A/HRC/12/48
page 170
arriving at the hospital. Abir Hajji, who was two months pregnant at the time, also suffered a
miscarriage.
4.
Factual findings
752. The Mission found Mrs. Hajji to be a credible and reliable witness. It has no reason to
doubt the veracity of her testimony. The Mission also notes that according to the testimony of
four other witnesses (those it heard in the case of Ibrahim Juha below), a very similar incident
occurred in the immediate vicinity on the same day.
753. With regard to the death of Muhammad Hajji, the Mission notes that Mrs. Hajji’s
testimony does not provide sufficient information to establish exactly what happened. On the
basis of the information before it, the Mission can neither make a statement as to what type
of weapon killed him, nor as to whether he was the intended target of a direct attack. The
circumstances of his death suggest, however, that he was killed by fire from the Israeli armed
forces while at home in a room with his children.
754. As to the fatal shooting of Shahd Hajji and Ola Masood Arafat, Mrs. Hajji’s testimony as
well as that of Mr. Mu’een Juha and Mrs. Juha, the parents of Ibrahim Juha, of Mr. Sameh
Sawafeary and of Mr. Rajab Darwish Mughrabi (see the case of Ibrahim Juha below) all
establish that there were no combat operations in the area at the time of the incident. Indeed, the
Israeli armed forces would not have ordered the members of the extended Hajji, Arafat, Juha and
Sawafeary families to walk to Rafah, thereby asking hundreds of civilians to come out of their
houses and fill the streets, if there had been any fighting in the neighbourhood at the time. The
Israeli armed forces opened fire on a group of persons they had interacted with during the
preceding 12 hours and therefore knew to be civilians. In doing so they killed Ola Masood Arafat
and three-year-old Shahd Hajji and injured her mother, who was holding her in her arms.
5.
The shooting of Ibrahim Juha
755. The Mission interviewed three eyewitnesses to the shooting of Ibrahim Juha and a further
witness of the events surrounding the shooting.421 The events preceding and following the
shooting of Ibrahim Juha are described in greater detail in chapter XIII below in connection with
the destruction of the Sawafeary chicken farms.
756. The Juha family lives in a house on al-Sekka Street a few meters north of where alSamouni Street goes off Salah ad-Din Street to the west. The house was struck by several
missiles during the night of 3 to 4 January 2009, which had caused significant destruction. In the
early morning of 4 January, Israeli soldiers entered the house and fired into the room where the
Juha family, consisting of Mr. Juha, his two wives, his mother and 13 children, was assembled.
Photographs of the scene taken by Mr. Juha show that numerous rounds were discharged. The
family was made to assemble in the upper part of the house. They were then ordered to leave the
house and walk towards Rafah.
421
Mr. Mu’een Juha and Mrs. Juha, the parents of Ibrahim, Mr. Sameh Sawafeary and Mr. Mughrabi.
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