The Israeli army’s decision to open fire on Palestinian demonstrators in Gaza on Friday, killing 17 people and wounding hundreds of others, was “calculated” and “unlawful,” a human rights watchdog has said, Newsweek informed. Human Rights Watch said senior Israeli officials who called for live ammunition to be used against protesters who did not pose a serious threat are responsible for their deaths.
The “high number of deaths and injuries was the foreseeable consequence of granting soldiers leeway to use lethal force outside of life-threatening situations in violation of international norms,” HRW said.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu praised the army for successfully “guarding the country’s borders” and allowing “Israeli citizens to celebrate the [Passover] holiday peacefully,” but the watchdog said Israel’s government has failed to provide any evidence that demonstrators posed any serious threat to soldiers.
“Israeli soldiers were not merely using excessive force, but were apparently acting on orders that all but ensured a bloody military response to the Palestinian demonstrations. The result was foreseeable deaths and injuries of demonstrators on the other side of a border who posed no imminent threat to life,” said Eric Goldstein, deputy Middle East director at Human Rights Watch.
The Israeli government has ignored calls for an independent investigation into the killings and has refused to cooperate with a United Nations inquiry, Newsweek noted. Goldstein condemned that decision, saying that it “says much about how cheaply Israeli authorities view the lives of Palestinians in Gaza.”
Tens of thousands of protesters had gathered at multiple locations along Gaza’s border with Israel to mark the 42nd commemoration of Land Day, when six unarmed Palestinians were killed by Israeli forces in 1976 during protests against the expropriation of Palestinian-owned land.
Hundreds of demonstrators reportedly ignored calls from organizers and the Israeli military to maintain a distance from the fortified fence marking the Gaza-Israel border and the Israeli military has claimed that some of those who approached had rolled burning tires and hurled rocks and fire bombs toward the border.
In the days following the deadly protests, several videos have emerged appearing to show unarmed demonstrators being killed or injured by Israeli gunfire, while at least two clips appear to show a man, who has since been identified as 18-year-old Abed el-Fatah Abed e-Nabi, running from Israeli positions carrying a tire before being shot in the back and falling to the ground.
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