Impunity ‘absolute’: NGO holding Israeli soldiers accountable Israel-Palestine conflict news
Israeli officials are concerned about the arrests of their soldiers after fighting in Gaza, after one soldier fled to Brazil to avoid questioning over alleged war crimes committed in Gaza and was filmed on social media.
The force behind this international accountability effort is the Belgium-based Hind Rajab Foundation (HRF).
Formed just five months ago, HRF has brought together lawyers and activists from around the world to prepare cases based primarily on social media content shared by Israeli soldiers.
HRF founder and president Diab Abu Jahjah says Israeli reservist Yuval Vaghdani was among the first people to be charged with war crimes.
Speaking to Israeli media on Wednesday after being “forced” to cut short his “dream trip” to Brazil, Wagdani said he would face charges of foreign war crimes after filming himself blowing up people’s homes in Gaza. Being found under investigation “felt a bit like a bullet to the heart.”
According to local media, Israel’s Foreign Ministry was instrumental in helping Vaghdani avoid investigation and possible prosecution for war crimes, first arranging to smuggle him to Argentina and from there to the United States. Before finally leaving for Israel.
Israeli officials and media have issued guidelines for soldiers to avoid arrest abroad and conceal their identities while deployed.
There was no response to Al Jazeera’s question whether these additional measures include training for reservists, which could constitute a war crime.
providing evidence against them
After 15 months of proudly sharing videos of Israeli soldiers committing possible war crimes in Gaza, HRF had plenty of evidence to use when seeking to prosecute them under international and domestic law.
Videos and photographs showed soldiers forcing Palestinian men to parade in their underwear, abusing detainees, looting and ransacking homes, and even wearing women’s clothing. Is.
“It’s about being accountable to the law,” Abu Jahjah said. “If individual soldiers feel they have not committed war crimes, that is fine. Let’s hear their case. It is in everyone’s best interest to do so.”
Hind Rajab is the name of the five-year-old girl who was killed by Israel in a car in Gaza after she pleaded for help on the phone for three hours, surrounded by her dead family members and in front of Palestinian paramedics. Was. When they tried to reach him they were also killed.
So far, the foundation named after him has filed more than 1,000 cases in the international court.
Abu Jahjah reported that HRF lawyers and online activists verified and geolocated each one of them, examining its metadata and verifying the chain of custody from the soldier who filmed it to HRF. Search through mountains of images and videos.
Where the perpetrator is a dual citizen, the HRF seeks to prosecute war crimes under the existing laws of the other country and, in the case of sole Israeli citizens, collate legal files, which are then transferred to the International Criminal Court (ICC). Is filed as evidence.
Predictably, HRF’s work has faced sharp criticism in Israel, with some claiming that these legal processes amount to “doxxing” (unauthorized publication of personal identities) of the soldiers who filmed themselves.
Abu Jahjah has also been personally threatened by Israeli Diaspora Affairs Minister Amichai Chikli, who told him to “watch his pager”, pointing to attacks on the communications systems of Hezbollah members in September 2024.
“I don’t really care,” Abu Jahjah said, “I’ve been working on this for many years and, when you compare it to what’s happening in Gaza, the threats against me are really very There are not many.”
The HRF also maintains a list of people it describes as “criminals, collaborators and instigators” against whom it is demanding investigation for war crimes.
impunity and persecution
“They are proud of these acts,” Milena Ansari of Human Rights Watch said from Jerusalem about possible war crimes broadcast by soldiers on social media.
“Putting this online both dehumanizes Palestinians and also provides cause for real celebration,” he told Al Jazeera.
“The feeling of impunity is absolute… it has always been there, especially with regard to Israeli actions in the occupied West Bank, but it has increased significantly since October 2023 (when Israel’s war on Gaza began) It has happened.”
Ori Goldberg, a political scientist from Tel Aviv, said that many in Israel view the cases against the Israelis as unjust and a continuation of centuries of anti-Semitism, claimed and weaponized by the State of Israel.
“The situation inside Israel is worsening,” Goldberg said. “You cannot be involved in genocide for 15 months and expect anything else. Israel has been fundamentally changed.
“People don’t even consider Palestinians as human beings anymore, if they ever really did. To most people Palestinians are not even insects. Insects will have to be killed. The Palestinians are even less,” he said.
In that context, Goldberg said, the “flaring up” of some soldiers during a war for which no one seems to be responsible, where the Palestinians were the only victims, was understandable to many Israelis.
“They’re turning the world against Israel,” Goldberg said of the government and media’s reaction to the many ongoing investigations and prosecutions.
“This is the persecution of the Jews once again,” he said.
Goldberg added, “Most people don’t even think Gaza has anything to do with them.”
