Rights Groups Dismiss Israeli Claim That Strike That Killed Aid Workers Was a Mistake

Destroyed buildings are seen in the Gaza Strip, as seen from southern Israel on Nov. 20, 2023. (AP)
Destroyed buildings are seen in the Gaza Strip, as seen from southern Israel on Nov. 20, 2023. (AP)
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Rights Groups Dismiss Israeli Claim That Strike That Killed Aid Workers Was a Mistake

Destroyed buildings are seen in the Gaza Strip, as seen from southern Israel on Nov. 20, 2023. (AP)
Destroyed buildings are seen in the Gaza Strip, as seen from southern Israel on Nov. 20, 2023. (AP)

Two basic mistakes, according to the Israeli military. First, an officer overlooked a message detailing the vehicles in the convoy. Second, a spotter saw something in one car – possibly a bag – that he thought was a weapon. Officials say the result was the series of Israeli drone strikes that killed seven aid workers on a dark Gaza road.

The Israeli military has described the deadly strike on the World Central Kitchen convoy as a tragic error. Its explanation raises the question: If that's the case, how often has Israel made such mistakes in its six-month-old offensive in Gaza?

Rights groups and aid workers say Monday night’s mistake was hardly an anomaly. They say the wider problem is not violations of the military’s rules of engagement but the rules themselves.

In Israel’s drive to destroy Hamas after its Oct. 7 attacks, the rights groups and aid workers say, the military seems to have given itself wide leeway to determine what is a target and how many civilian deaths it allows as “collateral damage.”

More than 33,000 Palestinians have been killed in Israel’s offensive, around two-thirds of them women and children, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry. Its count doesn't distinguish between civilians and combatants.

Israel says it is targeting Hamas fighters and infrastructure and that it tries to minimize civilian deaths. It blames the large number of civilian casualties on militants and says it's because they operate among the population. Israel says each strike goes through an assessment by legal experts, but it has not made its rules of engagement public.

OTHER STRIKES In the thousands of strikes Israel has carried out, as well as shelling and shootings in ground operations, it's impossible to know how many times a target has been wrongly identified. Nearly every day, strikes level buildings with Palestinian families inside, killing men, women and children, with no explanation of the target or independent accountability over the proportionality of the strike.

Sarit Michaeli, spokeswoman for the Israeli human rights group B’Tselem, said the World Central Kitchen strike drew world attention only because foreigners were killed.

“The thought that this is a unique case, that it’s a rare example — it’s an insult to the intelligence of anyone who has been following the situation,” she said.

She said a broader investigation is needed into the rules of engagement: “The relevant questions aren’t asked because the investigations only deal with specific cases, rather than the broader policy.”

Israel’s chief military spokesman, Daniel Hagari, acknowledged, “Mistakes were conducted in the last six months.”

“We do everything we can not to harm innocent civilians,” he told reporters. “It is hard because Hamas is going with civilian clothes ... Is it a problem, is it complexity for us? Yes. Does that matter? No. We need to do more and more and more to distinguish.”

But the military hasn't specified how it will achieve this.

Brig. Gen. Benny Gal, who was part of the investigation into the World Central Kitchen strikes, was asked whether more questions should be asked before a strike is authorized.

“This was not our standards,” he said. “The standard is more questions, more details, more crossing sources. And this was not the case.”

WHITE FLAGS Palestinian witnesses have repeatedly reported people, including women and children, being shot and killed or wounded by Israeli troops while carrying white flags. Several videos have surfaced showing Palestinians being fired at or killed while seeming to pose little threat to Israeli forces nearby.

In March, the military acknowledged it shot dead two Palestinians and wounded a third while walking on a Gaza beach. It said troops opened fire after the men allegedly ignored warning shots. It reacted after the news channel Al Jazeera showed footage of one of the men falling to the ground while walking in an open area and then a bulldozer pushing two bodies into the garbage-strewn sand. It said at least two of the three men were waving white flags.

