Ex-Israeli soldiers: Israeli army systematically used Palestinians as human shields

 Former Israeli soldiers from Breaking the Silence have testified that the army routinely used Palestinian civilians as human shields, with orders allegedly issued by commanders and tolerated at all levels.

The soldiers say these were not isolated incidents but part of a systemic failure and moral collapse within the military. “Israel condemns Hamas for (allegedly) using civilians as shields, but our soldiers do that all the time,” one testimony stated.

Palestinians recount being used as human shields by Israeli forces in Gaza and West Bank

Palestinian civilian Masoud Abu Saeed says he was used by Israeli forces as a human shield for two weeks in March 2024. According to an AP report, the 36-year-old was forced to enter buildings, homes, and a hospital in Khan Younis to search for tunnels while wearing a first-responder vest and carrying a phone, hammer, and chain cutters. During one operation, he says he encountered his own brother, also being used as a shield by another unit.

In the occupied West Bank, 25-year-old Hazar Estity reported being forced by Israeli soldiers to enter and film multiple apartments in the Jenin refugee camp before troops moved in. Estity says she pleaded to return to her 21-month-old son, but her request was denied. “I was most afraid that they would kill me,” she said. “And that I wouldn’t see my son again.”

How widespread the use of children and civilians as human shield?

Deeply disturbing reports have emerged from both Gaza and the West Bank, revealing a systematic and deliberate practice by Israeli forces: the use of Palestinian civilians as human shields during military operations. These accounts, collected from victims and even former Israeli soldiers, paint a harrowing picture of how human lives are being instrumentalized—placed at the front lines of danger, coerced into entering booby-trapped buildings, clearing tunnels, and scouting for militants, all to shield soldiers from harm.

One Palestinian man, Ayman Abu Hamdan, recounted how he was blindfolded, beaten, and separated from his family before being told that he would assist in a "special mission." For seventeen days, he was sent ahead of Israeli troops to search houses and dig through rubble in northern Gaza, always under the watch of soldiers who stood at a safe distance behind him. He was forced to examine holes in the ground for potential tunnels and to walk into unknown spaces that might have been rigged with explosives. Each night, he was locked in a dark room, bound and isolated, only to awaken and repeat the ordeal. It was only when his life was most at risk that he was unshackled—when his body served as a buffer for those who held him captive.

This experience was not an anomaly. Multiple Palestinian civilians have testified to similar treatment, detailing how they were forced into combat zones under duress, sometimes even alongside family members. One man, during an operation in Khan Younis, unexpectedly encountered his own brother being used by another Israeli unit in exactly the same way. They embraced briefly, believing it might be the last time they would see each other alive.

The cruelty of these acts is compounded by the awareness and complicity of military command. Israeli soldiers who have since left active duty described how orders to use civilians in this way often came directly from commanding officers. These practices were not the result of a few rogue individuals but part of a known pattern—so common, in fact, that they developed euphemisms within the ranks. Civilians coerced into these roles were called “mosquitoes,” a term devoid of humanity, and orders to deploy them were sometimes delivered casually over radio communications, suggesting not only normalization but operational dependence on this method.

Some soldiers even admitted that during planning meetings, commanders would suggest “capturing a mosquito” from the street to expedite a mission. This grotesque efficiency—the dehumanization of civilians into tools of war—was praised within the military as a way to preserve ammunition and reduce risks to soldiers and military dogs. In one documented case, a Palestinian man used in such a role was mistakenly shot by another Israeli unit who did not realize he was being used as a shield by their comrades. In another, a civilian collapsed inside a tunnel and later died. Still others described being forced to search hospitals, homes, and other civilian infrastructure—locations protected under international law.

Even women and minors were not spared. In the West Bank, a young mother was compelled to search her own home for threats while her infant son was left behind. She pleaded with the soldiers to let her return to him, fearing for her life and his. Her pleas were ignored. Another young boy, only sixteen, was seen trembling and whispering the name of his hometown as he was made to move ahead of soldiers, clearly terrified.

Such acts represent a flagrant and deeply troubling violation of international humanitarian law. The Geneva Conventions prohibit the use of civilians to shield military operations, explicitly forbidding any coercion of non-combatants into zones of hostilities. International law is unambiguous on this matter: civilians must be protected, not exploited. The Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court goes even further, categorizing the use of human shields as a war crime. These protections are not symbolic—they are the foundational legal and moral standards designed to preserve human dignity in times of war.

Yet what these reports reveal is not a failure of discipline or communication—it is a systemic, calculated collapse of legal and moral restraint. The regularity of these events, the casual language used to describe them, and the tacit approval of higher-ranking officers all point to a breakdown in military ethics and a disregard for the laws that are supposed to guide warfare.

The implications are profound. When civilians are used in this way, it erodes not only the protections afforded under international law but the very principle of human worth. It turns innocent people into expendable instruments of war. It also undermines the credibility of any state that claims to uphold democratic values and the rule of law while permitting such practices to occur under its authority.