A senior IDF official has allegedly warned that some soldiers in Gaza are “shoot[ing] first and asking questions later” after criticism of a strike on an aid convoy in Gaza.
As international anger over the killing of seven aid workers in an Israeli drone strike on Monday has grown, the senior official made the comments to The Times of Israel.
Speaking on the condition of anonymity, the Israeli official said that the deaths of the World Central Kitchen aid workers and the December killing of three Israeli hostages by IDF forces were both violations of the army’s strict rules of engagement in a difficult warzone.
“Soldiers are operating under immense pressure in very difficult conditions in which Hamas embeds itself within the civilian population, but the rules of engagement are designed to help deal with such conditions, and they’re too often being ignored,” said the senior Israeli official.