On the street in central Gaza City where the family of Khalil al-Bahtini lived, the contents of the Palestinian Islamic Jihad commander’s home and the two houses on either side remain spilled out into the street. Passersby must navigate the rubble and crumpled shell of a water tank, as well as the debris of an annihilated family life: a red teddy bear, kitchen utensils, scraps of books and clothing.
The Adas family were not the targets of the airstrike that hit their neighbour’s house at about 2am on 9 May, in the opening salvo of Israel’s Shield and Arrow operation, but the buildings were less than a metre apart. The GBU-39 bomb that crashed through three floors of the Bahtini home, down into the basement, also blew apart one side of the Adas’s house, killing the family’s two teenage daughters. Dania, 19, died immediately, while her sister, Imam, 17, clung to life for two hours before succumbing to her injuries in hospital.
“The explosion blew the bedroom door off on to me and my wife as we were sleeping, and then I ran into the living room to find the children,” said Alaa Adas, 55, a civil servant. “My son was there, but my daughters did not respond. When I saw their hair under the rubble my heart stopped.”
Shield and Arrow, a surprise Israeli airstrike campaign targeting Islamic Jihad, the second largest militant organisation in the blockaded Gaza Strip after Hamas, began with the targeted assassination of Bahtini and the near-instantaneous killings of two other commanders elsewhere in the strip.
Israel claims that it takes pains to avoid civilian deaths in “precision strikes” targeting high-ranking members of Gaza’s factions. But the timing and ferocity of Shield and Arrow’s opening salvo has led to new action from Israeli rights groups, challenging Israel’s supreme court to launch independent investigations into civilian casualties as per an existing – but not enforced – ruling on the use of targeted killings.
The assassinations, which came during a ceasefire, led Islamic Jihad to respond with almost 1,500 rockets fired towards Israel over the course of five days before a truce was brokered by Egyptian mediators. The violence left 33 people in Gaza dead, including at least 10 women and children, and, according to Palestinian officials, 103 homes were destroyed and a further 2,800 damaged. Three people were reportedly killed by misfired Islamic Jihad projectiles inside the strip, and in Israel, an 80-year-old woman and a Palestinian worker died.
After the ceasefire, Israel’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, described Shield and Arrow as “perfect”, citing what it achieved militarily.
This sort of Israeli operation is becoming more common. There have been four major wars between Hamas and Israel since the Islamist movement seized control of the strip in 2007, the last of which was fought over 11 days in May 2021. But there have also been three smaller operations since 2019, two of which were surprise attacks: in total, these more limited missions have killed approximately 107 people in Gaza, at least 42 of whom were civilians.
Israel Defence Forces (IDF) officials say that technological innovations and artificial intelligence allow attack cells working alongside drones and jets to pinpoint exactly which people and buildings should be targeted.
But for the tiny strip’s trapped population of 2.2 million people, these surprise operations are making it clear that if a neighbour is on Israel’s kill list, other families are also in danger.
“I didn’t know there was a commander living in this building,” said Abu Hamza, 55, who lives in a high-rise in downtown Gaza City that was hit in May, killing the senior Jihad figure Tareq Ezzedine and his 12- and eight-year-old children, as well as a dentist living on the floor below, his wife, and the couple’s 19-year-old son. “If they have such sophisticated weapons, why can’t they hit targets when they are in the car or somewhere else, away from families and innocent people sleeping?”
Palestinian and Israeli human rights groups allege that Israel’s assessments surrounding acceptable civilian casualties in airstrikes are changing, even though an Israeli supreme court ruling from 2006 states that targeted killings are only legal if certain conditions are met – including avoiding civilian deaths as much as possible.
In the past, Israeli officials have claimed it was not known that women and children would be killed in strikes targeting members of Gaza’s armed groups. But during Shield and Arrow the language used by the government and IDF shifted markedly, suggesting that instead measures were taken to reduce “necessary” collateral damage.
Far-right members of Israel’s new government campaigned on promises of a “tougher stance” against the Palestinians, and are also seeking to curb the powers of the supreme court, which plays an important checks and balances role.
The IDF’s chief of staff, Herzl Halevi, said the air force carried out “accurate action that hurt terrorist targets while minimising the damage to uninvolved parties. If we could, we would have operated without hurting uninvolved people at all, but we must remember terrorists act from inside the civilian population and put Gazan residents in danger.”
The IDF maintains that Shield and Arrow was a proportionate response against violence emanating from the strip, and the assassinations were postponed twice to “ensure suitable conditions and minimise civilian casualties”.
But on the grounds that the existing supreme court ruling on targeted killings is not enforced, Public Committee Against Torture Israel (PCATI) and Yesh Gvul, an NGO that plays a watchdog role on the Israeli military, have recently launched a petition demanding Israel’s attorney general establish an independent investigation into civilian harm in Gaza.
“If an independent committee is not formed to examine the legality of the military’s recent actions in Gaza, as mandated by the supreme court, Israel will have manifested that it is neither willing nor able to observe international law and the rule of law. This will open the door to intervention by international institutions, like the international criminal court,” a statement from the two human rights organisations said.
“Not only has Israel thus far not conducted an independent inquiry, it did not provide any evidence that the individuals targeted for assassination presented a clear and present danger; as far as we know the IDF did not warn neighbours or nearby civilians of the looming assassination, nor does it appear it actively attempted to limit so-called collateral damage.”
In emailed comments, the ministry of justice spokesperson, Efrat Oren, said the attorney general’s office had received the petition, and would reply in due course.
The issue of targeted killings, however, has increasing relevance outside the Gaza Strip. The occupied West Bank has witnessed more bloodshed in 2022 and 2023 than at any point since the second intifada, or Palestinian uprising, drew to a close in 2005 – and this year, Israel began using armed drones and airstrikes in the northern city of Jenin for the first time in nearly two decades.
“Israel’s supreme court sees the ruling [on investigating civilian harm caused by targeted killings] as more applicable to the West Bank than Gaza, as it does not view Gaza as still under occupation,” said Michael Sfard, a well-known human rights lawyer, who filed the petition to the attorney general on behalf of PCAT and Yesh Gvul.
“So this petition is very relevant. What’s interesting is that Israel of 2023 is using the pretexts of two decades ago to deal with the rule of law and international law now. Today it seems that the Israeli government no longer pretends like its actions are in accordance with the rulings of an independent judiciary … I just don’t think this government cares.”
• This article was amended on 19 July 2023. An earlier version incorrectly said that Benjamin Netanyahu’s description of Shield and Arrow as “perfect” was “due to the low Israeli death toll”. In his statement he did not mention Israeli death rates (or Palestinian civilian casualties), but pointed to the killing of Islamic Jihad leaders and the destruction of their weapons and command centres.
