‘Scotch wounds Gaza point to targeted fire’
The testimonies of international doctors who have worked in the Gaza Strip indicate that Israeli soldiers may have consciously shot on Palestinian children, writes de Volkskrant. The newspaper spoke with fifteen doctors who together saw at least 114 children aged 15 and younger who only had a shot wound in their heads or chest, “an important indication that aimed at the children”. Focusing on children is a war crime.
De Volkskrant emphasizes that it is a conservative count. Children who were doubted whether children who also had shot wounds in other body parts are not counted. The doctors also suspect that the total number of children shot in their head or chest is many times higher. Children who were killed instantly ended up in the departments of the doctors and the newspaper did not speak with doctors from all hospitals in Gaza.
The doctors who spoke to De Volkskrant for the investigation come from the United States, the United Kingdom, Australia, Canada and the Netherlands. They were all active in conflict areas before, but rarely experienced that children with shot wounds entered their heads or chest.
They worked in ten different hospitals and clinics in Gaza and delivered dozens of statues of children shot at. De Volkskrant places part of it, but does not publish the majority because those images would be too horrible.
Experts tell the newspaper that the wounds seem to be caused by long shots, which would have been fired by Israeli snipers or drones. This corresponds to statements of eyewitnesses. Earlier, the BBC and The New York Times also wrote about dozens of children who were hit by bullets in their head or chest.
Israel invariably denies that there is a targeted shot on citizens.
The doctors told de Volkskrant that they also saw instructions for other war crimes. For example, they saw patients with tiny cube or cylindrical particles in their bodies. They could come from fragmentation weapons, which are very controversial because they can take care of civilian casualties.
The Israeli army denies the use of that kind of weapons, but Amnesty International has been reporting that they are being deployed for some time.