LONDON: An Israeli army reservist has claimed that civilians in Gaza were frequently shot without warning or threat during his service, describing what he called shifting and often arbitrary rules of engagement that, at times, led to the killing of unarmed people.
In a rare on-camera interview with Sky News, the soldier, who served three tours of duty in Gaza with the Israeli military, said troops were often instructed to shoot anyone entering areas considered to be off limits, regardless of whether they posed a threat or not.
“We have a territory that we are in, and the commands are: everyone that comes inside needs to die,” he told Sky News. “If they’re inside, they’re dangerous, you need to kill them. No matter who it is.”
Speaking anonymously for fear of reprisal, the reservist from the Israeli military’s 252nd Division said he was twice stationed at the Netzarim corridor, a narrow military-controlled strip carved through central Gaza early in the war to divide the territory and tighten Israeli control.
He described how his unit marked invisible boundaries near civilian areas, sometimes while occupying homes belonging to displaced Palestinians. Local residents, he said, were expected to understand these lines without explanation or risk being shot.
“There’s an imaginary line that they tell us all the Gazan people know. But how can they know?” he said. “It might be like a teenager riding his bicycle.”
The soldier said the decision to open fire on civilians frequently depended on the “mood of the commander,” with criteria for engagement varying from day to day, adding: “They might be shot, they might be captured, it really depends on the day.”
He recalled one incident in which a man was shot for crossing the boundary, followed by another who was detained for approaching the body, only for the rules to change again hours later, with orders to shoot anyone crossing the line.
The soldier alleged that commanders were able to set their own rules of engagement, sometimes with deadly consequences.
“Every commander can choose for himself what he does. So it’s kind of like the Wild West,” he said. “Some commanders can really decide to do war crimes and bad things and don’t face the consequences of that.”
He also described a pervasive culture among troops that viewed all Gazans as legitimate targets in the aftermath of the Hamas-led attack on Israel on Oct. 7, which killed about 1,200 people in Israel and led to more than 250 taken hostage.
“They’d say: ‘Yeah, but these people didn’t do anything to prevent October 7, and they probably had fun when this was happening to us. So they deserve to die’,” he said.
“People don’t feel mercy for them. I think the core of it, that in their mind, these people aren’t innocent,” he added.
In Israel, where military service is a social rite of passage and the military is widely seen as a unifying national institution, public criticism of the armed forces is rare. The soldier told Sky News he feared being branded a traitor but felt compelled to speak out.
“I kind of feel like I took part in something bad, and I need to counter it with something good that I do, by speaking out,” he said. “I am very troubled about what I took and still am taking part of, as a soldier and citizen in this country.”
He added: “I think a lot of people, if they knew exactly what’s happening, it wouldn’t go down very well for them, and they wouldn’t agree with it.”
When asked about the allegations, the Israeli military told Sky News that it “operates in strict accordance with its rules of engagement and international law, taking feasible precautions to mitigate civilian harm.”
According to the statement: “The IDF operates against military targets and objectives, and does not target civilians or civilian objects.”
The military said complaints or reports of alleged violations are “transferred to the relevant authorities responsible for examining exceptional incidents that occurred during the war.”
It also highlighted steps it says it takes to minimise civilian casualties, including issuing evacuation notices and regular updates about combat zones.
