IV. White Phosphorus Attacks in Populated Areas

Human Rights Watch investigated six cases in Gaza where the IDF used white phosphorus munitions in populated areas.  Two of these were in villages near Gaza's armistice line with Israel: in Siyafa, in the north, and Khuza'a, in the south.  As the IDF escalated its ground campaign, it fired white phosphorus shells into even more densely populated urban areas, including in the Rimal and Tel al-Hawa neighborhoods of Gaza City, as well as central Beit Lahiya.

Attacks on Urban Areas

Tel al-Hawa Neighborhood, Gaza City

The Tel al-Hawa neighborhood in southeastern Gaza City is a relatively affluent residential area with wide streets and multi-story apartment buildings inhabited mostly by professionals and their families-what one resident called "a secular stronghold."  IDF air strikes hit select sites in the area, such as a ministry of interior administrative building and a facility used by the customs department of the ministry of finance, since early in the operation.  Ground fighting commenced when IDF troops began to enter the neighborhood from the south for limited periods around January 11, reportedly facing heavy mortar and gunfire from Palestinian armed groups.[12]

The fighting intensified around midnight on January 14-15, when Israeli forces advanced into Tel al-Hawa with troops and tanks, their furthest push towards the city's center to date.  According to residents and media reports, they took up positions in parts of the neighborhood, with tanks positioned on Industrial Street, after more armed encounters with Hamas.  Around 7 a.m. on January 15, the IDF began to fire high-explosive and white phosphorus artillery shells in the area.  According to three local residents, interviewed separately, the shelling lasted for approximately three hours, and during that time white phosphorus killed four civilians, all members of the same family who were traveling in a car.  The shelling resumed early the next morning, at approximately 1:15 a.m., and lasted until at least 10 p.m. that day.

Human Rights Watch visited the area on January 22 to examine where white phosphorus had been used.  On the roof of a residential apartment building, researchers saw a hole where a shell had struck and penetrated the building.  On that roof, and in an open area across the street, lay eight pieces of phosphorus-soaked felt, which residents had covered with sand to stop the burning.  When uncovered and kicked, the pieces reignited and released a pungent smoke.  When asked, residents showed two spent light green 155mm white phosphorus artillery shells in the apartment of Fathi Sabbah, 46, a journalist for Al-Hayat newspaper.  Both came from the same lot, produced in 1989 by Thiokol Aerospace at the Louisiana Army Ammunition Plant. A third shell with the same marking was located one block away in an open lot, as was a light green canister from a white phosphorus shell marked in red lettering "WP CANISTER," and dozens of pieces of felt.

Residents of the neighborhood told Human Rights Watch what occurred when the shells exploded on January 15.  According to Fathi Sabbah, multiple explosions around 7 a.m. startled his family as they slept in their second-floor apartment.  About three hours later, a shell exploded over their building, he said, followed by fire and smoke.  He explained:

I woke up at 7 a.m. to the sound of heavy bombing in the area.  The shells were falling around once a minute.  I was watching and I saw white smoke and flames all over the sandy road, for a distance of 200 meters.  When we saw the shelling was heavy we asked the residents of the building to go downstairs, women in the basement and men on the second floor.  At around 10 a.m. a shell hit this building.  After ten minutes the owners of the apartments on the top floors went up to inspect.  Two apartment owners on the south side said shells had hit their apartments.  After an hour we smelled something.  We went up later and found that a bedroom on the fifth floor was on fire.  We called the fire department and the ICRC.  They said the IDF was not allowing them to come.[13]

At that point, Sabbah said, neighbors came to the building to ask for help: a family was trapped in a car that had caught fire in the most recent shelling.  Another neighborhood resident interviewed separately, 55-year-old Muhammad al-Sharif, a paint factory owner, told Human Rights Watch what he knew about the burning car:

My daughter told me there was a car on fire with people in it.  I looked out and saw a young man who had lost control of himself trying to push his way into the burning car. When I got to the car he had fallen down and he was on fire. The shelling was ongoing and I dragged him to an alley and tried to talk to him, but he couldn't talk. One of his eyes had burned away and he was horribly injured.[14]

According to al-Sharif, he and the man were stuck in the alley for 90 minutes as the shelling continued, and because they feared Israeli snipers in the area. Once the shelling subsided, he and two young men carried the wounded man to a neighbor's car and then drove him to al-Shifa hospital. At 2:30 p.m. al-Sharif returned to the car and found that it had partially melted and the gas tank had exploded.

Around that time, Fathi Sabbah also arrived at the car, where he met a neighbor and an ambulance that had come to take the dead bodies away for burial. In the smoking wreckage, he said, they found only a few bones of the four occupants. A piece of a skull and some teeth lay next to the vehicle, al-Sharif said.

Those killed were:

'Uday al-Haddad, 55, branch manager for Palestine Bank

Ihsan, 44, ('Uday's wife)

Hatim, 24, accounting student at Islamic University ('Uday and Ihsan's son)

Ala`a, 14, pupil ('Uday and Ihsan's daughter)

The wounded man who tried to push his way back into the burning car was another of 'Uday and Ihsan's sons, Mohammad al-Haddad, 25. Human Rights Watch spoke to al-Haddad in the burn unit at al-Shifa Hospital on January 27, and he corroborated the facts as presented by Sabbah and al-Sharif.

