Press Release

Two Palestinians Killed by Israeli Soldiers

Date: 15 December 1999

Ref: 126/99

In a further escalation in the excessive use of force by the Israeli army, Israeli soldiers killed two Palestinians on the evening of 13 December 1999. The shooting took place in the village of Beit Awa near Hebron. The Israeli army claimed that the two Palestinians were affiliated to the military wing of the Islamic resistance movement Hamas and were wanted by Israeli security. They also claimed that the soldiers fired towards them after they had first opened fire against Israeli soldiers.

Eye-witnesses in the area testified that Israeli soldiers shot live ammunition and missiles towards a Palestinian house in the village without any provocation. Iyad Battat and Nadir Masalma were killed as a result of the shooting. This operation comes six weeks after a statement made by the Israeli Deputy Minister of Defense, Efraim Sneih, declaring that “terrorists” would be arrested and killed, and giving them an ultimatum of one year to live. Sneih made this statement before the Knesset on 2 November 1999 in reaction to a military operation executed by Palestinians against settlers in Hebron (the perpetrators remain unidentified).

In a press release issued on 10 November 1999 the Palestinian Centre for Human Rights stated that the statement made by the Israeli Deputy Minister of Defense can only be interpreted as an insistence on the part of the Israeli military establishment to carry out extra-judicial killing against Palestinians.

PCHR reiterates it condemnation of such practices, and all forms of excessive use of force perpetrated by the Israeli army against Palestinians. This incident brings the death toll of Palestinians killed by the Israeli army in 1999 to 13. PCHR once again calls upon the High Contracting Parties to the Fourth Geneva Convention to intervene immediately to end such grave breaches of the Convention and to ensure protection for Palestinian civilians in the Occupied Palestinian Territories. Concerning the claims made by the Israeli army about the operation, which are contradicted by eye-witnesses, PCHR calls for the formation of an international committee to investigate this incident.