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<a class="gmail-domain gmail-reader-domain" href="https://www.palestinechronicle.com/israel-lies-again-about-hind-rajab-killing-in-a-public-relations-whitewash-maneuver/">palestinechronicle.com</a>
<div class="gmail-domain-border"></div><h1 class="gmail-reader-title">Israel Lies again about Hind Rajab Killing in a Public Relations Whitewash Maneuver</h1>August 20, 2026</div>
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<img src="https://www.palestinechronicle.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/10/Rajab_Soldiers_PC.png" alt="" title="Rajab_Soldiers_PC" class="gmail-moz-reader-block-img" width="433" height="291" style="margin-right: 25px;">
According to a new investigation,
Sean Glass ordered the shelling of Hind Rajab's car and Itai Shukerkov
pulled the trigger. (Design: Palestine Chronicle)
<p><strong>By <a href="https://www.palestinechronicle.com/writers/robert-inlakesh" title="Display all articles for Robert Inlakesh">Robert Inlakesh</a></strong></p>
<blockquote>
<h3><span>Historically speaking, Israel has never once charged a single
Israeli soldier for killing a Palestinian in Gaza throughout any of its
large-scale assaults on the territory that began to ramp up in 2008. </span></h3>
</blockquote>
<p><span>The Israeli military made headlines again this Wednesday, after
they admitted for the first time to having fired upon the vehicle in
which 5-year-old Hind Rajab was ruthlessly murdered in January of 2024.
However, this \u201cadmission\u201d is being presented dishonestly and is a clear
Public Relations maneuver manufactured by Israel to whitewash their
actions.</span></p>
<p><span>Hind Rajab\u2019s murder at the hands of the Israeli army is one of
the most high-profile war crimes committed throughout the Gaza Genocide,
so much so that it was turned into an award-winning docudrama film,
\u2018The Voice of Hind Rajab\u2019. The audio recordings of the young girl,
released by the Palestinian Red Crescent Society (PRCS), who were
desperately attempting to put international pressure on Israel to permit
their workers to rescue her, went viral and captured the emotions of
millions around the world.</span></p>
<p><span>Israel understands this well and has therefore chosen to
strategically place the event under a criminal investigation, in order
to portray a sense of accountability. </span></p>
<p><span>It was one of five incidents that the \u2018IDF General Staff\u2019s Fact
Finding and Assessment Mechanism\u2019 claims to have investigated, three of
which it chose not to pursue further and absolved its forces of any
wrongdoing in:</span></p>
<p><span>-The killing of the seven World Central Kitchen (WCK)
humanitarian aid workers in April of 2024 while they were operating in
Deir al-Balah. The victims were Australian, British, Palestinian,
Polish, and dual American-Canadian citizens, who were targeted in three
clearly marked vehicles. Some of the survivors attempted to flee in
other vehicles and were subjected to double-tap strikes.</span></p>
<p><span>-The February 2024 tank strike on a Doctors Without Borders
(MSF) shelter that was located in Khan Younis, killing two of its
employees and injuring others. Despite the location being known to be an
MSF site, the Israelis simply claimed ignorance; they never presented
any evidence that they struck a military target.</span></p>
<p><span>-The November 2023 strike on a clearly marked MSF convoy in
Gaza City that killed two other employees. It was a convoy that was
attempting to evacuate 137 civilians and had coordinated with the
Israeli military, even halting at a crowded checkpoint for hours in
order to receive the go-ahead from Israel. </span></p>
<p><span>Another incident that Israel claims it is opening a criminal
probe into is the massacre of 15 Palestinian paramedics and first
responders in Tel al-Sultan, Rafah. On March 23, 2025, when contact was
initially lost with the emergency workers, Gaza\u2019s media office believed
the group had been kidnapped and appealed to the international
community. Israel refused to acknowledge the incident had even occurred
at the time. </span></p>
<p><span>Then by the end of the month, after the Israeli military had
withdrawn from the area, an unmarked grave was discovered, where the
bodies of the 15 paramedics, emergency workers and ambulance drivers
were found. Reports indicated that the group was executed at close
range, one by one, before the Israelis had buried them and their
ambulances in order to discard the evidence.</span></p>
<p><span>Israel\u2019s initial defense in late March was that a series of
unmarked vehicles had headed towards them with their lights off and in
the absence of emergency signals, prompting their forces to defensively
open fire. This account was later contradicted by video evidence that
emerged in April showing the opposite, prompting the IDF to change its
narrative and claim it had mistaken the emergency lights for a threat.</span></p>
<p><span>By late April of 2025, the Israeli military concluded, as a
result of an internal probe, that the incident could be attributed to
\u201cprofessional failures\u201d and \u201coperational misunderstandings\u201d. Later, the
Israelis would again shift their narrative by claiming, without any
