Families of hostages mistakenly slain by IDF decry promotion of involved commander

Two years after three escaped hostages were mistakenly killed by Israeli troops in the Gaza Strip, families of two of those killed in the incident decried on Sunday the planned promotion of the battalion commander involved in the deadly incident.

Yotam Haim, Alon Shamriz, and Samar Talalka were killed on December 15, 2023, during “intense fighting” in Gaza City’s Shejaiya neighborhood, five days after Israel Defense Forces troops had killed their captors, without knowing that the terror operatives had been holding hostages at the time.

The officer, Lt. Col. “Daled,” who commanded the Bislamach Brigade’s 17th Battalion at the time, was included on a list of appointments made by Ground Forces chief Maj. Gen. Nadav Lotan on Friday.

Iris Haim, the mother of Yotam Haim, demanded Sunday that IDF Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Eyal Zamir block the planned promotion, telling Ynet: “We are simply shaken… how can one give a promotion to such a person?”

“This commander heard shouting, and he was told that fluent Hebrew was being heard. He ordered [troops] to cease fire, but did not make sure that each and every soldier heard the order,” she said.

“This commander did not approach me on his own initiative even once. We forced him to come and speak with us. And even then, he did not tell us the truth.”

According to the IDF’s probe of the incident, a soldier with the 17th Battalion opened fire at three figures he had wrongly identified as a threat, killing two, while the third fled to a nearby building.

Commanders at the scene called on the soldiers to cease their fire in order for the third figure to be identified. Some 15 minutes later, the battalion commander heard someone shouting from the building, “Help,” and “They are shooting at me” in Hebrew, and again ordered troops to halt their fire, while shouting back at the figure: “Come my way.”

The third man — later confirmed to be Yotam Haim — came out of the building toward the troops, but two soldiers who, according to the probe, had not heard the battalion commander’s order due to noise from a nearby tank, shot and killed the hostage.

Slain hostage’s brother: Officer ‘failed 3 times in 15 minutes’

Yonatan Shamriz, the brother of Alon Shamriz, also denounced the planned promotion, writing that “A day after we went to the grave of Alon, my brother the hero, the IDF announced that it will promote the battalion commander who ‘oversaw’ that event – such is our story, of what we’ve become.”

“On the one side Alon, my brother the hero, who was kidnapped from his house in his underwear. A hero without fear, who over 65 days went through hell,” Yonatan wrote, adding that “over five days he oversaw one of the boldest operations the world has seen,” an apparent reference to the Gaza escape effort.

Shamriz said his brother showed “bravery, determination, mutual responsibility, dedication to the mission — values that we were raised on and on which we will raise our children.”

“And on the other side,” he wrote, “a battalion commander who failed three times in fifteen minutes. The mid-tier officer who didn’t inform his soldiers that there could be hostages in the area, and who didn’t tell them what every soldier knows, ‘you don’t shoot naked people holding white flags!’”

“The soldier who didn’t take responsibility, who didn’t take down his ranks, who wasn’t reprimanded, who wasn’t judged, who didn’t come to us to say ‘sorry,’ will receive a promotion,” Shamriz wrote.

“If only these senior officers had protected my brother, Yotam, and Samar, the way they protect themselves. Promoting an awful officer like this is spitting in the face of the family, and spitting on Alon’s grave. I promise that everyone responsible for this failure will pay the price. This will be their last job. It’s incumbent on us,” he wrote.

IDF: Officer is ‘principled, professional, honest’

The IDF, responding to criticism, said that Lt. Col. “Daled,” over the past two years, “has led hundreds of soldiers under his command, serving as commander of two different battalions, under fire and while risking his life.”

“He is a principled, professional, and honest commander who works tirelessly and dedicates his life to the security of the State of Israel,” the army said.

The IDF added that “the investigation in question concluded about two years ago, and its findings were presented to the families and to the public with transparency.”