NOTE to Blog Readers: My wife
(love of my life) and I have returned from our 36th Wedding
Anniversary vacation (6/4 through 6/7/26). I spent the day yesterday going
through neglected email accounts and whittling down old files on my laptop to
increase PC memory.
Hamas Jew-Hating Terrorists Use Their Own People for
Human Shields
An Intro by John R. Houk, Blog Editor
Intro © June 9, 2026
As I was whittling down files I came across a PDF file I
saved circa April 2025 from the Henry Jackson Society
(HJS). This “Society” is named from now deceased Henry (Scoop) Jackson was a Washington State
Senator (Democrat) from 1953 – 1983. Jackson was a traditional Dem
consistent with the timeframe he served in Domestic Policy though probably
would have abhorred today’s Dem-Marxist-Globalist-Gender Bender Party. On
Foreign Policy Jackson had become a firebrand anti-Communist. What I find
amusing about the Henry Jackson Society is that their headquarters is in London
as in the UK and not in Washington State USA.
The PDF file I had saved is entitled, “HAMAS’S HUMAN SHIELD
STRATEGY IN GAZA”. It’s authors are ANDREW FOX and SALO AIZENBERG. The PDF
contains 87 pages.
So, yup. I am a pro-Israel Christian Zionist that Jew-Haters
love to vilify. A few weeks ago I came across a Telegram comment upset that I
gave a thumbs-down emoji to a Joe Kent Antisemitic opinion about Israel. The
gist of my response was Hamas and their Gaza-Muslim supporters are bloodthirsty
Jew-Hating murderers that use Gaza citizens as Human Shields (men, women
& children) when the IDF begins reprisals for Hamas terrorist
attacks. The particular PDF reference is to the Hamas October 7, 2023 murder, rape
and kidnapping of Jewish men, women and children. The pro-Antisemitic
commenter essentially said, “Prove it.” My immediate response that belief in
Jew-Hating propaganda was not worth my time to share proof when Jew-Hatred WILL
NOT believe what was presented. Then I ran into my saved PDF document from HJS
documenting the Hamas Human Shield practice.
The HJS
summary page includes a link to the PDF is you wish to read the
entire document:
“4th May 2025
Andrew Fox and Salo Aizenberg
Since 7 October 2023, the UN has
issued 367 reports that are filed under the subject of “Gaza Strip”. A search
of these reports reveals that the UN has rarely acknowledged and never asserted
the use by Hamas of “human shields”. The phenomenon of “human shields” has only
been mentioned four times, in each case in only a single sentence, as either an
“allegation”, an Israeli “claim” or an unverified “report” that this practice
occurred. The UN has never dedicated a single paragraph, let alone an entire report,
to analysing how Hamas has fought the war in Gaza.
In contrast, the UN has issued
at least ten reports critical of Israel’s conduct in Gaza, from accusations of
“indiscriminate attacks” to illegal “attacks on hospitals”. A November 2024
investigative report by the UN accused Israel of committing genocide, but the
document makes no mention of Hamas’s fighting tactics in Gaza, let alone
provides an analysis. The NGOs (non-governmental organisations) Amnesty
International and Human Rights Watch each released reports in December 2024
accusing Israel of genocide in Gaza. Over hundreds of pages of text, the reader
would struggle to realise that Hamas even exists in Gaza. Neither report
provides any discussion or analysis of Hamas’s human shield strategy.
This report by the Henry Jackson
Society represents the “missing chapter” in all the UN and NGO reports. It
provides a comprehensive analysis of Hamas’s systematic use of human shield
tactics during the 7 October Israel–Hamas war and the broader Gaza conflict.
Drawing on extensive evidence from international media, military assessments,
legal frameworks and firsthand accounts, the report outlines how Hamas has
embedded its military operations within civilian infrastructure, weaponising
Gaza’s population and urban landscape to achieve both tactical and strategic
objectives.
Read
the Report Here”
I am not cross posing the entire 87 page document. These are
the sections I will be cross posting:
o Key
Findings
o Introduction
o
Overview of Hamas’s Human Shield Strategy
If those sections push you to seek more information, then
read the ENTIRE
REPORT.
JRH
6/9/26
ALWAYS FREE TO READ yet READER SUPPORTED!
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Hamas’s Human Shield Strategy in Gaza [EXCERPT]
Andrew Fox and Salo Aizenberg
PDF 87-Pages
April 2025
Jewish Dwelling After Oct.
