Mohammed Abu Hashem left the Air Force over US support for Israel

Even though he had been in the U.S. Air Force for 22 years, Mohammed Abu Hashem felt like he had more to give. But that changed in October, when urgent messages poured in from the family in Gaza.

An Israeli airstrike killed Abu Hashem's aunt and more than 20 neighbors, and wounded other relatives, he was told. Twelve children were among the dead, his family said. His thoughts turned to Washington's unwavering support for Israel, through its policies and vast quantities of weapons, and he soon concluded that 22 years was in fact long enough.

It was extremely emotional for me, knowing that the amount of bombs supplied to Israel was the cause of his death, Abu Hashem, a Palestinian American, said in an interview after retiring from the army in June. I knew at that moment that I could not be part of the system that allowed this.

Abu Hashem, 41, said he was forced to enlist after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks on his adopted country. Today, he is among a handful of experienced government and military officials who have left their jobs disillusioned, they say, with the Biden administration's handling of the Gaza crisis and Israel's unwavering support for his campaign. aimed at destroying the militant group Hamas. This is the first known departure with such a direct link to the wars which left a staggering number of civilian deaths. Others requested conscientious objector status.

Saida Saleh Abu Hashem, Mohammed's aunt, is at least the second Palestinian relative of an American service member to be killed in the Gaza war. This account is based on interviews with the former airman and people who know him, a review of messages he exchanged with Air Force superiors expressing concern over the home attack of his loved ones, text and voice messages shared by his family and images of the damage. in their building in Gaza.

The Israeli military, which has faced allegations of indiscriminate use of force throughout the conflict, told the Washington Post that its target that day was a Hamas operational structure located in a building and that the operation involved two precise munitions. The strike was planned, a spokesperson said, to avoid excessive civilian deaths. The Israeli military declined to provide further details.

Abu Hashem cast doubt on this claim. If this is true, he said, and my family's home was targeted with precise GPS-guided munitions, it would not be difficult for the Israeli military to publicly release the evidence and the names of members. of Hamas. She did not do so, he noted, or demonstrate that the strike was imperative. Humanitarian groups said Israel's tolerance for civilian deaths in strikes on militant targets was far too high.

Abu Hashem said he spoke to Air Force superiors about his concerns that Israel, Washington's closest ally in the Middle East, had potentially committed a human rights abuse and may, in doing so, have used weapons supplied by the United States. He called their response unsatisfactory and said it was a factor in his decision to terminate his government service.

I cannot serve an administration that ignores the facts, he said, and denies American and international law to defend and enable such horrific violence.

An Air Force official, speaking on condition of anonymity to describe Abu Hashem's interaction with his superiors, defended their handling of the situation and called their response empathetic. The official said an enlisted leader who joined Abu Hashem's unit in December offered him help, as did one of his predecessors, but acknowledged they didn't know what to do.

They behaved in a way I expected, the Air Force official said. However, as you know, no one in the Air Force has the ability to change foreign policy decisions.

Both of Abu Hashem's grandparents were farmers in Yibna, a village outside Tel Aviv. In 1948, he said, they were forced to flee when Israeli soldiers seized the territory, among more than 700,000 Palestinians who were driven from their land that year after Israel declared independence and the first of several Arab-Israeli wars ensued. The family reached Gaza, where his father, Saady, was born in a refugee camp.

As an adult, Saady Abu Hashem fled to Qatar, where Mohammed and five of his six siblings were born. Mohammed remembers that at the age of 4, he met his extended family in Gaza and touched their hands across the Egyptian border fence.

In 1991, when he was 8 years old, Abu Hashem's parents moved their immediate family to the United States, eventually settling in Ohio where his father opened a successful jewelry store.

Abu Hashem said he joined the air force because he felt the need to protect my family. He worked on the KC-135 refueling plane, a job that led him to be deployed ten times, including three mobilizations to Qatar, where he was able to connect with other families uprooted from Gaza.

As he rose through the ranks, Abu Hashem changed careers and became first sergeant, a leadership position responsible for advising commanders on training and quality of life issues. He said he enjoyed the role, working for several units before arriving at Joint Base Andrews in Maryland in April 2023.