According to Mohammad al-Haddad, the IDF started shelling Tel al-Hawa at 7 a.m. on January 15. He and his family waited in their home on Islamic University Street until 11 a.m., he said, when Israel announced it would begin a temporary unilateral ceasefire. At that point, they got into their gray 1996 Volkswagen Golf.  He explained what happened next:

We drove about 100 meters to the intersection at the end of our street, when we were hit. The power of the explosion threw me from the car. I lost consciousness, but then I went back to the car, and that's where Mr. al-Sharif said he found me. After that I woke up in the hospital.[15]

In addition to losing his left eye, al-Haddad suffered third-degree burns to his legs, hands and forehead, and a broken jaw. The only other surviving member of his immediate family, his younger brother Salam, 18, had left the family's house at 10 a.m., before the ceasefire began.

Dr. Nafiz Abu Sha'baan, head of the burn and plastic surgery unit at al-Shifa Hospital, treated Mohammad al-Haddad upon arrival. Dr. Abu Sha`baan said that he had not treated any white phosphorus wounds prior to Operation Cast Lead and that the hospital did not classify injuries as caused by white phosphorus due to a lack of diagnostic tools to make that assessment.  However, Dr. Abu Sha'baan told Human Rights Watch that Mohammad's injuries appeared consistent with wounds caused by white phosphorus. "We think it's from white phosphorus because the burns are very deep," he said. "We already excised burnt tissue and now his wounds are getting worse. When we saw him the first time the wounds were more superficial than they are now. We've got to operate again tomorrow to excise more tissue."[16] 

On January 28, Human Rights Watch inspected the remains of the al-Haddad family's vehicle, which still lay on the street where it had been struck. The car's metal frame and interior were thoroughly burned, the wheels had melted off, and the metal around them was deformed. The rear of the car had been blown open, apparently by the force of the exploding gas tank.

The IDF shelling of Tel al-Hawa with white phosphorus continued early the next morning, January 16, although civilian casualties are not known.  "Pieces of something hit the kitchen window and burned through the glass, starting fires," the journalist Fathi Sabbah said he saw around 1:15 a.m.  "We threw water on them but they would not stop burning so we pushed them out the window."  White smoke billowed in, he said, filling the apartment and choking the family: "We did not know what to do.  We were afraid the area was under attack and so we took refuge in the center of the building, at the elevator, thinking it was the safest place because it was away from the windows."  Eleven members of the family stood choking as smoke poured up the central staircase that wound its way around the elevator.  "We feared to leave the building even though there was no fighting so I called the ICRC [International Committee of the Red Cross] on my radio but they couldn't come as ambulances were barred from the area by the IDF," he said.  According to Sabbah, the fire burned for several minutes and then dissipated.  "When I went to the roof it was covered with burning embers, as were the streets." he said.

Al-Quds Hospital, Tel al-Hawa Neighborhood, Gaza City

The January 15 shelling of Tel al-Hawa also struck the compound of the al-Quds Hospital, run by the Palestine Red Crescent Society.  The hospital was treating about 50 patients at the time, and sheltering roughly 500 local residents who had gone there to seek shelter from the fighting.

The administration building and top two floors of the main hospital building were gutted by fire caused by air-burst white phosphorus munitions.  The hospital is clearly marked and there does not appear to have been fighting in that immediate area at the time, although the IDF was present in Tel al-Hawa.

The IDF had been shelling in the area throughout the morning of January 15, and at 9 a.m. the administration building started smoking.  "I saw pieces of flaming shrapnel falling," Muhammad Abu Musabbih, 28, the Director of Disaster Management Services for the hospital, told Human Rights Watch. He said:

Flaming pieces fell one and a half meters from the oxygen station; many fragments fell around the compound.  More flaming fragments fell near the electricity generator where we store 20,000 liters of fuel. We used water and sand to put the fires out. We feared that if the fire spread to the oxygen and fuel it would lead to an explosion.[17]

Medical personnel began to fight the fire in the administration building along with members of the hospital's emergency medical team, using bucket brigades to relay water and sand.  They found that fire extinguishers made the fire worse, so they tried to create a firebreak by cutting in two a second-story walkway that linked the administration building and the hospital.  Shortly thereafter, another white phosphorus shell hit the hospital itself and the roof burst into flame.  The hospital staff abandoned the administration building and focused on the hospital.  Several tank shells also hit the hospital, including one that struck the pharmacy on the second floor at around 9:30 a.m., but the fire was the staff's most pressing concern.  Two hours later, the civil defense and firefighters arrived and began to fight the fires spreading from the roof of the hospital to the floors below. 

