"Sergeant D." seems quite relaxed. Right foot crossed over his left knee, arms at rest. The expression on his face is open, almost expectant, as he faces the interviewer in an amiable manner. More than anything, he’s not fidgeting, as most people do if they aren’t used to being in front of the camera, almost motionless as he listens to the questions. He occasionally nods, but otherwise, he is still.

There are several possible reasons for his demeanor. Perhaps the man, now 25 years old, is extremely calm by nature. Or maybe he has learned to have complete control of his body.

It could be both.

"Sergeant D.," after all, is a sniper in the Israeli army, trained to stay in a single position for hours at a time so he can strike his target. This story focuses on him and his comrade, a young man from Munich – because they are suspected of having committed war crimes in the Gaza Strip.

The scene described above is from a video interview that was published on X in early October. The soldier, originally from Chicago, is identified as "Samar Dalet" in the video: "Sergeant D." He says he served in the Israeli Army’s 202nd Paratroopers Brigade. As did another sniper in his team, Daniel G. of Munich.

It is a disturbing interview. "Sergeant D." speaks on camera of the people that his comrades, he and Daniel G. shot to death during their deployment in Gaza. They are, he claims, responsible for at least 100 to 120 deaths, which he says is "extremely impressive."

Video Game Aesthetic

Some of the killings became known to the public when Israeli soldier Shalom Gilbert uploaded a seven-and-a-half-minute clip to YouTube in April 2024. The video showed people collapsing after gunshots were fired, dead bodies lying on the side of the road like garbage, Israeli units clambering across rubble. The entire thing was accompanied by dramatic music.

The video is no longer available on YouTube, but DER SPIEGEL has obtained a copy of it, one of many accounts from Israeli soldiers in Gaza. In the first months after the war began, the military posted huge numbers of photos and videos of its activities on social media networks. The images depict the horrors of war as though it were a video game. Heroic. One-dimensional.

On October 7, 2023, several thousand attackers from the terror organization Hamas and its allies assaulted southern Israel. The men forced their way into towns, slaughtered the residents of kibbutzim and massacred visitors to a large music festival. Most of their victims were civilians, many of them children. They raped women and took more than 250 hostages. Fifty of them are thought to still be in the Gaza Strip; more than half are likely dead. That day, with around 1,200 victims, was the largest mass murder of Jews since the end of the Holocaust.

Horror in the International Community

Following the horrific attack, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu spoke to his country: "Hamas has started a cruel and brutal war. We will be victorious, but the price will be heavy to bear." The Israeli army began airstrikes on Gaza that same day – and launched its ground offensive just three weeks later.

During the initial months of the war, the international community was gripped by horror – and was largely united in solidarity with Israel. The war against Hamas was accepted as necessary, and there was widespread hope for a proportionate response by the Israeli army, which Netanyahu repeatedly claimed was the "most moral army in the world."

But the global view of the conflict has since shifted. In late July, two respected Israeli non-governmental organizations referred to the army’s actions in Gaza as "genocide" for the first time. In early August, former high-ranking military and security officials went public, criticizing the brutal warfare in Gaza and calling for an immediate end to the conflict, saying it had ceased "being a just war."

One accusation that has been made repeatedly is that the army has been intentionally killing civilians. Numerous reports and anonymous statements from soldiers seem to indicate that such accusations are rooted in fact, but thus far, it has not been possible to conclusively verify them. Israel has not allowed unaccompanied foreign journalists into the Gaza Strip since the beginning of the war.

The First Fatal Shot

Nevertheless, DER SPIEGEL, the German public broadcaster ZDF, the British Guardian, the Belgian newspaper De Tijd and the reporting consortium Arab Reporters for Investigative Journalism have been able to trace the brutal activities of an Israeli sniper unit in Gaza. Videos, photos and digital analyses in addition to interviews with dozens of experts, former soldiers and international law experts indicate that members of the unit have likely shot unarmed people to death and thus may have committed war crimes. Among the soldiers who apparently fired on civilians is a young man from Munich. (Learn more here  about how DER SPIEGEL reported this story.)

A wobbly thermal image shows two men, who appear to be unarmed, walking down a street. Suddenly, a dark stripe can be seen. It strikes one of the men in his upper body and he pitches forward, where he remains, lying on the ground. The other runs off.

