Report: Israel Kills Anyone Who Crosses Line Splitting North and South Gaza

Israeli forces have deemed everyone a “terrorist” in Gaza, adult or child, and are killing any Palestinians who cross an arbitrary line drawn by the military, leaving their bodies to be eaten by dogs, a horrific new investigation reveals.

A report by Haaretz published Wednesday finds that Israeli military officials have designated the area around a line separating southern Gaza from north Gaza — where Israel is carrying out an ethnic cleansing campaign — as a “kill zone” where soldiers are authorized to hunt down and kill anyone they see with “unlimited firepower,” no matter whether the people are clearly unarmed, children, or even waving a white flag.

Through interviews with Israeli soldiers who operated in Gaza, the investigation reveals that the military has seemingly adopted a policy of treating Palestinians as nothing but targets to be killed or detained, whose bodies should be left to rot — despite international humanitarian law requiring that militaries take all steps possible to avoid civilian death and prevent bodies from being desecrated.

“The forces in the field call it ‘the line of dead bodies,’” a commander told Haaretz. The commander served in Division 252, which patrols the Netzarim Corridor — an Israeli-built road bisecting Gaza that analysts have said is a show of Israel’s intention to expand and make permanent its colonization of Gaza. The exact area of the zone changes day by day, soldiers said, depending on how the units feel or simply spanning a sniper’s eyesight.

“After shootings, bodies are not collected, attracting packs of dogs who come to eat them,” the commander said. “In Gaza, people know that wherever you see these dogs, that’s where you must not go.”

The practice is so accepted in the area that soldiers compete to see how many people they can kill.

“The IDF spokesperson’s announcements about casualty numbers have turned this into a competition between units. If Division 99 kills 150 [people], the next unit aims for 200,” one recently discharged Division 252 officer told Haaretz.

At the beginning of Israel’s genocide, the head of Division 252, Brigadier General Yehuda Vach, declared that “there are no innocents in Gaza” — and the report finds that this has been adopted as an “operational doctrine.” Division 252 was replaced in the corridor last month by Division 99, which has the same practices with regard to the corridor, the report finds.

Soldiers from Division 252 described horrific stories of soldiers reveling in killing people who were almost certainly civilians.

Once, a soldier said, his unit unloaded “hundreds of bullets” into four unarmed people with a tank’s machine gun. They killed three people and took the fourth person, stripped him, and imprisoned him in a cage. “Soldiers passing by spat on him. It was disgusting,” the soldier said. “Finally, a military interrogator came, questioned him briefly while holding a gun to his head, then ordered his release.” They discovered he was simply trying to travel to north Gaza to see his uncles.

Another soldier recalled how his unit saw a Palestinian approaching the corridor and opened fire, pelting him with “dozens of bullets” for over a minute, “shooting and laughing.” They went to photograph the body and take his phone, and saw that they had killed a child, who they estimated was 16 years old.

“That evening, our battalion commander congratulated us for killing a terrorist, saying he hoped we’d kill ten more tomorrow,” he said. “When someone pointed out he was unarmed and looked like a civilian, everyone shouted him down. The commander said: ‘Anyone crossing the line is a terrorist, no exceptions, no civilians. Everyone’s a terrorist.’”