GENEVA (Palestine Foundation Information Center) Euro-Med Monitor condemned the Israeli army’s militarization of civilian objects, including turning schools and educational facilities into military bases, in flagrant violation of international law and the rules of war.
The Israeli army was not satisfied with the systematic and widespread bombing and massive destruction of schools, committing serious crimes against people who were protected inside, and deliberately targeting them with air and ground military operations, murders, and direct unlawful executions, the Euro-Med said in a statement issued Wednesday.
“Instead, it converted several schools into military bases, gathering places for its forces and vehicles, detention and interrogation centers, and torture facilities, in violation of international humanitarian law, which was established to protect civilian objects from the danger of military operations, as well as the obligations placed on Israel as the occupying power under the Fourth Geneva Convention, which requires taking the necessary measures to ensure that children, who are orphaned or are separated from their families as a result of a war, exercise their education.”
During its field invasion of most of the Gaza Strip, the Israeli army converted several schools into military bases and detention facilities. One such facility was the “Salah al-Din Preparatory School” in Gaza City, which in February was used as a detention and interrogation center for hundreds of locals.
On April 30, the Israeli journalist Amir Bohbut released a video clip in which he documented an Israeli army military base located inside a Gaza Strip school. A voiceover was played alongside it, saying, “We are in a forward operations base belonging to the 162nd Division in the heart of the Gaza Strip.” He proceeded to display some containers that were positioned in the centre of the schoolyard, which, he said, had been turned into offices and bedrooms, adding: “Raids, ambushes, and other operations will start from here.”
A previous video showed Israeli soldiers from the “Givati” battalion filming themselves inside a school while wearing military gear and carrying weapons. The Israeli and battalion flags were flying proudly behind them. Additionally, they have published videos of sniper soldiers firing from inside schools, some of which are UN-run schools.
In a report published on December 13, Euro-Med revealed that the Israeli army has turned schools sheltering tens of thousands of displaced people into military centres and field execution sites as part of its ongoing genocide in the Gaza Strip, which began on 7 October.
Euro-Med Monitor received testimonies at the time about Israeli army forces carrying out unjustified field executions and killings of Palestinian civilians after detaining them for days inside the same schools where they had sought refuge from the violence.
The testimonies reveal horrific human rights violations and atrocities against civilians killed after their release. The timing of the murders indicates that there was no reason to shoot them, other than to satisfy the bloody desires of Israeli soldiers or express the comprehensive moral permissibility—in the eyes of Israel’s military—when it comes to slaughtering and humiliating Palestinian civilians.
Around 15 dead Palestinians’ decomposed bodies were found in the Al-Falujah neighborhood, west of the Jabalia camp. Based upon its initial investigation, Euro-Med Monitor confirmed that the individuals were subjected to field executions while being questioned by members of the Israeli army at the Shadia Abu Ghazaleh government school.
Last March, about a hundred leading European academics condemned Israel’s genocide against Palestinian civilians in the Gaza Strip, and its physical and cultural liquidation of them, including the systematic destruction of the educational system in the Gaza Strip.