"That was my team’s first elimination," says "Sergeant D.", before correcting himself. "Sorry, the second." In response to a follow-up question, he says that his zemed took the shot.

Nom de guerre "Santa"

"Zemed" is a Hebrew word that essentially means "partner." In the military, particularly among snipers, it is most often used in the context of a team of two that works extremely closely together. Such teams consist of the actual sniper, the person who takes the shot, and the spotter, the person who identifies the target, calculates the distance and takes the wind and weather conditions into account.

"Sergeant D.’s" zemed can also be seen in the YouTube video. The uniformed young man is sitting at a window opening on the sixth floor of a building in Gaza, surrounded by a landscape of rubble. He looks concentrated. On a tripod in front of him is an M4 assault rifle equipped with precision optics. One of the soldier’s fingers is close to the trigger.

The man in the image is Daniel G., a young man who was apparently born and raised in Germany. The 25-year-old’s nom de guerre is "Santa." He appears to still be registered to the address of his parents and younger brother. The house is located on the outskirts of Munich on a quiet side street in a neighborhood of single-family homes. When the skies are clear, the Alps can be seen rising on the horizon.

If it’s true what "Sergeant D." says about his deployment and the targeted killings in Gaza, he is not only incriminating himself, but also his partner. "Sergeant D." candidly opens up about something of which the Israeli army has been accused for some time but has vehemently denied: that it’s soldiers allegedly fires on civilians, or at least unarmed Palestinians. And that the practice is accepted by the military.

Should it be true, it would be a violation of international law, which makes a clear distinction between military and civilian targets. A violation that must be punished. Daniel G.’s involvement would also mean that a soldier from Germany apparently took part in such shootings, potentially making it a case for German federal prosecutors. Proceedings have already been launched in Belgium against one of G.’s comrades.

There are photos in circulation of Daniel G. in uniform, showing him posing in full battle gear or gazing in concentration through his rifle’s scope. In one image, an emblem on his helmet can be seen, reading "72 Virgins Express" – a reference to the 72 virgins that, as some Muslims are convinced, await a martyr in paradise.

But there are also photos of him from his life in Munich before the war. They show a smiling, shy-looking young man with a friendly, open visage. There is one image of him as a fifth-grade schoolchild, another as a 17-year-old athlete after taking part in a charity run. One picture shows him after completing his high-school finishing exams with Charlotte Knobloch, president of the Jewish Community of Munich.

Daniel G. was a rather quiet student, recalls a former teacher of his: less disruptive as a teenager than the other boys his age. She describes G. as "thoughtful, smart and level-headed," a "wonderful young man." A former classmate says that G. is a good person and "wouldn’t even hurt a fly." He was, the classmate says, neither Islamophobic nor anti-Palestinian.

DER SPIEGEL was unable to reach Daniel G., and his parents have instructed their lawyer to prohibit any contact with them. In reporting this story, DER SPIEGEL has thus spoken to those who have known him throughout his life: former teachers, friends and classmates. Hardly any of them wanted to speak openly about Daniel G. or be quoted by name. But they all agree on one thing: Daniel G. was an unassuming young man.

How, though, does someone who appears to have grown up in sheltered surroundings in the quiet German state of Bavaria become an elite fighter in the Israeli army?

Daniel G.’s parents are from the former Soviet Union. They are thought to have met during a volunteer year in Israel, with the father later becoming the sales director for a high-tech company. He was assigned responsibility for Europe and, as G.’s brother once said, the decision to settle in Munich was primarily made for practical reasons.

After completing his school exams, known as the Abitur in Germany, Daniel G. joined the Israeli military and received training as a sniper. He was assigned to the 202nd Airborne Brigade, and within the brigade, probably to the "Chetz" company, the members of which are particularly religious. On the internet, it is noted that the unit is composed of "lone soldiers," fighters from around the world interested in defending Israel. And the unit does, indeed, appear to be made up of men from South Africa, Belgium, the U.S., Ethiopia, Azerbaijan and Germany.

The snipers in the 202nd Airborne Brigade are among the best in Israel. A video circulating on the internet includes scenes from a competition that took place in September 2023, showing soldiers firing at targets from lying and standing positions, sprinting and hiding – as comrades applaud in the background.

