Greg Bouwer
IINZ
The publication of the Henry Jackson Society’s report Hamas’s Human Shield Strategy in Gaza should serve as a watershed moment for how we talk about the ongoing conflict between Israel and Hamas. Too often, the debate is framed in binaries: occupier versus occupied, oppressor versus victim. Yet what the report makes abundantly clear is that the moral calculus in Gaza is far more complex – and in many ways, far more tragic.
At the heart of the report lies one damning conclusion: Hamas systematically, deliberately, and strategically uses civilians as shields for its military operations. This is not collateral damage. It is not the fog of war. It is policy. It is doctrine. And it is designed to produce precisely the images that dominate international headlines – dead children, bombed-out schools, grieving families. These are the images Hamas manufactures not in spite of its military goals, but as an extension of them.
Civilians as Military Assets
The report details how Hamas integrates its military operations into the very fabric of civilian life. It locates rocket launchers adjacent to schools. It uses residential apartments to store arms. It places command centres in or beneath hospitals – most infamously beneath Gaza’s Al-Shifa Hospital, where Israeli intelligence and independent sources have long documented Hamas’s subterranean infrastructure. Tunnel networks, often constructed with diverted humanitarian aid, snake beneath kindergartens, clinics, and UN facilities, turning the civilian map of Gaza into a living chessboard of forced martyrdom.
This is not merely a tactic of desperation; it is a tactic of coercion. Hamas knows that Israel, bound by the laws of armed conflict and constrained by democratic accountability, will do everything possible to avoid civilian casualties. In contrast, Hamas positions itself above, behind, and beneath civilians, gambling that each innocent death will pay a propaganda dividend in the court of global opinion.
In short, every civilian in Gaza is forced into a double role: not only a victim of war but a pawn in Hamas’s propaganda machine.
A Violation of International Law
The use of human shields is not just morally appalling – it is explicitly illegal. Under Article 28 of the Fourth Geneva Convention, it is prohibited to use the presence of civilians to render military targets immune from attack. The Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court (Article 8(2)(b)(xxiii)) designates it as a war crime. This is not a grey area. There is no debate. The law is clear – and yet international institutions and human rights organisations have been conspicuously silent.
This silence is not merely a failure of moral courage: it is complicity by omission. When respected voices in the international community obsessively scrutinize Israel’s every military move while ignoring the structural exploitation of civilians by Hamas, they do more than distort the truth – they erode the very norms they claim to defend.
Israel’s Impossible Burden
The moral asymmetry in this conflict is staggering. Israel operates under more constraints than perhaps any other military in the world. It warns civilians with phone calls, leaflets, and even roof-knocking procedures before targeting military objectives. It aborts strikes when civilians unexpectedly appear. It places legal advisers inside military units. And still, when civilian casualties occur – as they tragically and inevitably do – Israel is roundly condemned, while the perpetrator of those casualties, Hamas, is given a pass.
Imagine a scenario where a fire department is condemned for using water to extinguish a blaze, while the arsonist who set the fire is ignored. This is the logic that governs much of the discourse around Gaza.
Moral Clarity and the Role of New Zealand
As a liberal democracy committed to the rule of law and the protection of civilians, New Zealand cannot afford to remain neutral in the face of these realities. Neutrality in the presence of such evil is not impartiality – it is abdication. It is moral paralysis masquerading as diplomacy.
We have a duty to speak clearly. Hamas’ actions constitute war crimes. They violate every principle of international law, and worse – they violate the moral obligation that every government owes to its own people. A government that uses its civilians as shields does not protect them: it weaponises them. It does not serve its people – it sacrifices them.
To acknowledge this is not to deny Palestinian suffering. On the contrary, it is to take that suffering seriously – by recognising its true cause. Every time the international community fails to hold Hamas accountable, it condemns Palestinians to perpetual victimhood under a regime that exploits their misery for political gain.
New Zealand’s voice matters. As a nation that prides itself on moral leadership, on championing peace and justice in international forums, we must be willing to call things by their rightful names. Hamas’ use of human shields is a war crime. It must be condemned – without qualification, without euphemism, and without delay.
The Bigger Picture: Toward Justice and Accountability
There can be no lasting peace until there is clarity about who stands for life and who glorifies death. There can be no justice until those who exploit civilians for military gain are held accountable. And there can be no future for the people of Gaza until they are liberated not from Israel – but from Hamas.
The Henry Jackson Society’s report is a powerful step toward restoring that clarity. It offers the world a chance to confront the hard truths of this conflict – and to choose the side not of nations or ideologies, but of moral truth and human dignity.
New Zealand should seize that opportunity.
This article was originally published by the Israel Institute of New Zealand.
