This page is subject to the extended confirmed restriction related to the Arab-Israeli conflict.On June 9, 2006, an explosion on the beach near the Gaza Strip municipality of Beit Lahia killed eight Palestinians.
[2] A subsequent investigation by the Israeli Defence Forces concluded that the explosion was not caused by the shelling of the beach and blamed it on a Palestinian land mine.
[2] The Human Rights Watch final report published in July 2007 provided a detailed analysis as to why the revised IDF conclusion involving an IED was the least likely of three scenarios.
HRW concluded "The availability of significant evidence that the IDF has not examined or taken into account casts serious doubt on its conclusions and underscores the need for an independent investigation of the incident."
[2] The head of an IDF investigative committee into the beach deaths, Major General Meir Kalifi, reported that the security establishment had received information that Ilham Ghalia said that “Daddy touched something and then there was an explosion”.
[13] At the time of the beach explosion, the February 2005 ceasefire agreement between Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas and Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon was still in effect, notwithstanding various violations by both sides.
[19] In response to Samhadana's assassination, Palestinians in the Gaza Strip fired two rockets into Israel hours after his death, hitting a building in the southern town of Sderot, but causing no casualties.
[21] On the afternoon of 9 June 2006, seven members of the Ghaliya (Ghalya) family—Ali (Isa), 49; Raisa (Ra’issa), 36; Alia, 24; Ilham, 15; Sabrin, 7; Hanadi, 2; and Haytham (Haitham), 8 months—were killed by a blast on the Sudaniya beach near Beit Lahia in northern Gaza.
A UN radio transmission describing "casualties" in the area at 4:33 pm was identified by the head of the IDF inquiry commission Major General Meir Klifi as related to "an earlier incident" near the abandoned settlement of Dugit.
Major General Meir Kalifi, head of an IDF investigative committee into the beach deaths, reported that the security establishment had received information that Ilham Ghalia said that “Daddy touched something and then there was an explosion”.
[32] A spokesperson for the Palestinian Interior Ministry described the Israeli report as "a lie and an attempt to escape moral responsibility for the massacre of a completely innocent family.
[36] Representatives of the Tel Aviv Sourasky Medical Center said that Palestinian doctors at al-Shifa Hospital in Gaza, who had treated a woman wounded during the blast, had made unnecessary cuts all over her body in an effort to remove all the surgically reachable shrapnel.
"[37] On 30 June, the Human Rights Watch presented a report, concluding that the evidence collected by HRW researchers and independent journalists on the ground in Gaza indicates that the civilians were killed within the time period of the shelling.
HRW concludes that in light of the 20-minute round trip drive between the hospital and the beach, this evidence suggests that the blast that caused the family’s death occurred during the time of the IDF shelling.
[30] According to The Times, "after seeing the details of an Israeli army investigation that closely examined the relevant ballistics and blast patterns, (Garlasco stated) that he had been wrong and that the deaths were probably caused by an unexploded munition in the sand.
[11] The report included interviews with some of the people that were on the beach that day and concluded with the following statements from Human Rights Watch's Marc Garlasco: "The likelihood that the Ghalia family was killed by an explosive other than one of the shells fired by the Israeli army is remote," and the Israel Defense Forces' Capt Dalal: "We're not trying to cover up anything.
On 19 June Israel's Channel 10 television's Shlomo Eldar reported that shrapnel from an Israeli shell was discovered in the body of one of the Palestinians wounded in the blast (twelve-year-old Adham Ghaliya).
[45] On 5 January 2009 Ha'aretz's military correspondent Amir Oren reported that Ilham Ghalia, who was treated for her injuries at Israel's Ichilov hospital, said that the explosion was caused by her father's manipulation of unexploded ordnance found on the beach.
Israeli Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni agreed and suggested that "There is a situation in which maybe … this was an explosive that was put on the beach for future attacks on Israel.