7, 2023 Hamas Murder Spree
…
Key Findings
o
Hamas has deliberately and systematically
exploited Gaza’s civilian infrastructure to shield its military assets from
attack by the Israel Defence Forces (IDF), violating the prohibition of the use
of civilian shields under the Law of Armed Conflict. Hamas has employed ten
distinct human shield strategies that knowingly place the civilian population
at high risk of harm throughout the 7 October Israel–Hamas war.
o
Hamas’s senior leadership has openly
admitted to using human shields since gaining control of Gaza nearly 20 years
ago, and similarly during the 7 October war. Hamas leaders have also boasted
about their willingness to sacrifice civilian lives in what they consider an
acceptable cost in their war against Israel.
o
Leading international political and
military leaders have verified and documented Hamas’s use of human shields both
in past conflicts and in the current war. US leadership has been particularly
vocal in criticising Hamas for its use of human shields, citing the strategy as
being a major reason why many civilians have been harmed in the 7 October war.
The EU has specifically condemned Hamas’s use of human shields after 7 October.
o
Historical evidence, extensive
third-party reporting, Hamas propaganda videos and IDF-sourced evidence confirm
Hamas’s illegal exploitation of civilian locations for military purposes.
Despite significant independent, non-IDF evidence of Hamas’s human shield
strategy, large segments of the mainstream media and numerous NGOs and
observers consistently downplay, ignore or express scepticism regarding Hamas’s
use of this strategy.
o
The IDF has provided thousands of
high-quality videos and photographs of its activities in Gaza that prove
without doubt that Hamas has militarised large portions of the civilian
infrastructure of the Gaza Strip. However, even when Hamas’s human shield tactics
are plainly evident, they are often presented by the media as unsubstantiated claims,
and not as a leading cause of civilian casualties in Gaza.
o
The UN and many NGOs accusing Israel of
war crimes and genocide deliberately disregard Hamas’s human shield strategy.
This glaring omission erases Hamas as an active party in the conflict, instead
placing full blame for civilian casualties on Israel. All of the evidence
documented in this report is absent from UN and NGO reports that discuss the
war in Gaza.
o
A proper evaluation of the 7 October war
must assess the full range of tactics used by Hamas to engage in combat against
incoming IDF forces. After the attack on 7 October, Hamas was aware that Israel
was going to invade Gaza to recover hostages and attack Hamas assets. The human
shield strategy was intended to impede the IDF’s efforts and to generate
worldwide condemnation of Israel when civilians were inevitably killed on the
urban battlefield. This report documents Hamas’s human shield strategy,
providing a tool for the researchers, media and NGOs that continue to cover the
7 October Israel–Hamas war.
This report reveals that Hamas’s human shield strategy not
only violates international law but also exacerbates civilian suffering and
complicates the resolution of the Gaza conflict. It underscores the necessity
of confronting these tactics with evidence-based reporting, rigorous legal
scrutiny and a commitment to safeguarding civilian lives. By exposing these
realities, this report aims to contribute to a more balanced and informed
global discourse on the conflict.
Introduction
Hamas attacked Israel on 7 October 2023 in a barbaric
assault that killed 1200 Israelis, including over 800 civilians, with an
additional 251 taken hostage. Even as Israel was still collecting bodies from
devastated communities in southern Israel, and well before the IDF’s ground
entry into Gaza, NGOs and academics were already levelling charges of genocide
against Israel. For example, on 15 October 2023, a group of nearly 900 academics
made a statement warning of genocide in Gaza. 2 Claims of genocide were
formally charged against Israel by South Africa in an application filed at the International Court of
Justice (ICJ) in December 2023. 3 While the case at the ICJ will take years to
litigate, many observers falsely asserted that the ICJ considered genocide in
Gaza to be “plausible”. 4 In September 2024, a UN Special Committee issued a
report that concluded that “policies and practices of Israel during the
reporting period are consistent with the characteristics of genocide,” 5
followed up in December 2024 by reports from the NGOs Amnesty International
(Amnesty) 6 and Human Rights Watch (HRW) 7 claiming Israel was committing
genocide in Gaza.
