UNDERSTANDING
THE GOLDSTONE REPORT

from:

Blocking the Truth of the Gaza War: How the Goldstone Commission Understated the Hamas Threat to Palestinian Civilians

Col. (res.) Jonathan D. Halevi

Statements of Wail and Salah al-Samouni

Wail and Salah al-Samouni described the shelling of Wail's house, where the extended al-Samouni family had sought shelter and where more than 20 people were killed.21 They told the commission: At about 5:30 a.m. on the morning of January 5 Wail left the house with some other men to bring wood for a fire. As soon as they left the house a helicopter filed a missile at them and then a number of missiles as the house. After the house was hit the wounded proceeded toward Salah a-Din Street and were refused medical attention by the IDF soldiers. Salah claimed that the soldiers fired shots over their heads to frighten them and make them leave more quickly. They said there was no activity of armed Palestinians around the house where the family members had sought shelter. Salah al-Samouni said that "everyone is a farmer, I swear to Allah that everyone is a farmer," and rejected the possibility that they were armed or wanted.

The commission members asked: Can Wail describe the soldiers and identify them according to their voices and uniforms? How did the IDF forces destroy the agricultural land near the house? How large was the agricultural area destroyed by the IDF? Was the witness treated at the Shifa Hospital?

The commission did not ask about the identity of the dead Palestinians and about the possibility that some of them were terrorist operatives. It did not challenge their claim that there were no armed Palestinians in the area, despite reports by both Palestinian terrorist organizations and the IDF about exchanges of fire in the area. In addition, the commission did not press the witness about his claim that the soldiers did not provide medical attention, in contradiction of a statement given by a female member of the family who told the NGO B'tselem that the soldiers had given them medical aid.

An examination of freely accessible Palestinian sources shows that Wail and Salah al-Samouni hid important details from the commission which could shed light on the event. An examination of their statements and the statements of other members of the al-Samouni family to human rights organizations and published in Palestinian newspapers raises questions as to the veracity of their version of what actually happened on January 5.22

Members of the family repeatedly claimed that all the people in the house were ordinary civilians. However, at least three were affiliated with Palestinian Islamic Jihad. Meisa al-Samouni did not tell B'tselem that her husband, Tawfiq Rashad Hilmi al-Samouni, who was killed on January 5, was a Palestinian Islamic Jihad terrorist operative. She and the other members of the extended family, including Wail and Salah (who gave statements to the Goldstone Commission), never mentioned or hinted that other family members in the house at the time were Palestinian Islamic Jihad operatives, among them Muhammad Ibrahim Hilmi al-Samouni and Walid Rahad Hilmi al-Samouni. A Palestinian Islamic Jihad flyer noted that Muhammad and Walid al-Samouni were active in fighting against the IDF in the Zeitun neighborhood.

The al-Samouni family members firmly adhere to the version that there was no Palestinian military activity near the house and that the nearest military activity was at least a mile away, and that, they claimed, was limited to firing rockets into Israeli territory, not close fighting.

However, the official Palestinian Islamic Jihad version is completely different. In a statement issued on January 5, Palestinian Islamic Jihad said that on the evening of January 4 its fighters had fired an RGP from the Zeitun neighborhood at an Israeli tank and had opened fire at IDF soldiers. At 1:20 a.m. on January 5, a Palestinian Islamic Jihad engineering unit detonated a 50-kg. bomb near an Israeli tank not far from the Al-Tawhid mosque near the house of Wail al-Samouni. At 6:30 a.m., the engineering unit detonated a bomb near an IDF infantry unit operating near the Al-Tawhid mosque in the Zeitun neighborhood.23 According to another official Palestinian Islamic Jihad statement, one of its operatives was killed in fighting nearby. His name was Muhammad Ibrahim al-Samouni.

The significance of the foregoing is that the four men who left the al-Samouni house in the early hours of the morning, among them Muhammad Ibrahim al-Samouni, did not necessarily do so for the innocent reasons given by their family. They might have gone out for a reason connected to the military activities taking place in the same area between Palestinian Islamic Jihad terrorist operatives and IDF forces. Palestinian Islamic Jihad reported that operatives of its military-terrorist wing, the Al-Quds Battalions, "surprised the occupation forces and attacked them from behind their lines, and there was a fierce battle in the southern part of the Zeitun neighborhood." Another report, given "exclusively to the Muslim Brotherhood website," detailed Palestinian Islamic Jihad activities in the Zeitun neighborhood on January 5: "According to eye-witnesses, the fighters of the resistance waited and barricaded themselves in secure locations, remaining in places inhabited by civilians, from which they left to carry out planned attacks against the forces of the Zionist occupier."

A Palestinian Islamic Jihad poster commemorating Muhammad Ibrahim al-Samouni is captioned: "He (Muhammad), along with the mujaheed Walid Rashad al-Samouni, blew up the tank, causing the deaths of a number of Zionists, as admitted by the enemy, on the first night of the ground invasion during the war south of the Zeitun neighborhood."24