jamal accompanied the soldiers and performed several tasks. He was made to enter what he estimates were 10 houses, going in first and calling on the occupants to come downstairs. He preceded the huge army bulldozer that forced its way through the neighborhood, ripping up the streets. "I am afraid the soldiers will shoot me," he told a soldier, who replied: "Don't be afraid."

In the meantime, that same Monday morning, Shafiq Daher, too, was continuing his mission of protecting Israel Defense Forces soldiers. The second house he was made to check was also empty. It belonged to the Al-Ajarmi family. Daher did not know that his two oldest sons were accompanying other groups of soldiers, and were being forced to smash holes in the walls of houses using sledgehammers. Nor did he know that at that very moment, a soldier was jamming his rifle into the back of his third son, standing at the door of Abed Rabbo's home.

Abed Rabbo himself, after being forced to smash a hole in the wall that separated his roof from his neighbors' roof and to accompany the soldiers inside, was made to enter several houses near the mosque, break into a car and then go into the Zeydan house. He was then taken to the Katari family's home, where he met Shafiq Daher and told him that his son was all right. At about 2 P.M., a soldier took him outside, pointed to the Abu Hatem house and said, according to Abed Rabbo's testimony: "There were armed people in that house. We killed them. Take off their clothes and take their weapons." At first he refused and said that was not his job. "Obey orders," he was told.

Dead or alive?
Abbed Rabbo went to the Abu Hatem house, shouting in Arabic that he was the owner. In the house, he found three very much alive members of Iz al-Din al-Qassam. They told him to leave and threatened him not to come back, "because we will shoot you." He returned to the soldiers, who made him undress and turn around, and then told them that the three were alive. The officer on hand asked to see his ID card and discovered that Abed Rabbo was a member of Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas' intelligence. He was handcuffed and moved aside. He heard shooting. Then he was again sent to check the Abu Hatem house, after being told the three militants were now dead; he found one wounded and the others "all right." One of them said: "Tell the officer that if he is a man, he can come up here himself."

The soldiers didn't like what they heard. One of them cursed, said Abed Rabbo, who was handcuffed again and made to wait. It began to grow dark when he heard a helicopter approaching, followed by the sound of a missile exploding. One of the soldiers said: Now we have killed them, with a missile. Come over here. Abed Rabbo complied and saw, with horror, that the missile had struck his house.

He told the soldier that the missile had missed. "Are you majnoun [nuts]?" the soldier asked him. "No," Abed Rabbo replied. "The missile hit my house."

There was a huge mess: Water was bursting out of pipes, pieces of concrete were lying all over. And all around the shooting continued unabated, interspersed with the sounds of many explosions and helicopters flying overhead.

At about midnight, between Monday and Tuesday, Abed Rabbo was forced to go for a third time, to ascertain whether the three Hamas militants were dead. The soldiers lit the way for him. He found two of the gunmen, still alive, but buried under the rubble; the third was still holding his weapon. Abed Rabbo returned to the soldiers, stripped down again and repeated that the three were alive.

"Are you majnoun?" they demanded.

"No, I am not majnoun, I am telling you what I saw," he replied. Hungry, thirsty and with a throbbing headache, Abbed Rabbo was taken back to the Katari house.

At 6:30 A.M. he was brought out, in front of what was once his house. Soldiers brought a megaphone, he recalled later, and started to shout: "Ya, armed people, you have 15 minutes to turn yourselves in. Come down, remove your clothes, the Red Cross is here, the journalists are here, we will treat the wounded men."

The soldiers then sent a dog into the house. One of the Hamas fighters shot and killed it. The soldiers again started calling on them to come out. There was no reply. "And then a bulldozer arrived and started to demolish my house, right before my eyes." Abed Rabbo was sent into the Katari house as the bulldozer started to wreck Abu Hatem's house. He heard sporadic gunfire shots. When he emerged, two hours later, he found two of the armed men "sprawled on the demolished concrete, dead." He did not see the third man.

"What kind of army is this, which can't break into one house where there are armed men?" Abed Rabbo asked himself.

The IDF responds
Haaretz spoke with eight residents of I'zbet Abed Rabbo neighborhood, who testified that they were made to accompany IDF soldiers on missions involving breaking into and searching houses - not to mention the family members who remained in the houses the army took over, which were used as firing positions. The eight estimated that about 20 local people were made to carry out "escort and protection" missions of various kinds, as described here, between January 5 and January 12.

The IDF Spokesperson's Unit stated in response: "The IDF is a moral army and its soldiers operate according to the spirit and values of the IDF, and we suggest a thorough examination of the allegations of Palestinian elements with vested interests. The IDF troops were instructed unequivocally not to make use of the civilian population within the combat framework for any purpose whatsoever, certainly not as 'human shields.'

"Following an examination with the commanders of the forces that were in the area in question, no evidence was found of the cases mentioned. Anyone who tries to accuse the IDF of actions of this kind creates a mistaken and misleading impression of the IDF and its fighters, who operate according to moral criteria and international law."