Israeli Brigadier General Yair Golan, Commander of the former West Bank Division, has been rebuked after a Military Police investigation has verified various reports that his troops had made use of the “human shield procedure” in the West Bank. Golan’s promotion to the rank of major general has also been put on hold. The IDF regularly blames their high civilian death tolls on the notion that their “terrorist” targets use human shields, though the procedure is regularly employed by Israel itself.

An Associated Press video shows Israeli soldiers leading a Palestinian civilian at gunpoint into a suspected terrorist’s house. The investigation is focused specifically on operation “Hot Winter,” which took place in Nablus in April of 2007. Despite the Israeli High Court officially outlawing the procedure, it is thought that even higher officers have also authorized the use of human shields.

Though the investigation stated that Golan had allowed failures to occur under his watch, the IDF Military Advocate General decided that there was no basis for submitting a charge against Golan. In short, the commander was reprimanded for allowing IDF procedures to be witnessed by the media, but he will not be charged for violating the human rights of Palestinians, which is standard practice in the IDF.

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