During the October 7 surprise attacks on Israel by Hamas, Dr. Tarek Abu Arar, an emergency room physician at Barzilai Hospital in the Israeli coastal city of Ashkelon, was shot by Hamas terrorists and used as a human shield while they continued shooting at civilians, the New York Post reported.
According to Dr. Abu Arar, the ordeal began as he was driving to the hospital to start his shift. As he approached a junction near Sderot, Abu Arar came across someone lying injured on the side of the road near a vehicle. As yet, there had been no alerts about the surprise attacks, so believing the person was involved in a car accident, Abu Arar stopped to provide medical assistance.
But as soon as he stopped, Abu Arar realized that he was in trouble.
About 160 feet away, a man in what appeared to be an IDF uniform called for his help. When the ER doctor was about 30 feet away, the “soldier” shot him in the chest. Fortunately, Abu Arar was wearing a bulletproof vest.
At first, Abu Arar thought the “soldier” had mistaken him for a terrorist. But then he heard another man say in Arabic, “Stop, he is an Arab.” That was when he realized that the men in the IDF uniforms weren’t soldiers but terrorists.
In total, more than ten terrorists dressed like Israeli soldiers descended on Abu Arar and began to interrogate him, quizzing him on his knowledge of Islam.
He said all of them carried Kalashnikovs and other “advanced military equipment” and were wearing uniforms similar to those of the IDF.
The terrorists secured him to a pole in the center of the junction and boasted that now that they had a hostage, the IDF would not be able to “eliminate” them from above. With Abu Abar secured to the pole as a human shield, the terrorists started firing at every vehicle that came through the junction as he was forced to watch helplessly.
Dr. Abu Abar said his ordeal lasted about two hours.
