Hamas slams Israel’s decision to close file of slain family in Gaza

The Hamas Movement condemned Israel’s decision to close its investigation of those responsible for massacring Al-Samouni family during its aggression against the Gaza Strip in 2009.

Its spokesman Fawzi Barhoum slammed the decision as a green light for Israeli soldiers to commit more atrocities against the Palestinians with impunity.

Spokesman Barhoum said the failure of the international community and the UN to take deterrent measures against Israel and its leaders encourages it to cover up its crimes and escape justice.

“Such decision will not deter us from continuing to expose the occupation’s crimes and cornering it internationally, legally and officially until those responsible for committing crimes against our people are brought to trial,” the spokesman stressed.

He also urged the international human rights organizations to start immediately legal moves against Israel.

For its part, the Palestinian center for human rights on Wednesday denounced the Israeli military’s decision to close the case of the Samouni family without initiating prosecutions.

The center stated that the case of Samouni family encompasses many documented Israeli war crimes such as the premeditated killing of 27 civilians and the armed targeting of civilians and populated areas which led to the injury of 35 civilians without allowing them to receive medical treatment.

The center affirmed that on behalf of 62 Palestinian victims, it submitted a legal and civil complaint concerning the Samouni case to the Israeli occupation authority and provided it with important evidence in this regard, yet it did not receive any response from the Israeli side.

It also said that Israel’s decision in this regard confirmed unequivocally that its investigation system is defective and not up to the international standards, and this is what the UN probe committee had also verified before.

“In view of the flaws inherent in this system, which has failed after three and a half years to level one charge for war crimes, the center believes that the Israeli legal system is used as a smokescreen to create illusions about the seriousness of investigations, although in fact it provides systematically a cover for large-scale violations against the international law,” the human rights center emphasized.

The 2009 shelling of a house in Gaza killed more than 20 members of Samouni family, but Israel claimed Tuesday that what had happened was not a war crime and that the civilians had not been targeted purposefully.