Aid groups have also reported strikes on their personnel.

Medical Aid for Palestine said its residential compound in the southern area of Muwasi – which the military had defined as a safe zone – was hit in January by what the UN determined was a 1,000-pound bomb. Several team members were injured and the building damaged, the group said.

The group said the Israeli military gave it multiple explanations – denying involvement, saying it was trying to hit a target nearby and blaming a missile that went astray. “The variety of responses highlights a continued lack of transparency,” the group said.

The medical charity Doctors Without Borders said a tank shelled a house sheltering its staff and their families in Muwasi in February, killing one staffer's wife and daughter-in-law.

Both groups said they had informed the military repeatedly of their locations and clearly marked the buildings.

Israeli admissions of mistakes are rare.

In December, after a strike killed at least 106 people in the Maghazi camp, the military said buildings near the target were also hit, likely causing “unintended harm to additional uninvolved civilians.” It also admitted soldiers mistakenly shot to death three Israeli hostages who were waving white flags after getting out of Hamas captivity in Gaza City.

‘THE PATTERN’ In Israel’s ground assaults, troops are operating in urban environments, searching for Hamas fighters while surrounded by a population hunkering in their homes and in motion, trying to flee or find food and medical care.

Some Israeli politicians and news outlets regularly proclaim there are no innocents in Gaza. And in some videos circulated online, soldiers talk of getting vengeance for the Oct. 7 Hamas attacks that sparked the war.

In that atmosphere, Palestinians and other critics say, soldiers on the ground appear to have wide liberty in deciding whether to target someone as suspicious. Residents and medical staff in Gaza say they see the result.

Dr. Tanya Haj-Hassan, a doctor with Medical Aid for Palestinians who just returned from two weeks at a Gaza hospital, said staff regularly treated children and elderly shot by snipers.

“It’s not an anomaly. It’s actually the pattern,” she told journalists in a briefing this week. “I don’t think it’s that children in particular are singled out as targets. The understanding and kind of the conclusion you reach ... is that everybody’s a target.”

Chris Cobb-Smith, a former British army and weapons expert who's done research and security missions in Gaza, said that if there was a breakdown in communication in the case of the World Central Kitchen strike, “for a professional army, this is inexcusable.”

“There seems to be a consistent pattern of utterly reckless behavior,” said Cobb-Smith, who helped investigate the Doctors Without Borders shelling.

Chris Lincoln-Jones, a former British intelligence staff officer who has worked in the defense industry including alongside an Israeli drone manufacturer, said the investigation showed unprofessional actions and poor command and control: “They don’t operate proper battle space management.”

Even if a gunman had been in the car with aid personnel, he said, it wouldn't justify a strike “unless the gunman was actually shooting at someone from the car.”

“No way that a NATO drone pilot would do that. I would expect to be prosecuted for doing that. I would expect to face the possibility of prison.”



Yemeni Platform Warns of Houthis Expanding Influence to Horn of Africa

Yemenis lift placards and flags during a rally in the Houthi-controlled capital Sanaa in solidarity with Palestinians on July 26, 2024, amid the ongoing conflict in the Gaza Strip between Israel and the Palestinian Hamas movement. (AFP)
Yemenis lift placards and flags during a rally in the Houthi-controlled capital Sanaa in solidarity with Palestinians on July 26, 2024, amid the ongoing conflict in the Gaza Strip between Israel and the Palestinian Hamas movement. (AFP)
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Yemeni Platform Warns of Houthis Expanding Influence to Horn of Africa

Yemenis lift placards and flags during a rally in the Houthi-controlled capital Sanaa in solidarity with Palestinians on July 26, 2024, amid the ongoing conflict in the Gaza Strip between Israel and the Palestinian Hamas movement. (AFP)
Yemenis lift placards and flags during a rally in the Houthi-controlled capital Sanaa in solidarity with Palestinians on July 26, 2024, amid the ongoing conflict in the Gaza Strip between Israel and the Palestinian Hamas movement. (AFP)

A Yemeni platform focused on organized crime and money-laundering, PTOC, has warned of the dangers of the Iran-backed Houthi militias expanding their activities and influence to the Horn of Africa.