"As firefighters contained one area and moved to another the wind would reignite the fire and they had to rush back to places they had already finished," Abu Musabbih said.  "It was not until 6 a.m. the next day that the fire was completely extinguished."  He added that the fire destroyed two ambulances and a medical storage area about 200 meters from the hospital's main building.[18]

With the hospital on fire, doctors decided to evacuate the building.  According to Abu Musabbih and Dr. Jamal al-Safadi, 36, an orthopedic surgeon, the hospital called the ICRC to coordinate an initial evacuation of the approximately 500 residents from the neighborhood who had taken refuge in the hospital from the fighting.[19] That group could move more quickly than the hospital's roughly 50 patients, hospital staff thought, and it would take time to prepare the wounded.  At around 3 p.m., two ICRC vehicles arrived to lead a convoy of civilians, who relocated to a nearby UNRWA school. The ICRC told the hospital that it was not possible to coordinate another move with the IDF until the next day.

Dr. al-Safadi told Human Rights Watch that, at the time, the hospital was treating 40 injured adults, seven newborns in incubators, and four patients in intensive care.  While the local residents were evacuated from the hospital, hospital staff relocated approximately 30 patients to the hospital operating rooms, which they considered safer.

Between 8:00 and 8:30 p.m., according to Abu Musabbih and Dr. al-Safadi, another shell believed to be white phosphorus exploded near the hospital, causing more flaming fragments to land on the roof.  As fire broke out again, the hospital director Dr. Khalid Jouda and director of emergency services, Dr. Bashar Murad, decided everyone must be evacuated.

One of those evacuated from the hospital was Tariq al-Baradei, 24, an information technology student at the Islamic University, who said he was in the hospital getting treatment for multiple fractures and shrapnel wounds he had sustained from an air strike on his home in Tel al-Hawa on January 4.  The same strike killed his 12-year-old brother, Omar, he said.

During the evacuation of al-Quds Hospital, al-Baradei said he lay on a gurney in an ambulance. He described the drive to al-Shifa hospital:

I got into an ambulance with an 8-year-old girl who was bleeding from the head.  I looked out the window and saw a group of injured people walking on the street; there were so many.  I could not recognize the streets of Gaza.  I saw it burning but I didn't believe it could be the hospital building.[20]

According to Dr. Safadi, the girl died after transit to al-Shifa hospital.

Human Rights Watch surveyed the damage at al-Quds hospital and found physical evidence consistent with personal accounts of a white phosphorus attack.  The top two floors of the hospital's main building were gutted by fire, and a third was severely damaged.  Extra patient rooms on the fourth floor, not occupied during the attack, were charred on the ceilings and walls.  The fifth floor children's playroom was totally destroyed, with charcoal beams littering the jungle-gym and small merry-go-round.  The sixth floor gymnasium was also burned and was open to the sky when Human Rights Watch examined the site.

About 100 meters down the street to the south, separated by a low building, stands the hospital's six-story administration office.  This entire building was gutted by fire and all that remained were the walls.  On the exterior, windows had black smoke stains extending upwards.

Human Rights Watch examined two light green 155mm white-phosphorus shell casings in the office of the hospital director.  Hospital officials said one of the shells had been removed from the top floor of the hospital's main building and another had fallen adjacent to the hospital.  The tops of the shells had blown off, removing the markings, but the shells were clearly the same as the other white phosphorus shells that Human Rights Watch found throughout Gaza, with their signature light green paint.

UNRWA Headquarters Compound, Gaza City

The UNRWA compound covers roughly four hectares at the edge of Gaza's wealthiest neighborhood, Rimal, enclosed by concrete walls at least three meters high.  The compound contains the headquarters for all of UNRWA's operations throughout the Middle East and its field office for Gaza operations, including logistical facilities such as warehouses and garages.

Around 7:30 a.m. on January 15, IDF artillery shells started landing near the compound, despite calls to IDF officers from UNRWA staff, asking the IDF to stop.  At approximately 10 a.m., six shells landed in the compound, at least three of which contained white phosphorus, as well as shrapnel from at least one high explosive artillery round.  Three people were wounded and the white phosphorus caused extensive fires.  About 700 civilians were sheltering in the compound at the time.[21]

According to an UNRWA statement, "Shells of white phosphorus – a highly incendiary material – set ablaze the [vehicle] workshop and two vast warehouses containing humanitarian food and medical supplies."[22]  The densely packed sacks of flour continued to burn for 12 days, until January 27.

Human Rights Watch visited the UNRWA compound on January 28 and saw four buildings-two large warehouses, a vehicle bay, and a workshop-that were destroyed by fire. UNRWA staff said that rebuilding and re-supplying the warehouses would cost US$10 million, including US$3.7 million for medical supplies that were burned.[23]  The fire also destroyed blankets, mattresses, hygiene kits, tinned meat and bags of wheat flour. Three vehicles were completely burned and 15 were damaged.

