A/HRC/12/48 page 123 The presence or movements of the civilian population or individual civilians shall not be used to render certain points or areas immune from military operations, in particular in attempts to shield military objectives from attacks or to shield, favour or impede military operations. The Parties to the conflict shall not direct the movement of the civilian population or individual civilians in order to attempt to shield military objectives from attacks or to shield military operations. These provisions reflect rules of customary law.344 493. The Mission finds it useful to clarify what is meant, from a legal perspective, by using civilians or a civilian population as a human shield. Parties to a conflict are not permitted to use a civilian population or individual civilians in order to render certain points or areas immune from military operations. It is not in dispute that both Palestinian armed groups and Israeli forces were fighting within an area populated by civilians. Fighting within civilian areas is not, by itself, sufficient for a finding that a party is using the civilian population living in the area of the fighting as a human shield. As the words of article 57 (1) show (“shall not be used to render”, “in order to attempt to shield”), an intention to use the civilian population in order to shield an area from military attack is required. 494. From the information available to it, the Mission found no evidence to suggest that Palestinian armed groups either directed civilians to areas where attacks were being launched or forced civilians to remain within the vicinity of the attacks. 495. The reports received by the Mission suggest that it is likely that the Palestinian armed groups did not at all times adequately distinguish themselves from the civilian population among whom the hostilities were being conducted. Their failure to distinguish themselves from the civilian population by distinctive signs is not a violation of international law in itself, but would have denied them some of the legal privileges afforded to combatants. What international law demands, however, is that those engaged in combat take all feasible precautions to protect civilians in the conduct of their hostilities. The Mission found no evidence that members of Palestinian armed groups engaged in combat in civilian dress. It can, therefore, not find a violation of the obligation not to endanger the civilian population in this respect. 496. The conduct of hostilities in built-up areas does not, of itself, constitute a violation of international law. However, launching attacks - whether of rockets and mortars at the population of southern Israel or at the Israeli armed forces inside Gaza - close to civilian or protected buildings constitutes a failure to take all feasible precautions. In cases where this occurred, the Palestinian armed groups would have unnecessarily exposed the civilian population of Gaza to the inherent dangers of the military operations taking place around them. This would have constituted a violation of the customary rules of international humanitarian law referred to above. It would also have constituted a violation of the right to life and physical integrity of the civilians thereby endangered. 497. Although the situations investigated by the Mission did not establish the use of mosques for military purposes or to shield military activities, the Mission cannot exclude that this might 344 Customary International Humanitarian Law…, rule 97.