The soldier, who said his unit held two Palestinian prisoners for the explicit purpose of using them as human shields to probe dangerous places, said the practice was prevalent among Israeli units in Gaza.
The soldier said that he and his comrades refused to carry on with the practice after two days and confronted their senior commander about it. Their commander, who first told them not to “think about international law,” saying that their own lives were “more important,” ultimately relented, releasing the two Palestinians, the soldier said.
The fact that they were released, he said, made it clear to him that they had no affiliation with Hamas, “that they are not terrorists.”