According to UNRWA, the attack wounded one UN worker and two civilians who had sought shelter in the compound.[24]

According to Israel, the IDF opened fire at the UNRWA headquarters only after Hamas had attacked its soldiers from within the compound. "We do not want such incidents to take place and I am sorry for it but I don't know if you know, but Hamas fired from the UNRWA site," Prime Minister Ehud Olmert told United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki Moon, who was visiting Israel at the time of the attack. "This is a sad incident and I apologize for it."[25]

UNRWA's Gaza director John Ging adamantly denied that any Palestinian fighters had entered the compound, let alone fired from it at IDF soldiers.[26]  UN officials said they made dozens of increasingly frantic phone calls with IDF officers as the shells got closer, asking them to stop, and the IDF did not warn UNRWA about Hamas activity in or near the compound.  "They should tell us if there are militants operating in our compound or in our area," Ging said.  "The fact that they don't, we take that as indicative of the fact that there wasn't."[27]

Muhammad Abu Shamla, 46, arrived for his job as an UNRWA security guard at 7:30 that morning.  He told Human Rights Watch that he heard explosions from artillery from shortly thereafter until 9 a.m.:

At first I didn't know where the shells were falling but the walls were shaking.  After about 30 minutes we moved [to another building] because we thought it would be safer there. Then a colleague told us there was fire inside the compound threatening fuel trucks.  We went out to help. The smell was terrible, like garbage. There was fire in the garage. We started moving the cars that hadn't caught fire. There were clouds of black smoke everywhere. I saw one shell in the ground that hadn't exploded.  I didn't sleep at all that night; I kept running around to fight the fire. The fires were still raging on and off when I left the compound the next morning at 9 a.m.[28]

UNRWA Gaza Field Administration Officer Scott Anderson told Human Rights Watch that he was in the compound when the shelling started:

I don't know when exactly the first shell hit us, but the shells were getting close by 8 a.m., and I called the IDF coordination unit at Erez to try to get them to stop it.  The pattern of shelling was that it started over the Gaza Training College, in the western part of the UNRWA compound, and then the shelling moved to the west and walked its way over the whole compound. It was hitting the compound itself for around an hour.[29]

Anderson, a retired US Army officer, speculated that the IDF was "walking" the artillery fire across the area – firing shells along an arc at evenly spaced intervals.  He showed Human Rights Watch researchers three spent artillery shell casings, all of them light green to indicate white phosphorus, which he said had landed in the compound, as well as six impact holes inside the compound, apparently where the spent shells had landed.[30]  Human Rights Watch recorded four of the six impacts: one through a warehouse roof; one through a metal wall and fence; one in a manhole in the parking lot; and one in the corner of the parking lot.

According to Anderson, the shell that hit the parking lot manhole failed to explode, leaving the canister with white phosphorus still inside.  A UN de-mining team later removed the shell from the area, he said.

Human Rights Watch also viewed photographs of the spent artillery shells and unexploded ordnance that the UN reportedly recovered at the UNRWA compound after it had been struck.  The light green 155mm shells were correctly marked for white phosphorus.  According to the photos, white phosphorus wedges also landed inside the compound, as had shrapnel from at least one high explosive artillery shell.

Anderson had no doubt that white phosphorus had hit the compound.  "It looked like phosphorus, it smelled like phosphorus, and it burned like phosphorus," he said.

According to Anderson, the main concern just after the attack was that the compound's 100,000-liter diesel fuel depot[31] and six fuel tanker trucks, two of them full at the time, might catch on fire:

Two of the fuel tankers were parked right next to the wall of one of the warehouses that caught fire.  I saw a burning fragment land under one of the trucks, and I and a colleague ran out with fire extinguishers, thinking we could put it out, but we couldn't.  So we had to bat it away from under the truck with sticks.  We figured we'd be dead anyway if the truck went up.  Then there was another shell, I saw that one myself, right overhead, and the shell landed just at the end of the parking lot.  After that we evacuated everyone, and we drove the fuel trucks around 800 meters down the road to an empty lot that had already been shelled.  The people here only had light injuries, we were lucky.

Human Rights Watch saw a small crater, which Anderson said was made by a spent artillery shell, roughly 10 meters from where the fuel tanker trucks had been parked.

According to Claire Mitchell, UNRWA field legal officer, five senior UNRWA staff made dozens of phone calls to the IDF during the attack, and she compiled a log of UNRWA's communications with the IDF at the time.

"Scott [Anderson] started calling at around 8 a.m. to Major Aviad Silberman at Erez [crossing]," she said.  "Aidan O'Leary making calls regularly from shortly before 9 a.m. to Uri Singer and [retired Brigadier-] General [Baruch] Spiegel [head of the IDF's Humanitarian Coordination Cell] in Tel Aviv."[32] 

Anderson confirmed the multiple phone calls to the IDF.  "I was calling the IDF guys at Erez all the time," he said.  "They said they were trying to stop the shelling. It looks like there was nothing they could do."  He added, "I know that in the US Army it would not take that long to get the artillery fire to stop."

UNRWA Gaza director John Ging said that he too had spoken with the IDF at the time of the attack.[33]  He and other UNRWA staff said they had given the IDF the GPS coordinates of all UN installations in Gaza before Operation Cast Lead began.  Speaking at a press conference on January 15, Ging said that after the first shells hit the compound, UNRWA alerted the IDF of the exact location of its fuel trucks.  He insisted that "there were no militants in the compound; there was no firing from the compound."[34]

According to the IDF's chief spokesman, Brig. Gen. Avi Beneyahu, the IDF has started an investigation.  "If it becomes clear that we returned shots at the source of fire, we will say so, and if it turns out we operated by mistake, we will not hesitate to confess," he said.[35]

Beit Lahiya UNRWA School

Around 6 a.m. on Saturday, January 17, the IDF starting firing at least three artillery shells, which Human Rights Watch determined to be white phosphorus, over and in the immediate vicinity of a UN-run elementary school in Beit Lahiya.  At the time, the school was housing roughly 1,600 people, who had sought refuge there from neighboring areas.  Human Rights Watch found no indication that IDF units or Palestinian armed groups were operating in the area at the time.

