Weapons in Gaza homes: a reserve commander’s account in the film

What the interview is

Private Screener. Thank you for taking the time to watch this film. We’d value your honest impressions after viewing. This link is intended for you only. Please don’t forward, download, record, or publish any part of the film without prior permission. One recording is with a company-level reserve commander who served in more than one round of fighting there. He is not named. The directors are unnamed for security, and the film is still being edited. What follows is his account. This site has not verified it independently, and other parties, including Hamas, may dispute it.

Weapons in homes

He says almost no house he entered was free of weapons. He describes one house that looked ordinary from outside, with a Hamas flag at the door. In the children's room, he says, an anti-tank charge lay under the bed next to a rug with cartoon figures. In the parents' room, beside an infant crib, he says there was a crate holding about thirty mortar bombs. He describes this as the central difficulty of fighting in residential areas: a room can be both a home and a storage place.

Uniforms and movement

He says the armed men he met did not wear uniforms. He says that after six fighters were killed, one was wearing military tzitzit. He says many moved between houses without a weapon, with the weapon kept inside. He describes a ceasefire during which children came toward the line, while men behind them, he says, filmed the layout. He also describes a training compound next to a kindergarten and a municipal building, says RPG fire from the kindergarten wounded five soldiers, and says UN/UNRWA food sacks were used as sandbags on fighting positions. He says an aircraft saw people leave a house without weapons and so could not strike.

The rules he describes

He recalls a soldier asking why he could not shoot a person in civilian clothes walking through an area that had been cleared. He says he had no good answer, because the rules of engagement did not allow it. He says the IDF still follows a process that considers terrain, the enemy's methods and a ban on indiscriminate fire.

Private Screener. Thank you for taking the time to watch this film. We’d value your honest impressions after viewing. This link is intended for you only. Please don’t forward, download, record, or publish any part of the film without prior permission.