On October 10, Mohammed's aunt, Saida Saleh Abu Hashem, was at home in the Jabalya neighborhood in northern Gaza with her husband and two of her three sons. At least two other families shared their building, including children.

It was three days after Hamas militants carried out a stunning cross-border attack in Israel in which they killed 1,200 people and took around 250 hostages. Israeli forces fired a warning shot at a building two doors down the street, loud enough for most residents in the neighborhood to hear, Mohammed Abu Hashem said. This practice, known as “roof knocking,” involves munitions containing little or no explosives. Although largely abandoned today, it was intended to signal to civilians that a strike was imminent.

What happened next was described in voice messages sent to Abu Hashem by his aunt's other son, also named Mohammed. He was attending school in Türkiye when his mother was killed.

Hearing the warning shot, the families were evacuated, but nothing happened. After waiting outside for about 90 minutes, they returned home. Saida Saleh Abu Hashem was in her living room when the bomb exploded. She was 49 years old.

Suddenly, stones fell on them, Abu Hashem's cousin said in the recording, assuming that the Israelis had waited until everyone went inside and then demolished the entire house.

In total, 23 people died following the strike, Abu Hashem's cousin counted. Among them was a family of six living in the same building, according to a death register maintained by Gaza's health ministry. The youngest was a 1 year old girl.

I know everyone there, and all of them, without exception, are civilians working in civilian jobs, including teachers, car drivers and a supermarket salesman, Abu Hashem's cousin said in the recording . I am certain that there are no resistance fighters or armed elements in this building.

In its response to the Post, the Israeli military did not answer questions about whether commanders believed civilians were injured in the attack or whether they were sure the correct building was hit. Israeli and U.S. officials have said Hamas militants were hiding among civilians, although the two sides have had sharp disagreements over Israel's efforts to limit civilian casualties.

The house was likely hit by American-made MK82s, 500-pound guided bombs or similar Israeli weapons, said Trevor Ball, a former U.S. Army bomb technician who reviewed photos and videos of the aftermath. strikes at the request of the Post. The MK82 is one of several American munitions supplied to Israel. The images, captured by neighbors and passersby, do not include any identifiable munition components or fragments.

Abu Hachem said he was seeking to channel his grief into something productive. He told a friend, a senior enlisted man in the Air Force, that he was struggling but hoped that providing information about the attack on his family's home would lead to the discovery of a war crime or would reveal to the Israelis that a tragic accident had taken place. occurred. His friend, he said, told him she would relay the details to her contacts in the intelligence community.

Nothing came of it, Abu Hachem said. His friend, who has since left the service, did not return a request for comment.

Frustrated by this inaction, Abou Hachem decided in late October that it was time to leave.

He accepted a temporary position with a company in the Akron, Ohio, area through a program for military personnel transitioning to civilian careers. In February, he was introduced to a younger man who was also leaving the Air Force. They exchanged pleasantries, but Abu Hashem made no mention of why he left the army.

A few days later, that airman, Aaron Bushnell, doused himself in gasoline and set himself on fire in front of the Israeli embassy in Washington. Free Palestine was among his last words. Greg Kennedy, who oversaw Abu Hashem's work at Leaf Home, confirmed the brief meeting between the two men.

Abu Hashem said he wondered what, if anything, he could have done to steer Bushnell down a different path, but that his grief was too overwhelming to share. I had the opportunity to talk to this young man about my life, he said. I chose silence.

Abu Hashem said his relatives in Gaza face an uncertain fate. They were transferred to a camp for displaced people in Rafah, the southern Gaza town where Israel launched an offensive a few weeks ago that forced more than a million people to flee. His uncle, in a voicemail, spoke of tents baking in the summer heat, hepatitis infections and hungry people grinding corn and animal feed as a last resort.

Abu Hashem criticized the Israeli military for not releasing any evidence supporting the reasoning that led to the attack on their home. There are no checks and balances in their narrative, he said.

What we should really be asking here, he said, is why my aunt's life and the lives of my innocent children were considered so worthless that they could simply be considered collateral damage.

Hazem Balousha in Cairo, Hajar Harb in London, Reem Akkad and Meg Kelly contributed to this report.

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