The attack killed two young brothers when an already-detonated white phosphorus shell landed in a classroom on the top floor of the school; the shell also severely injured their mother and a cousin.  The shelling also spread burning white phosphorus wedges all over the school and surrounding area, wounding 12 other people, setting fire to a classroom where displaced persons were sheltering, and damaging a nearby market.[36]  Human Rights Watch visited the site on January 23, six days after the attack, and saw white phosphorus wedges still burning when children dug them out of the sand.

According to two witnesses, around 3 a.m. the IDF began firing shells that appear to have been white phosphorus some 600 meters north of the school.  Nimr al-Maqusi, 50, an unemployed civil servant who lives across the street from the school, said he saw the shells explode above northern Beit Layiha every few minutes.  "Wherever the pieces of the shells landed, fires would suddenly ignite," he recalled, reckoning that the shells were coming from the southeast.[37]  Yusuf Daoud, 45, an unemployed electrician who lives on the same street, also across from the school, was watching the same explosions.  Interviewed separately, he told Human Rights Watch: "None of us at home were sleeping.  We were all afraid of the shelling that was coming in."[38]

Around 6 a.m., for unknown reasons, Israeli forces started shelling the Beit Lahiya UN school.  According to three witnesses – the two men who live across the street from the school and another man who was inside the school at the time – no IDF forces were in the area at the time.  All of the witnesses said they saw at least three shells explode above the school.

'Ali al-Shamali, 46, who works as an attendant at the school and is also a volunteer with the local committee for displaced persons, said he saw a shell crash through the school roof and land in a classroom on the top floor.  "Less than ten minutes later, another phosphorus[39] shell hit the school, and we rushed upstairs," he said.  "Then another three or four white phosphorus shells hit, and one hit the market next to the school."[40]

The shell that hit the classroom immediately killed two young brothers and severely wounded their mother, al-Shamali said.  The Al-Mezan Center for Human Rights, based in Gaza City, identified the two children as Bilal al-Ashqar, 5, and Muhammad al-Ashqar, 4.[41]  According to a relative of the victims, Azhar al-Ashqar, the boys' mother, Nujud, 28, was wounded in the head and right hand, which was later amputated at the hospital.  The boys' cousin Mona, 18, was wounded in the leg and had it later amputated.[42]

Dozens of burning wedges landed in the courtyard and a classroom on the second floor caught on fire, all of the witnesses said.  On January 23, Human Rights Watch saw the scorched classroom with burned clothes and other personal items inside.

The attack continued as ambulances and a fire engine arrived at the scene, the witnesses said, while the displaced persons who had been staying in the school escaped to the streets and nearby homes.  Yusuf Daoud said he watched as more shells exploded over the school, causing pieces of debris and flaming fragments to land on his balcony.  "The smoke was white with some yellow, and the odor was awful," he said.  "It seems to affect little children and older people, especially."

According to Nimr al-Maqusi, some shells landed in the school while others landed in the street nearby.  "The scene was beyond description," he recalled.  "The people in the school were running around in a panic.  They had left their homes and sought shelter in the school but now this shelter, too, was not immune.  Some of the people were on fire and parts of their bodies were melting away."

A fourth witness, Ra'fat Shamiyya, 34, arrived at the scene approximately 50 minutes after the shelling began to help evacuate the wounded.  "I got there and there were pieces of phosphorus around in the courtyard," he said. "There was one shell that hit the bathroom area after I arrived."[43]  He shared with Human Rights Watch the videos that he said he had recorded of the incident on his mobile phone, beginning at 6:55 a.m.  The videos show dozens of burning wedges around the school compound, producing heavy smoke, as well as the second-floor classroom on fire.  The sound of a powerful crack is audible, apparently from a spent shell hitting the school.  According to al-Shamali, the last round in the attack hit the bathrooms of the school.

Many of the air-burst shells also sent flaming wedges onto the market next to the school, the witnesses said.  The market was badly damaged when Human Rights Watch visited the site on January 23.

Al-Shamali told Human Rights Watch that no Palestinian fighters were present in the school.  "No one holding any weapon is allowed into the school.  Even in regular circumstances, civilian cars are not allowed inside the compound," he said.  "I know about the school.  That's my job.  No shooting was coming from the school."

As with all the UNRWA sites that came under Israeli attack, the UN had transmitted the GPS coordinates of the Beit Lahiya school to the IDF before the military operation began.