Simulation Becomes Reality

Afterwards, the major responsible gushed in an interview about how realistic the simulated situations were. The last task, for example, had been to hit the target at night in a built-up area at medium range. Daniel G.’s unit took third.

None of the participants likely thought the simulation would become reality so soon. Not even four weeks after the competition, all hell broke loose in Israel and the 202nd Paratrooper Brigade was among the first units sent into the Gaza Strip. Their mission: Take control of tall buildings.

A few months later, someone posted an entry to the Facebook page belonging to the Israeli soldier forum Pazam praising the snipers from the 202nd Brigade. According to the entry, they had been deployed to the city of Sderot, to the kibbutzim Kfar Aza and Be’eri, and later to the Gaza Strip – to Rimal, Shejaiya and Khan Younis, and perhaps soon to Rafah. "Thus far, they have eliminated around 100 terrorists," the post continues. "Soon, it will be even more!"

The faces of the soldiers in the post were blurred out. But DER SPIEGEL has obtained the unedited group photo. Daniel G. can be recognized in the second row.

In November 2023, "Sergeant D." and his partner Daniel G. reached the Gaza City quarter of Tel al-Hawa, taking up position in a building in so-called Barcelona Park. It is surrounded by trees and shot-up buildings.

In a video clip apparently produced at this time, a destroyed road can be seen from the perspective of a drone. In the center of the image lies a motionless man, with another bending over him and grabbing for his hands. Then, a shot is fired, and the second man falls backwards. He is bleeding from his head.

"That was my first elimination," says »Sergeant D.« later in his video interview. He doesn’t know who it was that he shot, he says, but he also doesn’t seem much to care. "He wasn’t armed, but he was in a combat zone. And he didn’t have good intentions."

Drawings on the Walls

DER SPIEGEL and its partners were able to identify the man apparently shot by "Sergeant D." His mother and four other relatives say he was a 19-year-old man named Salem Montasser Doghmosh.

According to them, Salem was trying to save his big brother, 26-year-old Mohammed Montasser Doghmosh – the man who was lying motionless on the ground at the beginning of the video. The brothers were not terrorists, the family members insist. They collected plastic and metal to sell as a way of ensuring the family’s survival in the war, says their mother. The two presented no danger to the Israeli army, their family members say. The Israeli military declined to comment.

With the help of videos, photographs and satellite images, the team of reporters was able to identify the spot where the Doghmosh brothers were apparently killed. It is located on Munir-al-Rajjis Street, located just a few hundred meters from Barcelona Park – precisely the spot where the two snipers "Sergeant D." and Daniel G. were posted.

A photo from this period, which DER SPIEGEL has obtained, shows "Sergeant D." sitting on a plastic chair in a room painted in pink. He is looking out through a hole in the wall, his sniper rifle at the ready.

The six-floor building offers a clear view of Munir-al-Rajjis Street – DER SPIEGEL reporters visited the site. Even several months later, drawings on the wall could still be seen, including a Star of David and, beneath it, a nine decorated with a devil’s tail and horns – exactly the same logo that numerous members of "Sergeant D.’s" unit wore on their uniforms.

The fact that Daniel G. of Munich spent time in the building is proven by a clip from a video uploaded to YouTube by the soldier Shalom Gilbert. G. can be seen at the window, with the buildings at the edge of Barcelona Park visible in the background.

According to "Sergeant D.," the images from a thermal camera showing one of two passersby being shot also come from this area. It is the scene described by "Sergeant D." in the interview, in which he says it was his "zemed" who had fired the shot.

Additional thermal footage shows a similar scene. Again, two apparently unarmed men are walking down a street. One of them is shot and the other runs away. People at the site claim that the victim this time was Mohammed Farid Doghmosh, a 47-year-old who, they say, worked for civil defense. This shot, too, says "Sergeant D.," was fired by his partner.

It isn’t possible to independently verify the witness statements: The images are black-and-white and strongly pixelated. Some of the details are inconsistent and it also cannot be excluded that "Sergeant D." may have been mistaken when describing the thermal images shown to him.

