A video posted on Sunday by the Israel Defense Force (IDF) showing General Staff Lieutenant General Herzi Halevi telling soldiers in the army’s 99th Division in Gaza not to shoot people surrendering went viral, with posters mocking the fact that the video even had to be made.
Others online also pointed out that some of the soldiers in the video looked like they were laughing and not taking the message seriously.
A soldier to the left of Halevi finishes laughing right as the video begins, and a few others look like they also found something funny as Halevi begins speaking.
“This situation is a very difficult and painful one, and no one will come and say otherwise,” Halevi says, according to subtitles on the video posted by the IDF. “But beyond that, and we all understand this, I don’t need to come and tell you this. I tell you that this situation could easily not have happened.”
Halevi went on to say that IDF soldiers had to use their heads in combat and that while he wasn’t blaming soldiers who shot three escaping Israeli hostages on Friday, what he wanted the soldiers to do was to make sure they got it right going forward.
Israel claimed on Saturday that they’d mistakenly killed three Israeli hostages who’d escaped from Hamas in the Shijaiyah neighborhood of Gaza City, east of the city center, which has seen heavy fighting in recent days, reported the Associated Press. The hostages were shirtless, unarmed, and waving a white flag to show they were surrendering, according to the Israeli military. But one soldier thought the men were a threat, despite them shouting out for help in Hebrew, and opened fire, killing two of the hostages. A third ran back into a building wounded. When he came back out later, he was shot and killed, reported the New York Times.
“I’m sure they are the best, because everyone wants to do well, and I’m sure they were confident they were doing the right thing,” Halevi said.
“You see two people, they are with hands up and without shirts, take two seconds, and I want to tell you something just as important, and if it’s two Gazans with a white flag coming out to surrender why would we shoot at them? Absolutely not. Absolutely not. That’s not the IDF,” Halevi went on, before telling the soldiers to spread the message around among the other troops.
On X, posters were taken aback at how nonchalant some of the soldiers were about the talk.
“Can’t even get through the 2 minute ‘Don’t shoot civilians in the head’ pep talk without a couple of cheeky grins,” wrote @jewdas, a left-wing British Jewish organization next to a screenshot of the moment at the beginning of the video when a few soldiers all look like they’ve been laughing heartily.
“Really weird to see soldiers here laughing and grinning away while discussions over civilian murder is conducted,” added @MouseSized.
Others claimed that the IDF feeling it was necessary to post a video like this was evidence it was losing the PR battle in the war.
“When you have to film and publicize a speech by the commander-in-chief of the IDF where he reminds troops that they shouldn’t kill people who are very obviously surrendering, you’ve already lost the battle,” posted @Seamus_Malek.
The fact that the video was filmed in front of a wall bearing graffiti of the word “shalom,” which means “peace” in Hebrew, also had some people questioning how genuine the video was.
“you know this isnt war propaganda because they made sure to have ‘shalom’ written on the wall in the background and framed to be almost constantly in view,” wrote @saoirsefashion.
Others questioned why the warning from the army was only coming now, after Israelis were killed by the decision of the soldiers to shoot unarmed civilians, which is formally against the Israeli army’s rules of engagement.
“so it took 3 Ιsraelis for you to say this and not the 20,000 Ρalestinians ?” asked @SaeedDiCaprio.
While the IDF has said the shooting of the hostages violated the army’s rule of engagement policy, the Israeli army has also claimed that Hamas has been using recordings of children crying out in Hebrew to trick IDF soldiers into rushing into ambushes.
