A/HRC/12/48 page 213 is termed “operational reasons”. This is the deliberate destruction of houses from which fire had been opened on Israeli soldiers or which were suspected of being booby-trapped, containing tunnels or being used for weapons storage.511 “Operational necessity” also embraced the destruction of houses which obstructed visibility for the Israeli armed forces or had a “strategic advantage” for them.512 “In case of any doubt, takedown houses. You don’t need confirmation for anything, if you want”, were the instructions of one commander to his troops.513 1001. The third phase of destruction of housing was no longer tied to the “operational necessities” of the ongoing military operations. It was in view of “the day after” the Israeli armed forces withdrew from Gaza. In the words of one Israeli soldier: … then we were told there are houses to be demolished for the sake of “the day after”. The day after is actually a thought that obviously we’re going in for a limited period of time which could be a week and it might also be a few months. But it’s not a longer span of time without defining what it is. And the rationale was that we want to come out with the area remaining sterile as far as we’re concerned. And the best way to do this is by razing. That way we have good firing capacity, good visibility for observation, we can see anything, we control a very large part of the area and very effectively. This was the meaning of demolition for the sake of the day after. In practical terms this meant taking a house that is not implicated in any way, that its single sin is the fact that it is situated on top of a hill in the Gaza Strip.514 1002. Satellite imagery provided by UNOSAT at the Mission’s request is consistent with the soldiers’ testimonies. It shows, for instance, that 65 per cent of the destruction/damage of buildings in Rafah was caused by airstrikes between 11 and 18 January. By contrast, 54 per cent of the destruction/damage in Izbat Abd Rabbo (east Gaza) occurred between 6 and 10 January as the Israeli troops advanced into the city.515 1003. The UNOSAT reports on the destruction of buildings in al-Samouni neighbourhood and al-Atatra, two areas that suffered particularly heavy destruction of civilian housing and other buildings, show that most were destroyed during the last three days of the Israeli armed forces’ presence on the ground in Gaza. In al-Samouni, out of 114 severely damaged or completely destroyed buildings, 60 were destroyed between 27 December 2008 and 10 January 2009 (i.e. the rockets and machine guns are fired against a house where IDF soldiers took up positions in the Ezvet Abd Rabbo region in the eastern sector of Jabalya” (p. 12). Soldiers’ Testimonies…, pp. 26, 35, 44, 56, 59, 61 (“Sometimes you know the house is empty. You know as far as you can know. Now if the house disrupts your defence line, you take it down with a tank or a bulldozer. We took an eight-storey house and the instruction was not to enter any doorway because it would be booby-trapped.”), and 66 (“we were to raze as much as possible of the area. Such razing is a euphemism for intentional, systematic destruction, enabling total visibility. Razing was meant to give us the advantage of full control over fire and field of view, to see exactly what was happening throughout the zone. So that no one could hide anything from us.”). 511 512 Ibid., pp. 12, 61, 100 and 101. 513 Ibid., p. 56. 514 Ibid., p. 66. See also p. 69. 515 UNOSAT satellite imagery, pp. 14 ff.