God knows what I hit
rank: Staff Sergeant
unit: Armored Corps
place: Gaza
period: 2000
I remember a case when we attacked at night, I couldn't even see where I was going, couldn't see well, eventually we did fall. And at first somebody fired at us, he really did, and then he stopped. And we fired and he fired again and then he stopped. And we fired. All that, again, in the middle of a built-up area.
What did you fire?
0.5, no. Mags.
Who at?
At a person.
This person was in your sights?
No, nobody saw. Hard to believe somebody saw him. At first they saw from where we were shot at, but from my poor experience as a loader, I too fired without training and with no idea how to do it. I just fired, God knows what I hit, more or less in the direction of the source of the fire.
Did they speak with you? Emphasize the importance of firing at the source of the fire? Explain the harm you can cause? Hitting civilians?
I don't remember such things. Maybe there was something like this, I don't remember such a thing and I can say from my experience at that time I fired, it was in Gaza too I think. Mostly I was scared and wanted to shoot, do what I was expected to do and go back in. I mean, I didn't start to aim directly at the source of the fire and worry I may have hit somebody. I just fired.
Did you hear about it later on? Read in the papers?
No, never. Later on, when I was in Bethlehem, there were incidents every day and we heard nothing, there was nothing. Not just incidents where we like did something wrong, but incidents of them putting bombs on the road and such stuff. Almost nothing, maybe even nothing at all, got to the media. 
This testimony appears under these categories: Patrols, Rules of engagement
http://www.breakingthesilence.org.il/testimonies/database/24364
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