Israel’s military announced on Wednesday that it will conduct internal investigations into the deaths of Palestinian civilian Hind Rajab in January 2024 and 15 emergency and aid workers in March 2025 in Gaza. However, human rights organizations stated that such inquiries seldom result in convictions.
The military stated that the decisions to investigate followed examinations by its Fact-Finding and Assessment Mechanism, with outcomes revealed for five incidents involving Palestinian fatalities. These included a review of the deaths of seven aid workers affiliated with the World Central Kitchen charity in April 2024. The military concluded that there was no basis for criminal investigation due to the absence of reasonable suspicion of misconduct.
Highlighting the intense combat operations conducted by the Israel Defence Forces (IDF) across various fronts over more than a thousand days, the Israeli military emphasized its commitment to reviewing exceptional incidents in compliance with international and domestic laws.
The killings of Hind Rajab in February 2024 and the 15 Palestinian medics in May 2025 garnered global attention. Nevertheless, Israeli rights groups expressed skepticism regarding the effectiveness of criminal misconduct investigations involving Israeli troops in cases of Palestinian fatalities.
Yesh Din, an Israeli rights organization, noted the rarity of indictments against soldiers or commanders for reported offenses. The organization’s spokesperson criticized the leniency of sentences imposed on convicted individuals compared to the gravity of the crimes committed.
Following the announcement of the investigations, Hind Rajab’s grandmother, also named Hind Rajab, expressed disbelief, stating the family’s lack of trust in Israel’s ability to conduct a fair inquiry. She called for international intervention to investigate the circumstances surrounding her granddaughter’s death and that of other children in Gaza, emphasizing the need for accountability and protection of children’s rights.
UNICEF reported last October that more than 64,000 Palestinian children had been killed or injured since the onset of the Gaza conflict in October 2023. In June, a United Nations Human Rights Council report accused Israeli security forces of intentionally targeting and killing Palestinian children in Gaza, a claim rejected by Israel as propagandistic.
During the Israeli offensive following the October 7, 2023, Hamas-led attack, Hind Rajab was trapped in a car for hours, pleading for help via mobile phone while her relatives lay dead nearby. Despite efforts by Palestinian medics, contact was lost, and the bodies were recovered twelve days later, along with those of two ambulance workers. A film depicting Hind Rajab’s tragic ordeal received international acclaim, winning the Silver Lion Award at the Venice Film Festival and earning an Academy Award nomination.
In March 2025, the bodies of 15 emergency and aid workers from various organizations were found in a grave in southern Gaza. UN officials condemned the killings, attributing them to Israeli forces and demanding accountability. The Red Crescent media director emphasized the importance of protecting medical personnel and upholding international laws safeguarding humanitarian workers.
Israel maintained its stance that it does not intentionally target civilians in the Gaza conflict, citing Hamas’s practice of using civilians as shields. The military facilitated the recovery of the bodies from what it termed an active combat zone but did not provide specific details regarding the circumstances of the workers’ deaths or the condition of the vehicles found at the site.