Israel’s military said on Friday that its soldiers had made errors and violated its operating procedures in their strike on a humanitarian convoy this week that killed seven aid workers.
Officials said the attack on workers from World Central Kitchen, one of the main providers of food to Gaza’s besieged population, came after Israeli forces mistakenly identified one of the WCK staff who was carrying a bag as a gunman.
Israel’s military said it had dismissed two officers over the strike, and also formally reprimanded two others, including the commander of the Southern Command for his overall responsibility for the incident.
The killings of the workers — including three Britons, an Australian, a Pole, a Palestinian and a dual US-Canadian citizen — have triggered a wave of international condemnation.
They have also renewed scrutiny of the conduct of Israeli forces in the Palestinian enclave, where aid groups have warned that a famine is setting in.
WCK said the Israeli disciplinary actions were “important steps forward”, but added that the Israeli military “cannot credibly investigate its own failure in Gaza” and demanded an independent investigation.
“The IDF has deployed deadly force without regard to its own protocols, chain of command and rules of engagement,” WCK said in a statement. “Without systemic change, there will be more military failures, more apologies and more grieving families.”
Daniel Hagari, a spokesperson for Israel’s military, said the strike was a “tragedy”. “It’s a serious event that we are responsible for and it shouldn’t have happened, and we will make sure that it won’t happen again,” he told a briefing with journalists.
Yoav Har-Even, a retired military officer who led the Israeli investigation, confirmed that WCK had provided the Israeli military with advance information about its convoy, and that the vehicles’ roofs were emblazoned with WCK’s logo.
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