What is immediately apparent in all scholarly articles, NGO
publications, court filings and UN reports charging Israel with genocide is the
effective removal of Hamas as a relevant party to the conflict in Gaza. Hamas’s actions on 7 October
are typically acknowledged and condemned, but regarded as little more than one
dreadful day of criminal acts by Hamas in the context of a broader conflict that is primarily Israel’s
fault. But beginning on 8 October, Hamas has been treated as a non-actor in
Gaza – it is as if the IDF is not engaging in combat with a potent military
force in Gaza that prepared the battlefield for an IDF entry over a 17- year
period, but is attacking defenceless civilians for the sole purpose of killing
them. By the end of January 2025, the IDF had suffered 405 soldiers
killed in action and more than 2500 had been wounded. This demonstrates that
there is clearly aggressive force-on-force combat challenging the IDF in Gaza.
8 The removal of Hamas as an actor in the conflict necessarily means that there
is no mention of Hamas’s human shield strategy, whereby the militant group has
intentionally embedded its core military infrastructure within large areas of
civilian Gaza.
This report demonstrates that Hamas’s use of Gaza’s civilian
infrastructure for its military operations and combat tactics is indisputable.
There is widespread acknowledgement that Hamas has built a vast tunnel network
beneath densely populated urban areas of Gaza, estimated to be around 500
kilometres long. Extensive documentation of this tunnel network existed well before
7 October, including numerous investigative video reports from Al Jazeera. 9
Hamas leaders have openly acknowledged that the tunnel
network is intended to provide protection solely for their combatants, leaving
the civilian population to fend for themselves above ground. 10 However,
Hamas’s strategy of using human shields is far more extensive and complex than
just the tunnels, as this report outlines. The Law of Armed Conflict (LOAC)
defines the criminal act of human shields as “Utilizing the presence of a civilian or other protected person to render
certain points, areas or military forces immune from military operations.” 11
Hamas’s use of human shields increases the likelihood, and often ensures, that
any military action by the IDF against Hamas will result in civilian
casualties.
This tactic is designed to force Israel into the dilemma of
either attacking Hamas targets with the knowledge that civilians will often be
killed, incurring significant international criticism and calls for Israel to halt its military actions, or allowing
Hamas to achieve permanent immunity for fear of harming civilians.
In several previous rounds of conflict between Hamas and
Israel, such as in 2009 and 2014, the human shield tactic was effective: Israel
greatly limited its operations in Gaza due to the high expected collateral
damage that would result from a full assault against Hamas and its infrastructure.
However, after the scale of the Hamas attack on 7 October, the ongoing hostage situation
and Hamas’s threats to attack again, 12 Israel assessed that the military
necessity of action against Hamas had escalated to a level that removed
previous restraints on attacks against the group.
There is no dispute that the use of human shields by Hamas
does not absolve Israel from complying with the LOAC, such as the principles of
distinction and proportionality. However, Hamas’s tactics must be properly
acknowledged and assessed when evaluating Israel’s military actions in Gaza.
This paper demonstrates that Hamas’s use of human shields is
not merely an operational tactic but a deliberate and strategic policy,
explicitly aimed at restricting IDF military responses and causing intentional civilian casualties. From its
inception in 2006, the Hamas leadership has openly endorsed and developed this
strategy, embedding its military infrastructure within civilian areas and
suppressing local dissent. Hamas intentionally places civilians at risk, exploiting
their deaths to delegitimise Israel internationally and leverage global media
coverage and diplomatic pressure as political weapons. This approach has been
publicly acknowledged and praised by Hamas leaders, reflecting their
willingness – even determination – to sacrifice civilian lives to advance their
broader strategic and ideological goals.
A stark example of the refusal to examine Hamas’s human
shield strategy is the admission by a UN official regarding a June 2024 report
released by the organisation titled “Children and Armed Conflict”. 13 When the
UN official was asked by a reporter why the issue of Hamas’s use of human
shields was overlooked, with only one vague comment about “reports” that Hamas
engaged in such practices, the official replied that “word count” constraints
limited the discussion of the topic. 14 Instead of being central to the
discussion of civilian harm in Gaza, the UN treated the issue of human shields
as a non-factor.
This report can therefore be characterised as the “missing
chapter” from all the so-called “genocide” reports noted previously – the
chapter that exposes how Hamas rigged every element of the civilian infrastructure of Gaza, reverse engineering
the rules of war, to create a dense, 360-degree urban battlefield unprecedented
in military history. This missing chapter documents how Hamas’s human shield
strategy directly led to a substantial number of civilian casualties. It
demonstrates how Israel’s attacks on Hamas targets, such as tunnels and shafts,
booby-trapped buildings, Hamas combatants fighting from within residential
homes and rockets stored and fired from humanitarian zones, resulted in
unavoidable collateral damage.