evidence, that six of those killed had ties to the Palestinian Islamic
Jihad (PIJ) armed group. </span></p>
<p><span>Now it is going with a separate narrative, based on its latest
so-called investigation, that the \u201cfiring conducted during the incident
raises a reasonable suspicion of criminal misconduct.\u201d Its forces were
shown by independent investigations, including one conducted by Forensic
Architecture, to have fired at least 900 bullets and carried out
close-range executions. </span></p>
<h4><b>Silencing the Voice of Hind Rajab</b></h4>
<p><span>Media outlets from across the spectrum have reported that
Israel is now launching an internal criminal investigation into the
killing of Hind Rajab and admits to firing upon the vehicle in which she
was killed, along with six of her family members. However, Israel\u2019s
internal investigation just drew another conclusion that seeks to
whitewash the entire event, protecting its soldiers rather than taking
accountability for its actions.</span></p>
<p><span>\u201cThe findings of the examination indicate that IDF troops fired
at a vehicle that was approaching them,\u201d is what the Israeli military
now claims as a result of its latest investigation. \u201cFollowing review of
the findings and due to apparent failures in the coordination of the
movement of the Palestine Red Crescent ambulance, it has been decided to
initiate a criminal investigation of the incident by the Military
Police Criminal Investigation Division.\u201d</span></p>
<p><span>Keep in mind that this is precisely the same excuse given to
run cover for the executions carried out against 15 first responders and
paramedics in the Rafah massacre; they are now stating they will be
subject to a criminal investigation. It is an excuse that assumes that
Israeli forces simply acted in self-defense and fired towards what they
interpreted as a threat. </span></p>
<p><span>Also, two vehicles were struck in the incident, not one. Two
PRCS paramedics were slain following a double-tap strike on their
ambulance.</span></p>
<p><span>Numerous independent forensic and satellite investigations were
conducted into the specifics of the incident, including one by the
Washington Post and another by Forensic Architecture [in collaboration
with EarShot and Fault Lines], which demonstrated Israeli forces fired
335 bullets into the Kia Picanto in which Hind Rajab and six of her
family members were killed.</span></p>
<p><span>Evidence also shows that it was impossible for the vehicle to
have traveled south as the Israeli military claimed it should have,
following their instructions to locals that day, as the streets heading
south from their location had all been blocked. The investigations also
concluded that the car was fired upon from a short enough range for
Israeli soldiers to see the innocent civilians sheltering inside it. </span></p>
<p><span>Israel\u2019s shots also penetrated the vehicle from its right side.
Even if the Israelis continue to claim the car was heading towards them
\u2013 presumably somehow being driven by a terrified 5-year-old girl \u2013 the
vehicle was clearly not shot from the front, meaning that it was
conclusively not a threat. </span></p>
<p><span>That said, the Red Crescent workers based in occupied Ramallah
spent around three hours on the phone with little Hind, desperately
attempting to get Israeli permission to rescue her. By this point, it
had become an international incident.</span></p>
<p><span>For 12-days, beginning on January 29 of 2024, Hind Rajab\u2019s
status was officially considered to be \u201cmissing\u201d and presumed dead,
until February 10, when her little body was recovered from the Tal
al-Hawa neighborhood, riddled with bullets. </span></p>
<p><span>When Israel was finally forced to address the issue, it claimed
that its forces were not even stationed in the area and that there were
no operations taking place at the time. It even launched an internal
probe, which produced the same excuse with different wording. </span></p>
<p><span>This narrative more or less held for around two and a half
years, as Israeli officials and the military periodically made small
alterations to their claims, despite the evidence that emerged to debunk
them. Israel even attempted to blame Palestinian fighters for the
killings, another tactic they have used countless times to explain away
their war crimes.</span></p>
<p><span>Historically speaking, Israel has never once charged a single
Israeli soldier for killing a Palestinian in Gaza throughout any of its
large-scale assaults on the territory that began to ramp up in 2008. </span></p>
<p><span>The harshest sentence ever dealt to an Israeli soldier for
their conduct inside Gaza was to a member of the Givati Brigade in 2009,
during what Tel Aviv called \u201cOperation Cast Lead\u201d, landing the
combatant a total of 7.5 months in prison. This was not for killing,
raping or torturing Palestinians; it was for stealing a credit card.</span></p>
<p><em>(The Palestine Chronicle)</em></p>
<div>
<p><br></p>
<p><span><em>\u2013 Robert Inlakesh is a journalist, writer, and documentary
filmmaker. He focuses on the Middle East, specializing in Palestine. He
contributed this article to The Palestine Chronicle. </em></span></p></div>
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