"The Israeli army knew exactly our GPS coordinates and they would have known that hundreds of people had taken shelter there," said UNRWA spokesman Christopher Gunness.  "When you have a direct hit into the third floor of a UN school, there has to be an investigation to see if a war crime has been committed."[44]

To Human Rights Watch's knowledge, the IDF did not conduct ground operations in the vicinity of the school at any time during Operation Cast Lead.  Human Rights Watch's investigations in the area did not uncover any physical evidence to suggest a confrontation with Palestinian armed groups, such as bullet holes, bullet casings or tank tracks.

Attacks on Outlying Communities

Siyafa Village, Beit Lahiya

Israeli forces had bombed the open areas in Gaza's north since the military operation began on December 27, but they had not struck any of the residential areas north of Beit Lahiya, including the village of Siyafa, just north of Atatra.  Residents there, who mostly work the nearby fields, say they stayed in their homes, not fearing much for their safety because of the absence of Palestinian armed groups.  Some of them had regular contact with Israelis, with whom they traded strawberries and other goods.

Siyafa village became more dangerous on January 3, when the IDF intensified its shelling and aerial bombing in the north, in apparent preparation for the ground offensive that was to begin that night.  According to a local resident and chairman of the Agricultural Cooperative for Farmers of Strawberries, Vegetables and Flowers, Mahmoud Khalael, "they were sending a message to evacuate."[45]  According to other residents, the IDF dropped leaflets from the air warning civilians to leave the area, but residents did not leave because, they said, there were no fighters in the area and they thought they would be safe.[46]

According to Khaleal, at around 10 pm that night he got a telephone call from an Israeli officer named Balad, whom he knew from business-related coordination with the IDF.  Balad told him to warn the residents of the area to evacuate, especially the al-Ghoul family and Bedouins in the area.[47]  IDF tanks began to approach shortly thereafter, Khaleal said, under air cover.  Around 1:30 a.m. on January 4, he said, the IDF fired three missiles at the northern end of his house.  Human Rights Watch researchers who inspected the house on January 23 saw extensive damage to its northern end that was consistent with a missile strike, although how many missiles was unclear.  According to Khaleal, the Israeli officer Balad called him again around 7 a.m., telling everyone not to leave the area, but rather to stay in their homes.

The shelling and bombing in the open areas around Siyafa continued throughout the day, and also further south as IDF forces approached the village of Atatra about 500 meters away, which they eventually occupied.  Residents of Siyafa told Human Rights Watch that they sheltered in their homes, hoping the attacks would stop, and that they neither saw nor heard any Palestinian fighters in the area.[48]  Among them were 14 members of the Abu Halima family, who gathered in the home of Sa`dallah and Sabah Abu Halima, mostly in the central hallway.

The house, visited by Human Rights Watch on January 23, was the second structure in from open fields, from which one has sweeping views of Beit Lahiya and the Jabalya refugee camp.  Visible tank tracks and dug-up berns indicated that IDF tanks had positioned themselves in the nearby field between 100 and 120 meters from the Abu Halima house after the family left the area on January 4.

In separate interviews, three members of the family told Human Rights Watch what happened that afternoon, around 4 pm, when an artillery shell containing white phosphorus directly hit their house, killing five members of the family and wounding five.  The testimony is consistent with accounts given to journalists and the Israel-based human rights group B'Tselem.

Ahmad Abu Halima,  the 22-year-old son of Sa`dallah and Sabah Abu Halima, who was inside the house at the time of the attack, told Human Rights Watch what he saw:

I was talking with my father when the shell landed.  It hit directly on my father and cut his head off.  The explosion was large and the smell unbearable. It caused a big fire.  The pieces [from the shell] were burning and we could not put them out… We ran outside, the four of us who were unharmed.  My brother's wife and daughter, Ghada and Farah, came down with no clothes [because they were burned off].  My brothers Yusif and Ali too. Yusif was burned on his face and Ali on his back[49]

Ahmed's brother Omar Abu Halima, 18 years old, was next door at his uncle's house when the shell struck:

I heard the sound of an explosion.  We ran into the street and saw that it had hit our house.  We ran upstairs and when we arrived I found my father and four others dead.  We took them out and then dealt with the four wounded.

The stairs were very smoky.  We went inside and it smelled very strange.  We had never experienced that before.  It was difficult to go forward.  First I saw my mother with burns coming out of the house.  We found her at the entrance. She told us to go in and get my injured brothers.  But when we got inside we saw nothing because of the smoke and dust, and we couldn't breathe.  We found my brother's wife, Ghada, she was burning in flames, and also her daughter Farah, also burning.  There were also my brothers Yusif and Ali. All of them were burning badly; their clothes were melting.  They were all burned but Abd al-Rahim and my father had their heads cut from their bodies too. We took the wounded in two tractors, with my mother in the first one.  We tried to call an ambulance but they said they couldn't come.[50]

Those killed in the attack are:

 

Sa'dallah Abu Halima, 45, father (husband of Sabah)

'Abdel Rahim, 14, son

Zeid, 11, son Hamza, 10, son

Shahid, 15 months, daughter.

