Israel 'used child as human shield' during Gaza conflict

Israel violated a range of human rights during its invasion of Gaza, including using a child as a human shield, the United Nations said yesterday.
The Telegraph Foreign Staff
Mar. 30, 2009

Radhika Coomaraswamy: The Sri Lankan human rights lawyer visited GAza in early February. She cited a long series of incidents to back her charges. Photo: AP

The claims were included in reports to the UN Human Rights Council which also called for an urgent end to Israeli restrictions on humanitarian supplies to Gaza and a full international investigation into the conflict.

They came just days after Israeli soldiers admitted shooting and killing unarmed Palestinian civilians during the invasion between Dec 27 and Jan 17.

"Civilian targets, particularly homes and their occupants, appear to have taken the brunt of the attacks, but schools and medical facilities have also been hit," said one report by Radhika Coomaraswamy, the U N Secretary-General's Special Representative for Children and Armed Conflict.

The Sri Lankan human rights lawyer visited the region in early February. She cited a long series of incidents to back her charges.

In one, she said, Israeli soldiers shot a father after ordering him out of his house and then opened fire into the room where the rest of the family was sheltering, wounding the mother and three brothers and killing a fourth.

In another, on January 15, at Tal al Hawa south-west of Gaza City, Israeli soldiers forced an 11-year-old boy to walk in front of them for several hours as they moved through the town, even after they had been shot at.

Israel criticised the report. Israel's ambassador to the UN, Aharon Leshno Yar, said it "wilfully ignores and downplays the terrorist and other threats we face,"

Last week an Israeli infantry squad leader told local media of an incident in which a sniper mistakenly shot a Palestinian woman and her two children.