The UN and NGOs deliberately omit this chapter because an
honest assessment of this critical aspect of the conflict would undermine their
entire argument that Israel is deliberately targeting civilians, instead proving that civilian harm in
Gaza is largely due to how Hamas is fighting the war, not Israel.
Overview of Hamas’s Human Shield Strategy
Origin of Hamas’s human shield strategy
Hamas’s human shield strategy dates back to 2006, soon after
Hamas took control of the Palestinian Legislative Council. After a rocket was
fired at Israel from the residential home of Popular Resistance Committee
member Mohammed Baroud, local Hamas leader Nizar Rayan called on residents to
crowd the rooftop of the building with the expectation that Israel would not
strike the location of the rocket fire, given the presence of many civilians.
The strategy worked and the IDF called off the strike, despite an advance
warning it gave to Baroud of an impending airstrike. Al Jazeera reported the
incident, openly admitting to Hamas’s human shield strategy in the title of its
article: “Palestinians form human shield: Hundreds of Palestinians form a human
shield against Israeli airstrikes in the Gaza strip”. 15 The article noted that
“Israel routinely orders residents out of their homes ahead of airstrikes on
suspected weapons-storage facilities, saying it wants to avoid casualties.” The
article quotes Nizar Rayan, a local Hamas leader who joined the protest: “We
came here to protect this fighter, to protect his house and to prove that we
are capable of defeating this Zionist policy.” 16 In this manner, asymmetric
combatants aim to exploit the Law of Armed Conflict to prevent attacks from
conventional opponents.
This human shield action was lauded by Ismail Haniyeh, who
at the time was the Palestinian Prime Minister and would later go on to lead
Hamas. He said:
We are so proud of this national
stand. It’s the first step toward protecting our homes, the homes of our
children… This strategy was decided by our people. [It] was decided by our
leaders, who were here from all the factions… and so long as this strategy is
in the interest of our people we support this strategy. 17
The human shield strategy evolved, eventually encompassing
all aspects of the civilian infrastructure of Gaza. Palestinian humanitarian
activist Ahmed Fouad Alkhatib, who grew up in Gaza over this time period,
explained how this military strategy expanded, and that local dissent was
brutally suppressed:
Partly due to the urban nature
of Gaza, and partly by embedding its activities and assets among the civilian
population, Hamas’s infrastructure grew increasingly intertwined with civilian
infrastructure and populations. This despite numerous occasions in which people
in Gaza would object to rocket launches firing near their homes, tunnels being
dug underneath their properties, or hidden stockpiles being placed close to
their businesses and houses. Hamas mostly used the stick approach to silence opposition
to its militant encroachment upon civilian areas and neighborhoods. 18
Hamas leaders admit to using human shields
Hamas leaders have encouraged and lauded the human shield
strategy over the 17 years of Hamas rule in Gaza leading up to 7 October. There
are many documented examples. In 2008, soon after Hamas took control of Gaza,
Hamas official Fathi Hammad delivered a speech on Al-Aqsa TV:
[The enemies of Allah] do not
know that the Palestinian people has developed its [methods] of death and
death-seeking. For the Palestinian people, death has become an industry, at
which women excel, and so do all the people living on this land. The elderly excel
at this, and so do the mujahideen 19 and the children. This is why they
have formed human shields of the women, the children, the elderly, and the mujahideen,
in order to challenge the Zionist bombing machine. It is as if they were saying
to the Zionist enemy: “We desire death like you desire life.” 20
During the 2014 Gaza war, Hamas spokesperson Sami Abu Zuhri,
speaking on Al-Aqsa TV, specifically encouraged the use of human shields. After
being asked to comment on how civilians went up to the rooftops of buildings
that the IDF had warned it would strike, Zuhri said:
This attests to the character of
our noble, Jihad-fighting people, who defend their rights and their homes with
their bare chests and their blood. The policy of people confronting the Israeli
warplanes with their bare chests in order to protect their homes has proven effective
against the occupation. Also, this policy reflects the character of our brave, courageous
people. We in Hamas call upon our people to adopt this policy, in order to protect
the Palestinian homes. 21
Now deceased Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar admitted to hiding
military bases in civilian areas in a statement he made on Al Jazeera Live in
June 2021:
Regarding the [Hamas] military
and security bases that are located among civilian residents [in the Gaza
Strip], this was a serious problem in the previous stages, and we and the
resistance factions made efforts to carry out an operation of gradual movement and
transfer of a large number of these bases from among the civilian residents,
and we succeeded in carrying out a large portion of it. But there is still a
portion that needs to be transferred, and Allah willing this operation will