Those wounded are:

Sabah Abu Halima, 44, mother (wife of Sa'dallah)

Yusif, 16, son

'Ali, 5, son

Ghada, 21, wife of son Mohammad

Farah, 2, daughter of Ghada and Mohammad

On January 23, Human Rights Watch investigated the Abu Halima house.  In the ceiling above the hallway where the family said it had been sheltering, researchers saw a hole approximately one meter in diameter, apparently caused by the shell.  The hallway beneath was badly charred and the remaining furniture burnt.  The rooms around the hallway had black burns on the walls and the plastic light switches and electrical outlets had melted.  The wood around the doors and windows of the house was charred. On the wall in one bedroom, someone had written in lipstick, in Arabic with some misspellings: "From the Israel Defense Forces, we are sorry."[51]  Residents do not know if IDF forces entered the houses of the neighborhood because they all fled, but the tank positions about 100 meters to the east of the Abu Halima house indicate that the forces were nearby.

Amid the debris of the family's possessions, Human Rights Watch found two 155mm artillery shell fragments, painted the light green color that militaries use to identify white phosphorus shells, as well as the base plate from the shell.  Two canisters of the sort used to hold white phosphorus in artillery shells were found outside the house.  Another white phosphorus shell and canister were found about 20 meters to the west of the house, and a third shell was about 50 meters from the house in the same direction.  Human Rights Watch does not know if any of the shells struck at precisely those spots or whether they had been moved.

The following day, Human Rights Watch visited Sabah Abu Halima, the mother, who was being treated for serious burns at al-Shifa Hospital in Gaza City.  Sabah Abu Halima had her feet and right arm bandaged. She was visibly in shock and Human Rights Watch did not seek to interview her.  "They're taking my children," she kept repeating.  Earlier, however, she had spoken with the media about what happened to her family.  "The children were screaming, 'Fire! Fire!' and there was smoke everywhere and a horrible, suffocating smell," she told the New York Times. "My 14-year-old cried out, 'I'm going to die. I want to pray.' I saw my daughter-in-law melt away."[52]

Human Rights Watch spoke with Dr. 'Alaa 'Ali from the al-Shifa Hospital burn unit, where Sabah Abu Halima was getting care. He said that she had been admitted on January 4 at 5:05 p.m., and he showed hospital entry records confirming that date and time.  "Sabah had very deep burns that reached the bone, and in some places even burned the bone," he said.[53]

Seventeen days later, at the military hospital in Cairo, Human Rights Watch interviewed another member of the family, Mohamed Abu Halima, 24 years old, who was accompanying his badly burned wife Ghada and daughter Farah.  His account of what happened on January 4 was consistent with the accounts of his brothers.  "The attack on my house was all of a sudden, they hit the neighbor and then us," he said.  "We're farmers and there were no fighters around."[54]

According to Mohammad Abu Halima, his wife Ghada was burned on 40 percent of her body and his daughter on 45 percent.  Doctors at the hospital did not allow Human Rights Watch to see Ghada or Farah because they were still getting treatment in the intensive care unit but photographs of the two patients taken at the hospital revealed extensive burns on Ghada's back and on Farah's chest and legs.  According to Physicians for Human Rights-Israel, which is following this case, Sabah Abu Halima was also transferred to Egypt for medical care in mid-February, because al-Shifa Hospital could not properly care for her wounds.[55]

In testimony given to B'Tselem on January 8 from al-Shifa Hospital in Gaza City, Ghada Abu Halima gave details of the attack that were consistent with what her relatives later told Human Rights Watch.  She also said that the first ambulance taking her and Farah to the Rafah border crossing with Egypt had come under fire by the IDF.  "The driver was slightly wounded in the face and he drove back to the hospital," she said.[56]

The shelling of the Abu Halima family with white phosphorus was not the end of the family's ordeal.  According to Omar, Ahmad and Mohammad Abu Halima, as well as three other witnesses from the area interviewed separately, Israeli forces fired on the family as they tried to evacuate the wounded and dead to the hospital on tractors and in a car, killing two cousins, Mohammad and Mattar.

Khuza'a Village

Situated to the east of Khan Yunis, approximately 500 meters from the Israel-Gaza armistice line, the village of Khuza'a is one of the closest Palestinian residential areas to Israel, in sight of IDF watchtowers.  Open fields separate it from the armistice line.

In a series of ground incursions between January 11 and 13, Israeli forces engaged Palestinian fighters, apparently killing three of them.  At the same time, local officials said, 16 civilians died and dozens more were wounded, many by smoke inhalation from the extensive use of white phosphorus.[57]  On two separate occasions the IDF heavily used air-burst white phosphorus, artillery fired, killing one woman and injuring dozens of others, including one boy who burned his foot on a buried white phosphorus wedge 12 days after the attack.

Residents and local human rights activists told Human Rights Watch that Palestinian fighters were active in the area, and an Islamic Jihad commander told the media that about one dozen fighters had directly engaged the IDF in Khuza'a.[58]  But these engagements appear to have been minimal, with the fighters mostly retreating whenever Israeli forces advanced.  Even with the presence of these fighters, the IDF's extensive use of air-burst white phosphorus in a populated area was unlawful due to the munition's indiscriminate effects.   In addition, if the purpose of the white phosphorus was to mask approaching troops, it is unclear why the IDF air-burst the white phosphorus over the neighborhood instead of ground-bursting it, which causes a denser smoke.