In a report, it said the militias were actively seeking to expand their operations there with the direct supervision of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) and in coordination with the Lebanese Hezbollah militia, which is also backed by Tehran.

This is the first time that a report is filed about the Houthi plans in the Horn of Africa.

Asharq Al-Awsat received a copy of the report that details the Houthis’ expansionist plans at Iran’s direction. It discusses the Houthis’ smuggling and armament operations, recruitment and training of Africans, and identifies the officials responsible for the militias’ project in the Horn of Africa.

Overseeing the foreign expansion are leading Houthi officials Abdulwahed Abu Ras, Al-Hassan al-Marrani and Abu Haidar al-Qahoum, as well as head of the so-called security and intelligence agency Abdulhakim al-Khiwani and foreign operations agency official Hassan al-Kahlani, or Abu Shaheed.

The report also highlighted the role played by deputy Houthi foreign minister Hussein al-Azzi through diplomatic sources and figures in Ethiopia, Eritrea, Djibouti, Sudan and Kenya to forge intelligence, security, political and logistical ties.

Training

The report said the Houthis were keen on establishing “sensitive intelligence centers” throughout the Horn of Africa and countries surrounding Yemen. They are working on training cadres “as soon as possible” so that they can be “effectively activated at the right time to achieve the Quranic mission and common interests of all resistance countries, especially Iran, Gaza and Lebanon.”

The report obtained documents that reveal how the Houthis have established ties with African figures to “complete preparations and operations in the Red Sea and Horn of Africa to support the Houthis should they come under any international political or diplomatic pressure.”

Leading officials

The report identified several Houthi figures who are overseeing these operations, starting with IRGC official “Abu Mahdi” to the owner of the smallest boat that is used for smuggling weapons in the Red Sea.

It also spoke of the relations forged with the al-Shabaab al-Qaeda affiliate in Somalia and the African mafia to smuggle Africans to Yemen in what the report described as one of the most dangerous human trafficking and organized crimes.

The PTOC report said the Houthis have recruited Africans from various countries, especially in wake of the militias’ coup in Sanaa in 2014. They have been subjected to cultural and military training and deployed at various fronts, such as Taiz, the west coast, Marib and the border.

Some of the recruits have returned to their home countries to expand the Houthi influence there.

Abu Ras and al-Kahlani

The report named Abdulwahed Naji Mohammed Abu Ras, or Abu Hussein, as the Houthis’ top official in expanding their influence in the Horn of Africa. A native of the Jawf province, he was tasked directly by top Iranian political officials and the IRGC in running this file.

Among his major tasks is coordinating with the IRGC and Houthis and directly overseeing the smuggling of IRGC and Hezbollah members from and to Yemen.

Abu Ras has avoided the spotlight for several years during which he has handled the Houthis’ most dangerous intelligence and political files.

He served as secretary of foreign affairs at the security and intelligence agency until Hassan al-Kahlani's appointment to that post. Abu Ras was then promoted to his current position at the recommendation of Houthi leader Abdulmalek al-Houthi and the IRGC leadership.

Al-Kahlani, also known as Abu Shaheed, was born in the Hajjah province in 1984. He is a known Houthi security operative as he grew up among the Houthis in Saada and Sanaa and joined the militias at a young age.

The report said al-Kahlani was part of the Sanaa terrorist cell that carried out several bombings and assassinations in wake of the killing of Houthi founder Hassan al-Houthi in 2004. He was also among the Houthi leaderships that took part in the coup in Sanaa.

Al-Kahlani now works directly under Abu Ras. He is known for his close ties to the IRGC and has been using this relationship to impose himself as the top official in the security and intelligence agency, exposing the struggle for power between him and the actual head of the agency Abdulhakim al-Khiwani.