Human rights group Yesh Din asked the Israeli High Court of Justice today to order the IDF Military Attorney-General to open an investigation into the killing of Mohammed Faisal Mahmoud Qawariq and Salah Mohammed Kamal Qawariq, two Palestinian 19-year old teens, who were cousins, shot to death by IDF forces five months ago while working in their families’ fields, during the plowing season, near the West Bank village of Awarta.
The two victims were initially accused, by reports based on statements from the Army of disguising themselves as farmers, and using a pitchfork and a glass bottle to try to attack IDF forces who had stopped them.
They were akilled by ten bullets fired by IDF soldiers (seven hitting one young man and three hitting the other), “in circumstances which raise serious suspicion of a grave criminal offence”, according to Yesh Din.
A medical post-mortem examination conducted at Rafidiya Hospital in Nablus reportedly found that the IDF bullets had been fired “at very close range”.
Yesh Din attorneys Michael Sfard, Emily Schaeffer and Ido Tamari wrote in the petition that: “The details of the incident were not clarified, and there’s a risk they will never be clarified, as long as the Military Attorney-General continues to refrain from deciding on the matter … Refraining from opening a criminal investigation five months after the incident is scandalous and will damage any attempt to conduct an effective and thorough investigation”. It also opens the possibility that charges of war crimes can be brought in other countries, under the principle of universal jurisdiction, against the IDF soldiers involved, according to the Yesh Din legal team.
Even the IDF had admitted that the circumstances remain unclear, the Yesh Din lawyers noted.
The petition, filed on behalf of the families of the deceased young men, also said that the military’s failure to open an investigation, to date, is a dangerous one “which demonstrates to every IDF soldier taking part in security activities in the West Bank that there’s no need to investigate incidents which result in Palestinian deaths”.
The petition argued that “in any case of death of civilians by soldiers’ gunfire, it is mandatory to conduct a professional, immediate, independent and effective investigation. This was not done in this case”.
As a result, the Yesh Din petition stated, the Army’s inaction “conveys a message of contempt for the lives of Palestinian civilians”, and “the Petitioners feel very aggrieved by the small amount of protection the military advocacy grants completely innocent civilians hurt by the illegal use of arms in the course of a clearly civilian situation”.