Israeli soldiers used an 11-year-old boy as a human shield

UN Special Representative for Children in Armed Conflict, Radhika Coomaraswamy, stated on Monday that Israeli soldiers used an 11-year-old boy as a human shield during the latest Israeli war against the Palestinians in the Gaza Strip.


Coomaraswamy based her statement on the findings of the group of United Nations human rights experts on Monday.

Israeli soldiers forced the child to walk in front of them in Tal Al Hawa neighborhood in Gaza City, and also used him while breaking into buildings and homes.

The incident took place on January 15, shortly after Israeli tanks invaded the neighborhood.

Coomaraswamy stated that this act comes in direct violation to the international law and basic principles of human rights.

She also said that Israeli soldiers shot children, bulldozed homes, including a home in which a woman and her child were still inside, and also shelled a building after forcing civilians into it a day earlier.

Coomaraswamy added that there are several similar incidents that took place during the war, and that the UN Human Rights experts will investigate the claims.

“The violations are carried out on daily basis”, Coomaraswamy stated, “they are too numerous to count”.

The UN officials visited Gaza for five days in February, observed the conditions on the ground and listened to hundreds of incidents of Israeli violations against Palestinian civilians.

Israel killed nearly 1450 Palestinians during the war on Gaza; at least 960 of them were civilians, among them 431 children and 114 women.

Israeli ambassador to the UN, Aharon Leshno Yar, slammed the report and ignored the fact that a large number of the casualties were civilians.

He only said that this report “willfully ignores and downplays the terrorist and other threats we face”, Haaretz said.

He also claimed that Hamas also used Palestinians as human shields by hiding among the civilians.

Leshno Yar claimed that the 43-page report “demonizes Israel” and claimed that the United Nations became “an informal bloc of African and Islamic nations, supported by Russia and Cuba”.

Furthermore, Richard Falk, U.S Academic and UN special rapparatuer on human rights in the occupied territories also presented a report on the Israeli violations against the Palestinians in Gaza.

Israel barred Falk from entering the country last year after accusing him of “bias and prejudice”.

The accusations came after Falk said that Israel is subjecting the civilians in Gaza to an “inhuman form of warfare that kills, mains, and inflicts mental harm”, Haaretz said.

The usage of Palestinians civilians as human shields led to dozens of casualties and in spite of a decision by the Israeli High Court of Justice in 2005 barring the army from using civilians as human shields, troops continued their illegal acts.