continue. 22
Another former Hamas leader, Ismail Haniyeh, confirmed the
group’s readiness to sacrifice the lives of civilians to advance Hamas’s war
aims in comments made on Lebanon’s Mayadeen TV on 26
October 2023:
I have said this before, and I
say it time again. The blood of the women, children, and elderly… I am not
saying that this blood is calling for your [help]. We are the ones who need
this blood, so it awakens within us the revolutionary spirit, so it awakens
within us resolve, so it awakens within us the spirit of challenge, and [pushes
us] to move forward. 23
The open willingness to sacrifice civilian lives in Gaza has
been repeated by other Hamas leaders during the current war. According to a
June 2024 report in The Wall Street Journal, Sinwar cited civilian
casualties as “necessary sacrifices”. 24
The day after 7 October, senior Hamas official Ali Baraka
told Russia Today TV: “The Israelis are known to love life. We, on the other
hand, sacrifice ourselves. We consider our dead to be martyrs. The thing any
Palestinian desires the most is to be martyred for the sake of Allah, defending
his land.” 25
In an interview with Russia Today TV, another senior Hamas
official, Mousa Abu Marzouk, was asked: “Many people are asking: Since you have
built 500 kilometers of tunnels, why haven’t you built bomb shelters, where
civilians can hide during bombardment?” 26 Marzouk replied: “We have built the
tunnels because we have no other way of protecting ourselves from being targeted and killed. These tunnels are meant to
protect us from the airplanes. We are fighting from inside the tunnels.”
Marzouk effectively admitted that Hamas had no intention of protecting Gazan
civilians, who were thus human shields for Hamas’s fighters.
As the war continues in Gaza, Palestinian Authority
officials have been critical of Hamas’s actions in Gaza, calling out its use of
human shields. A statement issued by Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas’s Fatah Party on 11 January 2025,
said that Hamas’s decision to launch the 7 October attack on Israel led to
“catastrophic” conditions in Gaza and accused Hamas of using Gazan civilians
“as human shields instead of protecting them and their homes”.
The statement added that, “Hamas is now attempting to stir
security chaos in the West Bank, thereby continuing its policy that brought
disaster upon the Palestinian people.” 27
Hamas leadership continued to laud its human shield strategy
even as the ceasefire agreement between Israel and Hamas was announced in
January 2025. Senior Hamas leader and key negotiator Khalil Al-Hayya glorified how civilians in Gaza
“served as an ‘Impenetrable Shield’ for the Resistance”. He vowed to continue
attacking Israel and considered the Hamas attack on 7 October and the overall
war as a victory for Hamas. 28
Khalil Al-Hayya Glorifies
Human Shields
Worldwide leaders acknowledge and decry Hamas’s human
shield strategy
Hamas’s human shield strategy is well documented and
recognised by US and foreign political leaders, as well as by military and
intelligence agencies. The NATO Strategic Communications Centre of Excellence,
an international military organisation accredited by NATO and based in Riga,
Latvia, was established by seven European NATO members in 2014. In 2019 it
published a detailed report titled “Hamas’s use of human shields in Gaza”. 29
This report states that Hamas has been using human shields in conflicts with
Israel since 2007, based on the organisation’s awareness of Israel’s desire to
minimise collateral damage and its understanding that using human shields makes
Hamas less vulnerable to IDF attacks. 30 The report also notes that Hamas recognises
the sensitivity of public opinion regarding civilian harm, as the media often emphasizes
narratives focused on the suffering of innocent civilians. 31 Additionally, the
report outlines four common forms of Hamas’s human shield tactics: (1) firing
rockets and other projectiles from heavily populated areas, (2) positioning
military infrastructure within or near civilian areas, (3) using human shields
to protect the homes of Hamas militants, and (4) engaging the IDF from or near
residential and commercial areas, including employing civilians for
intelligence gathering. 32
Officials worldwide have widely confirmed the use of human
shields by Hamas in the past and in the current war. In April 2018, the
European Parliament adopted a resolution on the situation in the Gaza Strip
that “strongly condemns the persistent tactic of Hamas of using civilians for the
purpose of shielding terrorist activities.” 33 On 12 November 2023, the 27
European Union nations jointly issued a statement about the 7 October war: “The
EU condemns the use of hospitals and civilians as human shields by Hamas.” 34
Former US President Biden criticised Hamas’s strategy in a
statement he made on 10 October 2023: “Hamas does not stand for the Palestinian
people’s right to dignity and self-determination. Its stated purpose is the
annihilation of the State of Israel and the murder of Jewish people. They use
Palestinian civilians as human shields. Hamas offers nothing but terror and
bloodshed with no regard to who pays the price.” 35 A few days later, Biden
reiterated the same point: “Innocent Palestinian families, and the vast
majority have nothing to do with Hamas, they’re being used as human shields.”
