UNDERSTANDING
THE GOLDSTONE REPORT

Hamas websites directly contradict the testimony of a man who is a known Hamas operative.  The bombing near the school hit a high number of identifiable combatants, some determined suicide terrorists.

Statement of Mohammed Fuoad Abu Askar

Mohammed Fuoad Abu Askar represented himself to the commission as the director-general of Hamas' ministry of Muslim religious endowments.11 He said he had been detained in Israel in 1992 for belonging to Hamas. He told the commission that his house was "unjustly" blown up by the IDF. He said he had received a telephone call warning him to evacuate the house from someone who identified himself as an IDF representative and that twenty minutes later his house was struck from the air.

Askar said a short time later the area around the Al-Fakhura school was also bombed. The school served as a shelter for many Palestinians from Beit Lahiya, Al-Salatin and Al-Atatra, who regarded it as a safe haven because it was located in the middle of the refugee camp and it was flying the UNRWA flag. He said he saw three bombs hit the school region and he heard more. Two hit the house of the Diyab family, killing 11 people. Dozens of people were killed near the school and most of the casualties were children. There were no armed men in the area, as opposed to Israeli claims. Two of his children, Khaled and Imad, were killed, as was his bother Raafat, all of them, according to Askar, innocent civilians.

The commission members asked: Was the telephone warning you received a recorded announcement and what did you do following it? Did you receive the call via a land line or cell phone? Where did you go when you left the house? How much time passed between the attack on the Al-Fakhura school and the attack on the Diyab family house? Did you or any of your family visit the Diyabs' house after the attack on yours?

Although Mohammed Fuoad Abu Askar admitted being a Hamas operative and having been detained by Israel, the commission did not think to ask whether he was connected with the Izz al-Din al-Qassam Brigades. They did not ask him whether those killed near the school belonged to any organization or were military-terrorist operatives.

An examination of freely accessible Palestinian sources shows that contrary to his claims, he and his sons were directly and closely linked to the Izz al-Din al-Qassam Brigades, a connection which included providing terrorist operatives with weapons and ammunition, and that there were a number of Palestinian terrorist operatives in the Al-Fakhura school area, as follows:

• Mohammed Fuoad Abu Askar himself plays a key role in the Izz al-Din al-Qassam Brigades.12 Some of his sons also belonged to the Brigades, among them Khaled (killed in the attack), Ahmed (killed on July 7, 2006, when he tried to launch an anti-tank missile against an IDF force),13 and Osama (critically wounded fighting the IDF on October 13, 2004).14

• Khaled Mohammed Fuoad Abu Askar (Abu al-‘Izz), Mohammed's son, an Izz al-Din al-Qassam Brigades operative, was born on December 12, 1989, in Jabaliya. At the age of 15 he joined the Muslim Brotherhood and was active in the Hamas student organization, which serves as a recruiting agency for the Izz al-Din al-Qassam Brigades. In 2006 he was accepted into fighting groups posted in front-line positions. He underwent an advanced military training course and was posted to a special unit of the north Gaza battalion where he participated in dozens of ambushes and fought against IDF forces. He served as a military instructor in the Imad Aqel battalion and supervised the ambush and suicide unit.

He was supposed to be the third member of a Hamas squad in a suicide bombing attack on October 26, 2007, but an operative named Ghassan al-Ela was sent in his place. Khaled was offended and demanded to be sent on a suicide bombing mission. In March 2008 he was sent to ambush IDF forces operating in the northern Gaza Strip, but because of conditions on the ground the attack was aborted. He again demanded to be put at the top of the suicide bomber list. On June 4, 2008, he and four other Izz al-Din al-Qassam Brigades operatives prepared a suicide bombing attack, but a technical error caused the bomb to explode and he was the only one who survived. He again demanded to be sent on a suicide bombing mission, although he had gotten married on December 12, 2008.

He was killed in January 2009 in the attack in the region of the Al-Fakhura school. The Izz al-Din al-Qassam Brigades website reported that during the last months of his life he worked for the military supply unit and provided operatives with weapons, missiles, and military equipment. This information is particularly important because it supports IDF intelligence that the house of Mohammed Fuoad Abu Askar, where his son Khaled lived, served as an Izz al-Din al-Qassam Brigades weapons storehouse.15

Others terrorist operatives killed in the same incident included:

• Bilal Hamzah Obeid, an Izz al-Din al-Qassam Brigades operative, who was killed along with Khaled Abu Askar in the attack near the Al-Fakhura school.16
• Raafat Abu Askar, a military-terrorist operative in the security services with the rank of warrant officer, killed in the attack near the Al-Fakhura school.
• Osama Jemal Obeid, an Izz al-Din al-Qassam Brigades operative, killed in the attack near the Al-Fakhura school.17
• Iyad Jaber Aman, an Izz al-Din al-Qassam Brigades operative, killed in the attack near the Al-Fakhura school.18
• Abd Muhammad Abd Qudas, a Fatah operative active in Palestinian Military Intelligence, killed in the attack near the Al-Fakhura school.19
• Atia Hassan al-Madhoun and his son, Ziyad al-Madhoun, operatives in the Brigades of National Resistance, the military-terrorist wing of the Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine. Atia was regional commander for Jabaliya. The two were the father and brother of Hassan al-Madhoun, one of the senior commanders of Fatah's Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, who was lynched by Hamas in the summer of 2006. The two were killed in the attack near the Al-Fakhura school.20