Ref: 08/2008

Date: 07 February 2008

Time: 11:00 GMT

IOF Bomb School in Beit Hanoun, Killing one Teacher and Injuring 3 Students:

IOF escalation kills a total of 7 Palestinians in 4 Hours

In the early hours of Thursday, 7 February, 2008, IOF killed seven Palestinians in the northern Gaza Strip. One of the victims was a school teacher on his way to work when his school, in Beit Hanoun, was directly hit by an IOF surface-to-surface rocket.  In addition to killing the teacher, IOF seriously injured two students at the school.

According to PCHR preliminary investigations, at approximately 7:30 on 7 February, IOF units stationed on the eastern border of the Gaza Strip, near Gaza City, fired a surface-to-surface rocket at a group of Palestinian resistance activists who were near the Beit Hanoun Secondary Agricultural School in the northern Gaza Strip. Approximately 70 students and 35 school employees were in the schoolyard at the time of the strike. Teacher Hani Sha’ban Na’im, aged 41, was killed instantly. Three students were injured, with two of them sustaining serious injuries. The students have been identified as:

 Emad Maher El-Kafarna (17), seriously injured.

1.      Nidal Medhat El-Kafarna (17), seriously injured.

2.      Tha’er Rashad El-Kafarna (17), moderately injured.

In addition to bombing a school, IOF also escalated attacks against Palestinian resistance activists today. At approximately 03:15 this morning, IOF fired a surface-to-surface rocket against a group of resistance activists near the Salam Mosque in el-Qerem Street, east of Jabaliya. The activists were resisting an IOF incursion into the area. Two of the activists were killed instantly, and another two were injured. Fourty five minutes later, at approximately 04:00 this morning, an IOF planes flying over the northern Gaza Strip fired 6 rockets at various areas. One rocket hit a group of resistance activists near El-Ja’al fuel station east of Jabaliya. Four activists were killed instantly including 2 brothers, and two other activists were injured. Medical crews have not been able to access the area because it remains extremely dangerous. The 6 activists who were killed have been identified as:  

1. Ahmad Zakaria Abu H’meid (25), from El-Tuffah Quarter in Gaza City.

2.      Hammouda Mohammad El-Shorafa (40) from El-Tuffah Quarter in Gaza City.

3.      Sa’ed Abdallah Nabhan (20), from Jabaliya.

4.      Jawdat Abdallah Nabhan (22), from Jabaliya.

5.      Mohammad Yusef El-Mutaweq (26), from Jabaliya.

6.      Osama Fayez Assaf (22), from Jabaliya.

These extra-judicial executions come in the wake of a continuing IOF escalation in the use of excessive lethal force in the Gaza Strip. In the five weeks since the beginning of 2008, PCHR has documented 95 Palestinians killed by IOF attacks in the Gaza Strip. This includes forty unarmed civilians, among them three children and seven women.  

PCHR is gravely concerned about these continuing IOF extra-judicial executions, and therefore:

1. Renews its condemnation of these extra-judicial executions, which are also a continuation of Israeli war crimes in the OPT. These crimes reflect IOF disregard for the lives of Palestinian civilians. The Centre considers these actions to be acts of reprisal and collective punishment, in violation of Article 33 of the Fourth Geneva Convention (1949).
2. PCHR calls upon the international community to act immediately to end these crimes; and renews its call to the High Contracting Parties of the Fourth Geneva Convention to fulfill their obligation under Article 1 of the Convention to ensure that it is respected at all times, and their responsibilities under Article 146 to pursue perpetrators of serious violations of the Convention, which are determined in Article 147 that lists violations of the Convention amounting to war crimes.