36 Following the signing of the ceasefire agreement in mid-January 2025, Biden
restated this point to MSNBC journalist Lawrence O’Donnell: “...it’s true,
Sinwar and those guys were hiding beneath the hospital, the thing about … Hamas
is they had all their facilities underneath – schools, hospitals, churches …
and to get to them you had to take people out.” 37
In a November 2023 press briefing, former US Secretary of
State Antony Blinken said that Hamas “could stop using civilians as human
shields and stop using civilian infrastructure to stage and launch terrorist
attacks.” He added that “everyone around the world who cares about protecting
innocent civilians, innocent lives, should be calling on Hamas – indeed, demanding
of Hamas – that it immediately stop its murderous acts of terror and deplorable
use of innocent men, women, and children as human shields.” 38 On 16 January
2025, during an interview on CNN with Christiane Amanpour to discuss the end of
his term under the Biden Administration, Blinken was asked about Israel’s
conduct in the war. Blinken said: “Uniquely, you have an enemy that
intentionally embeds itself within the civilian population, in and under apartments,
in and under schools, mosques, hospitals…” 39
Former US Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin also detailed
Hamas’s human shield strategy in a press conference on 18 December 2023:
Above and beyond that, we see
that Hamas routinely uses civilians as shields. Beyond that, they place their
headquarters and their logistical sites near protected sites, hospitals,
mosques, churches, you name it. And so that adds to the complexity and as
you’ve heard Jake Sullivan say it provides an additional burden for the forces
that are prosecuting this fight. 40
US officials regularly cite Hamas’s human shield strategy as
a key cause of civilian deaths in Gaza. For example, in October 2024, US State
Department spokesperson Matthew Miller responded to a question regarding the
death of a 19-year-old Gazan:
The thing that that question
leaves out, as often happens, and I understand why, is the burden that Hamas
bears. And not just the burden that Hamas bears by hiding behind humans and
using humans as civilian shields… Hamas needs to stop hiding behind human
shields.” 41
On 13 October 2023, former US National Security Council
Spokesperson John Kirby acknowledged Israel’s calls to move Gazan civilians out
of harm’s way and Hamas’s efforts to undermine the evacuations by using
civilians as human shields. Kirby explained:
But it’s pretty clear that what
they’re [the IDF] trying to do is to the maximum extent possible avoid civilian
casualties and also separate Hamas from the human shields. I mean, Hamas
actually gave a counterorder telling Palestinians in Gaza to stay at home. Why?
Because having human shields, they think, protects them. 42
Indeed, Hamas leadership called for Gazans to defy IDF
evacuation orders as they knew that emptying northern Gaza of civilians would
make it easier for Israel to separate Hamas fighters from civilians. Eyad
Al-Bozom, a Hamas spokesperson, said: “We tell the people of northern Gaza and
from Gaza City, stay put in your homes, and your places.” 43
Recently appointed Secretary of State Marco Rubio also
specifically cited Hamas’s human shield strategy in his confirmation hearing.
When discussing Israel’s action in Gaza, he said the IDF has to fight “against
an enemy that does not wear a uniform, against an enemy that hides in tunnels,
against an enemy that hides behind women and children, and puts them at the forefront and uses them as human shields, that’s who
Hamas is.” 44
British officials have also decried Hamas’s human shield strategy.
