How Hind Rajab Was Killed and Memories of Shark Island Are Erased
Our latest investigations focus on the killing of 6-year-old Hind Rajab in Gaza and how industrial development in Namibia threatens to bury a colonial era concentration camp
Mapping damage on the Kia Picanto. Image source: Dawoud Abo Alkas/Anadolu via Getty Images (Forensic Architecture, 2024)
The Killing of Hind Rajab — Gaza City, Gaza
On 29 January 2024, a six-year-old Palestinian child in Gaza City, Hind Rajab, pleaded over the phone for emergency workers to rescue her from a car riddled with bullets. Her body was found two weeks later, on 10 February, alongside the bodies of six of her family members in the car they had packed into to flee their neighbourhood as Israeli forces invaded. The bodies of two Palestine Red Crescent Society (PRCS) paramedics, missing since they were dispatched to rescue Hind on the evening of the call, were discovered in their ambulance just 50 metres away.
Working closely with journalists from Al Jazeera’s Fault Lines, Forensic Architecture collaborated with Earshot to examine the circumstances surrounding the killing of Hind Rajab, her four cousins, her aunt and uncle, and the two paramedics who attempted to save her.
The Israeli army has denied responsibility for their deaths. Our findings indicate that not only were Israeli forces in the area on the day of the attack, but the damage sustained by the car and the ambulance is consistent with damage caused by Israeli munitions. Furthermore, our analysis shows that the person who took the life of Hind’s 15-year-old cousin, Layan Hamada, was likely aware of the presence of the two children in the back seat of the car when they opened fire.
Hind’s mother, Wissam Hamada, who was nearby, witnessed shots being fired at the car from an intersection to the north. Many Israeli military vehicles—in a shape and size consistent with Israeli Merkava tanks—are visible in satellite images of the intersection from that day.
We saw them open fire, but we thought that maybe those in the car were alive because they slightly turned left, so we said they parked at the station. So, we thought they must be safe, and they will go to a safe home, that they’ll go to a safe spot. – Wissam Hamada
Satellite image (29 Jan 2024 ©️ Planet Labs PBC) from 3.31pm shows the presence of Israeli vehicles. (Forensic Architecture, 2024)
Around 2:30pm, Hind’s 15-year-old cousin Layan Hamada was killed while on a call with Palestine Red Crescent dispatchers. Earshot analysed the recording of this call and determined that Layan was likely shot by Israeli forces at close range (13–23 metres).
Gunshot simulation and derived shooter distance (Earshot, 2024)
This analysis matches Layan’s final words:
Layan: They are shooting at us. The tank is next to me.
Operator: Are you hiding?
Layan: Yes, in the car. We’re next to the tank.
Taking into account the radius from which the shots were likely fired (13–23m), the location of Hind and Layan within the car (left rear passenger seat), and the alignment of the entry and exit holes on the Kia they were traveling in, we developed a simulation to map the most likely position of the tank at the time of the shooting.
The most likely position of the tank (Forensic Architecture, 2024)
Read the full investigation. Watch the account of our work on Hind’s killing in the Fault Lines documentary, ‘The Night Won’t End’: Biden’s War on Gaza.
German Colonial Genocide in Namibia: Shark Island — Lüderitz, Namibia
In collaboration with Forensis, we present new findings on the Shark Island concentration camp in Lüderitz, where thousands were murdered during the 1904-08 German genocidal war against the Nama and Ovaherero.
Drone photograph of Shark Island seen from northeast. Authorities are planning an expansion of the port, threatening the preservation of Shark Island as a site of contemplation. (Forensic Architecture/Forensis, 2024)
Our research, undertaken in collaboration with Ovaherero Traditional Authority (OTA) and Nama Traditional Leaders Association (NTLA), identifies mass grave sites and presents the camp's layout and operation in greater detail than ever before.