The IDF's assault on Khuza'a began around 9:30 pm on January 10, with an intense artillery barrage in the area, including white phosphorus shells bursting over the al-Najjar district, inhabited primarily by a family of that name.[59]  According to three residents, interviewed separately, white phosphorus shells exploded above private homes, showering the area with burning wedges.  Some homes in the area caught on fire, and neighbors helped each other to extinguish the flames. 

Local resident Iman al-Najjar, 30, told Human Rights Watch how white phosphorus shells struck around her house:

That night, starting around 9:30, they began to fire phosphorus randomly.  Almost all the houses here got their share…  We thought it was fog but it was smoke.  It was hard to breath.  We tried to put out the fire.  The whole neighborhood came out… Two phosphorus pieces landed in my house and it was on fire.  People were choking, so we went to the neighbor's house.[60]

A few hundred meters from Iman al-Najjar's house, a shell burst through the roof of a house, killing Hanan al-Najjar, 47, and injuring her four children inside.  Based on Human Rights Watch's inspection of shell remnants found in the house, it was a white phosphorus shell.[61]

Hanan's husband, Majid al-Najjar, was in an adjacent house when white phosphorus wedges began falling in the area, setting some structures on fire.  He left the house where he was staying to help an elderly couple escape the flames, he said, and at that point he saw an artillery shell strike his house:

First the phosphorus pieces landed.  We evacuated the old couple and then the shell hit the house… I saw and I heard the sound of the shell so I went back.  I saw the children and men coming out, some of them were injured.  My little girl Aya got burned and her right arm was broken.  My son Ahmad burned his right foot.  My other son Moaz scratched his wrist and head – he is 12 years old.[62]

When Majid al-Najjar went inside his house he saw that a shell had struck his wife Hanan directly in the chest.  He showed Human Rights Watch a photo of Hanan that he had taken on his mobile phone, in which her chest had been cut open.  Human Rights Watch also saw his injured daughter Aya, who had a cast on her right arm.

"We took them to Nasser Hospital in Khan Yunis," Majid al-Najjar said.  "The ambulance came after one hour.  We were 10 people in the ambulance, and my dead wife too."

Human Rights Watch examined the house on January 24 and saw the hole in the roof where the shell had entered.  Although Hanan al-Najjar was apparently directly hit by the empty shell, evidence of white phosphorus lay all around.  Burn marks apparently from white phosphorus wedges stained some outside walls and the ground around the house.  On the roof lay a white phosphorus canister and the remains of unburned wedges, which ignited when kicked.

The day after the attack, January 11, IDF forces moved into the al-Najjar district of Khuza'a for the first time.  From approximately 5 a.m. to 11 p.m. they stayed on the edge of the village, residents and local human rights activists said, and several homes were bulldozed.  The IDF returned around 3 a.m. on January 12 and destroyed some more homes, but withdrew again around noon.

The next assault took place around midnight on January 13, with heavy shelling, including the extensive use of air-burst white phosphorus.  Ismail Khadr, a 50-year-old farmer, described what happened during the attack. "When the phosphorus landed we were on an island of smoke," he said.  "Fires were everywhere and reached waist high.  The pieces were like foam.  Some of my farm was burned."[63]  Khadr showed Human Rights Watch a small onion field next to his home, where he had buried some white phosphorus wedges to stop them from burning. When exposed to air, they reignited and produced a garlic-smelling smoke.

In the residential area around Majid al-Najjar's house, Human Rights Watch found extensive and irrefutable evidence of white phosphorus use, although it was not clear if the wedges had landed on January 10 or 13.  Shell remains marked THS89D112-003 155MM M825E1lay inside a burned multi-story home with a hole in the ceiling next to a mosque.  In another burned home, lay a white phosphorus canister and the base of a white phosphorus shell.  A white phosphorus shell marked THS89D112-003 155MM M825E1 was found between two homes, one of which was completely burned.  Lastly, the house of Abdul Hadi Qudeh, 88 years old, had a hole in the roof where a shell had apparently entered.  A white phosphorus canister lay inside and felt wedges were on the roof.  Three canister liners were outside, as well as more white phosphorus felt wedges.

The widespread use of white phosphorus in the area caused many injuries from smoke inhalation, residents and local human rights activists said.  This was confirmed by Dr. Yusuf Abu Rish, the director of Nasser Hospital in nearby Khan Yunis, where many of the wounded were taken.  He told Human Rights Watch that the hospital received more than 150 patients on January 13, and most of them were suffering from smoke inhalation.  "Even the ambulance bringing the victims was full of a foul odor," he said.  "Many of the victims suffered from a shortness of breath, hysteria and muscle spasms."[64]  Twelve patients arrived at the hospital dead that day, Dr. Abu Rish said, but that was from all attacks in the Khan Yunis area and not just from white phosphorus.

Human Rights Watch reviewed the hospital's records and found that on January 13 doctors there had treated 13 persons for what the hospital called chemical burns.  Two of these patients required transfer to Egypt for treatment.  Dr. Abu Rish also showed Human Rights Watch seven samples of white phosphorus in glass jars, which he said a resident of Khuza'a had collected on January 13.