Former British Defence Secretary Sir Grant Shapps said:
The problem we have with Hamas
is not just that they butchered and killed and raped those Israelis. It’s that
they also use their own Palestinian population – who are no friends of Hamas –
as human shields, and they hide themselves amongst them. And so we understand
and appreciate that it’s a very difficult position for Israel to be in. 45
In a UN Security Council debate on 24 October 2023, Tom
Tugendhat, then-UK Security Minister said: “We know that Hamas are using
innocent Palestinian civilians as human shields; they have embedded themselves
in civilian communities.” 46 During the same meeting, German Foreign Minister
Annalena Baerbock echoed the same point: “Hamas is playing with human
suffering, using women and children in Gaza as human shields, hiding
its weapons under supermarkets, apartment blocks, even hospitals – with obvious
intent.” 47 Baerbock made similar remarks on 13 October 2023: “Hamas is now
barricading itself behind more innocent people and is using them as a shield in
Gaza…Their tunnels, their weapons depots and command centers are deliberately
located in residential buildings, supermarkets and universities.” 48
In an interview on 16 October 2023, Italy’s Minister of
Foreign Affairs and Deputy Prime Minister Antonio Tajani said that the
Palestinian people “...are victims of Hamas, which uses them as human shields: Israel told them to get out, the terrorists
impose them to stay.” 49
On 23 October 2023, addressing Parliament, French Prime
Minister Élisabeth Borne said:
“Hamas, acting as it did, has
deliberately exposed, in a criminal and cynical manner, the entire population
of Gaza, they use the population as a human shield.” 50
A joint statement issued by the Prime Ministers of
Australia, Canada and New Zealand in December 2023, stated: “Hamas must release
all hostages, stop using Palestinian civilians as human shields, and lay down
its arms.” 51 UN Secretary-General António Guterres has been highly critical of
Israel’s conduct in the war, but he also acknowledged that “there are
violations by Hamas when they have human shields”. 52
Hamas’s strategy is well known to former US leaders familiar
with the Israel–Palestine conflict.
Former US President Clinton cited Hamas’s human shield
strategy while speaking at an event in October 2024: “Hamas makes sure that
they’re shielded by civilians, they’ll force you to kill civilians, if you want
to defend yourself.” 53
President Obama, who held office during Hamas’s rule in
Gaza, noted in a statement he issued on the current war that: “Hamas’ military
operations are deeply embedded within Gaza – and its leadership seems to
intentionally hide among civilians, thereby endangering the very people they
claim to represent.” 54
There is clearly a unified international consensus and
opposition to Hamas’s human shield strategy. However, this has been broadly
absent from much of the media and international NGO criticism of Israel’s conduct of the war. Even Palestinians themselves
have condemned the tactic.
Palestinian criticism of Hamas’s use of human shields
While Gazan civilians are typically unwilling to expose
Hamas’s human shield strategy for fear of reprisals, 55 it has been discussed
by some Gazans who have left the territory and are in a safe position to speak about the subject. For example,
former Gazan resident and author Jehad al-Saftawi explained that since its
violent takeover in 2007, “Hamas has continued to normalize violence and
militarization in every aspect of public and private life in Gaza.” 56 An unexpected
example of criticism of Hamas was seen in a 5 November 2023 live broadcast from
Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital in Gaza. An Al-Jazeera reporter interviewed an elderly
man about recent evacuations. The man was critical of Israeli attacks but
added: “As for the resistance – they come and hide among the people. Why are
they hiding among the people? They can go to hell and hide there…” 57 The
reporter deliberately cut away in the middle of the interview, likely aware
that Hamas wants to suppress these types of comments by regular Gazans.
A BBC report from July 2024 titled “Hamas faces growing
public dissent as Gaza war erodes support” investigated ordinary Gazan
attitudes towards Hamas. 58 A local Gazan doctor told the BBC right outside a
hospital: “I am an academic doctor, I had a good life, but we have a filthy
[Hamas] leadership. They got used to our bloodshed, may God curse them! They are
scum!” The report says that some Gazans “have publicly criticised Hamas for
hiding the hostages in apartments near a busy marketplace, or for firing
rockets from civilian areas.”
Another interviewee, who concealed his identity, said: “They
did not build any safe shelters for people, they did not reserve enough food,
fuel and medical supplies. If my family and I survive this war, I will leave
Gaza, the first chance I get.”
A New York Times investigative piece from June 2024
regarding the attitude of ordinary Gazans towards Hamas revealed anger at the
callous disregard the organisation had for civilians in Gaza, specifically how
Hamas was protected in “underground tunnels” while Gazans were “above ground
with no protection”. 59 One Gazan interviewed said that Hamas “threw the Palestinian people into the
bottom of the well.” 60
…YOU GET THE PICTURE – YET
MORE TO READ!
