Thread by @Aizenberg55

🧵Australian military expert affirmed tragic death of 7 WCK aid workers was not deliberate, vindicating Israel. He assessed that unexpected gunmen were with convoy and looked like Hamas; but failures still led to mistaken attack. An important independent report, some detail: 1/

The primary reason for the IDF misidentification error was the unexpected presence of armed persons, one of whom fired his weapon into the air on the trailer of the WCK truck, which was deemed “consistent with Hamas hijacking the aid convoy.” 2/

The official Australian report by Air Chief Marshal Mark Binskin noted that later on several additional gunmen moved around the WCK escort vehicles. According to the Australian assessment, IDF brigade officials “classified” the gunmen “as Hamas.” 3/

A key reason for the identification of gunmen as Hamas is that the guards were not coordinated with IDF, and furthermore, the IDF would not have allowed armed guards anyhow. Report admits WCK could have inadvertently hired armed guards with links to Hamas. 4/

However there was a situational awareness breakdown and IDF controls failed, which IDF fully admits, which led to errors in decision making and misidentification of convoy as hostile. 5/

An interesting revelation: The Australian report noted that the IDF post-incident investigation system is similar to the Australian system. Fake NGOs @hrw @amnesty @btselem and others (falsely) claim that Israel’s post-incident investigations are a sham, do not really happen. 6/

The Australian report concluded that Israel’s acceptance of accountability, reporting and response has been “appropriate” and “sufficient” – again, contradicting fake NGO and some media claims that Israel never does these things properly. 7/

Report is important as it may be the first time an independent foreign military expert published a public report assessing IDF action. It's also perhaps the only time in history an army has allowed a foreign investigation like this. But Israel is always treated differently. END