Europe Solidaire Sans Frontières
On Tuesday, 30 January 2024, at 5:30 A.M., security cameras at Jenin’s Ibn Sina Hospital captured 12 soldiers, Special Police Unit officers and Shin Bet agents entering the hospital disguised as medical staff, women and patients. They went up to the third floor and one of them, in a white doctor’s coat, rang the bell of the rehabilitation department.
The nurse at the reception desk opened the door and the force entered the department. Several members stayed at the entrance, two went up to the reception desk to distract the nurse, and other members went into the room where Basel Ghazawi, 18, was lying. An Islamic Jihad military wing operative, Ghazawi was hospitalized on 25 October 2023 after a shrapnel injury from an Israeli airstrike left him paralyzed in his lower body. In the room, the members of the force used a silencer to shoot Ghazawi and two people who were with him in the room: his brother Muhammad Ghazawi, 23, also an Islamic Jihad military wing operative, and Muhammad Jalamneh, 27, a Hamas military wing operative.
Meanwhile, the members who went to the reception desk assaulted the nurse, knocked her down and took her phone. After the three operatives were shot, the force left the department, while the nurse hid under her desk.
Israel, acting in this case as a criminal organization rather than a state, considered the operation a success and the IDF Spokesperson was quick to praise the force. Without even attempting to presenting it as an arrest mission gone awry, Israel declared it had “targeted” the operatives. Yet intentionally killing people who were endangering no one at the time, inside a hospital, which is supposed to be a safe haven, contradicts fundamental legal and moral principles that every state is supposed to uphold. Given Israel’s response, clearly no one will be held accountable for the three killings — the individuals fired the shots, their commanders, or the officials who greenlighted the operation and gave the orders. In these circumstances, such incidents are bound to recur.
On 4 February 2024, the nurse at Ibn Sina Hospital gave her testimony to B’Tselem field researcher Abdulkarim Sadi and recounted the incident:
"On Tuesday, 30 January 2024, I was at working at Ibn Sina Hospital, in the rehabilitation department on the third floor. My shift started at 8:00 P.M. and was supposed to end at 8:00 A.M. I was the only one on duty in the department that night, and was sitting behind the reception desk.
At 5:30 A.M., I heard the bell ring at the main entrance to the department. Normally, after 11:00 P.M. we lock the main door because visiting hours are over, and we only open it for medical staff. When the bell rang, I looked at the screen and saw a person in a white doctor’s coat showing the identification tag doctors in the hospital carry. So I immediately pressed the button and opened the door. Two men came in. One was in a white doctor’s coat and the other person told me his son was in a severe accident and he was here to see him. I told him all the accident patients are on another floor.
Some other people followed them in. One was wearing the traditional clothes that older Palestinians wear. Another was leading someone in a wheelchair. At first I didn’t pay much attention to them, because I was talking to the first two men. But then I started explaining that they weren’t allowed into the department at night. Suddenly, the men I was talking to came behind the desk. One of them grabbed me, and the other put his hand on my neck and tried to push me to the floor. I started shouting for help, and he put his other hand on my mouth. The other man joined in and pushed me to the floor. Then they took my phone away because I tried to make a call, and then one of them told me they were from the Israeli army.
I couldn’t see what was happening in the department and could only hear people speaking Hebrew, which I don’t understand. I was in shock and very scared. I crawled under the table and stayed there until everything calmed down and I couldn’t hear anything anymore. I didn’t know what to do, so I got up and ran to the department opposite my department. When I got there, I broke down and started crying. They sat me down and tried to calm me down, until my brother came and took me home. At that point, I had no idea what happened in the room they entered. I only found out later they killed three young men.
I can’t believe it happened. I thought I worked in a safe place where things like that don’t happen. I haven’t really recovered and can’t handle going back to work yet. I never imagined I’d experience anything like that."
B’Tselem
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