A photo, likely from 1906, labelled by the archive as ‘Burial of Shark Island concentration camp victims near Lüderitzbucht,’ shows the burial ceremony in Radford Bay. The markings indicate different grave zones. Image source: National Archives of Namibia (Forensic Architecture/Forensis, 2024)
Today, Shark Island and nearby mass graves are at risk of destruction by planned industrial development: a ‘green hydrogen’ project enthusiastically supported by Germany. The planned destruction of this irreplaceable heritage site threatens to further erase traces of the history which binds Germany to Namibia and to the Nama and Ovaherero.
Map of the proposed Namport expansion, with structures and sections of the concentration camp on Shark Island, as well as an overview of terraformation such as sand infill. (Forensic Architecture/Forensis, 2024)
Our film Shark Island, produced in collaboration with Forensis, was meant to premiere at the exhibition ‘The Year 1983’ curated by Zoé Samudzi at the Staatliche Kunstsammlungen Dresden’s Albertinum museum in early June. Sadly, the show did not open. Read Zoé’s statement and our joint statement with the Nama Traditional Leaders Association (NTLA) and the Ovaherero Traditional Authority (OTA) on the reasons the exhibition never opened to the public.
Read the full investigation. Watch our film.
Updates
The Grenfell Tower Fire: Situated Testimonies
On 3 June, we publicly premiered a series of interviews with eleven individuals affected by the Grenfell Tower fire. These individuals—bereaved family members, survivors, and nearby residents—worked with researchers from Forensic Architecture to tell their stories. Watch their testimonies.
These interviews have been made public as we continue the long wait for a final report from the ongoing inquiry into the 2017 fire.
Verdict: The Killing of Tahir Elçi
On 12 June 2024, a decision was handed down in the case concerning the killing of Tahir Elçi, prominent Kurdish human rights lawyer and chair of the Diyarbakır Bar Association, and a titanic figure in human rights advocacy in Türkiye. The officers charged with his death were acquitted.
On 28 November 2015, Elçi was shot and killed during a press conference in the city of Diyarbakır, at which he was appealing for calm in the city, after violence had erupted again between the Turkish state and the Kurdistan Workers' Party, or PKK.
In March 2020, an indictment was issued against three officers, referencing our 2019 investigation of Elçi’s killing. However, the indictment ignored a key aspect of our work in order to hold open the possibility that a Kurdish militant could have been responsible. The recent verdict plainly disregards the conclusions of our report, which identified three police officers as the only individuals who could have fired the fatal shot.
This verdict has failed Tahir Elçi’s family, colleagues, and the global human rights community. Turkish authorities should demonstrate their commitment to accountability with an effective investigation.
‘When it Stopped Being a War’: The Situated Testimony of Dr Ghassan Abu Sittah
In July, we publicly premiered our new film ‘When it Stopped Being a War’: The Situated Testimony of Dr Ghassan Abu Sittah. We were joined by Dr Abu Sittah who addressed the audience after the screening.
In April 2024, Forensic Architecture began working with Dr Ghassan Abu Sittah, who witnessed and survived the bombing of al-Ahli Hospital on 17 October 2023, the first large-scale massacre of the ongoing assault on Gaza, in which hundreds of Palestinians sheltering in the hospital yard were killed. Using a navigable 3D model of the hospital, FA researchers conducted a ‘situated testimony’ interview with Dr Abu Sittah, who gave an account of his recollection of events leading up to and following the blast and helped situate his own memories and video clips both temporally and spatially.
As a first-hand witness and expert in reconstructive surgery, Dr Abu Sittah is uniquely positioned to speak about the injuries he saw and attempted to treat directly after the strike. His reading of the victims’ wounds offers critical insights into the type of weapon used in the attack, further undermining Israeli claims about the source of the explosion.
We follow Dr Abu Sittah's journey from al-Ahli to al-Shifa Hospital that night, where he participated in an unforgettable press conference surrounded by victims of the attack. ‘This,’ he told us, ‘is when it stopped being a war, and it became a genocide’.
Forensic Architecture Research Fellow, Lawrence Abu Hamdan, featured in The New Yorker
Read the recent New Yorker article about Lawrence Abu Hamdan, our close collaborator, Research Fellow, and a PhD graduate of the Centre for Research Architecture. Lawrence is an artist, audio investigator, and founder of the audio forensic research agency Earshot.