One of the videos apparently shows a projectile, but according to numerous experts and DER SPIEGEL’s own calculations, it is too slow to be a bullet from a sniper rifle. There is hardly anything visible that could help to clearly identify where the footage was taken.

Yet "Sergeant D.’s" description is consistent with witness statements and the conditions on site. The soldier, for example, says that two additional killings took place "on the same axis" as his first elimination. The precise location of these apparent killings can be conclusively established thanks to drone footage. DER SPIEGEL has been able to identify six people who were apparently hit on that same day on that same axis, including the father of Salem and Mohammed Doghmosh.

Statements Match Death Certificates

The team of reporters, however, was unable to find any evidence that the men who were killed belonged to Hamas or the Islamic Jihad. If they have been correctly identified, they are all from a single large family, the Doghmosh clan. In the mid-2000s, a member of the family was involved in the kidnapping of an Israeli soldier and founded the Salafist-jihadi terror organization Army of Islam.

According to media reports, however, the family has had repeated altercations with Hamas, some of them violent. Last year, Hamas executed the leader of the Doghmosh clan, accusing him of having negotiated with Israeli authorities.

What we have been able to verify is consistent with the statements of family members. The names of all three of the men are on the list of people killed in the Gaza Strip kept by the Health Ministry, which is controlled by Hamas. According to death certificates that DER SPIEGEL was able to examine, all of them died on November 22, 2023.

That date is consistent with the story told by "Sergeant D." In the video interview, he says that they had been in Tel al-Hawa one or two days ahead of the ceasefire. Within two days, he and his partner had "eliminated" eight people at the site. A one-week ceasefire began on November 24, 2023 – two days after the killings near Barcelona Park.

The text that every Israeli soldier is required to internalize during training is called "The Spirit of the IDF," better known as the Code of Ethics. It defines four central principles the army should adhere to. The defense of the state, its citizens and residents is the first principle, followed by love of the homeland and loyalty to the state and its laws.

Human dignity is third.

A soldier’s actions are derived from the recognition of human dignity, the codex reads. The troops must also respect the value of human life, even in battle, according to the document, in addition to seeking to protect human dignity and only using violence to the extent necessary. Israel and its armed forces frequently refer to the codex when rejecting criticism of its conduct of war.

Criticizing Warfare

For the past several months, however, accusations have been mounting that the Israeli army is committing war crimes and crimes against humanity in the Gaza Strip, and may even be guilty of genocide, according to some genocide experts. Intentional attacks on civilians and the disproportionate use of violence are often cited as evidence, in addition to the use of starvation as a weapon of war.

The International Criminal Court has even issued an arrest warrant for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. South Africa has opened proceedings against Israel at the International Court of Justice, while Amnesty International and the United Nations are calling for a comprehensive investigation into the allegations.

Asa Kasher is troubled by the photos and videos of Israeli soldiers he has seen on social media channels. "There are things there that clearly violate the fundamental values of the Israeli military," he says. The 85-year-old lives near Tel Aviv and is seen as a kind of house-philosopher for the army. He was involved in developing the Code of Ethics, and for years, he has been researching and writing about moral issues in times of war. Every Israeli soldier, he says, is a "champion of the sanctity of human life."

Kasher hasn’t reviewed the footage of the shooting of unarmed Palestinians. DER SPIEGEL, however, described the scene to him in which "Sergeant D." killed a man who was apparently trying to recover a dead body. Kasher says: "This is undoubtedly a rescue operation. That is something that should be respected." There have been an increasing number of reports of Israeli soldiers intentionally targeting people seeking to help others. In May, the World Health Organization (WHO) released a report saying there had been 180 attacks on rescue vehicles since October 7, 2023.

Arbitrary Line

"Sergeant D." also speaks in his video interview of an imaginary line in the warzone that separates life from death. Another soldier recently said on Sky News that such dividing lines have become standard in the Gaza war. "Sergeant D." says that those who cross the line will be shot – whether they are armed or not. The problem for the Palestinians is, in the words of "Sergeant D.": "There is a line that we define. They don’t know where this line is, but we do."

Which means that the Israeli soldiers draw an arbitrary line and shoot everybody who crosses it. An approach that Asa Kasher finds horrifying. "A civilian should not automatically become a target just because he is in an area that has been declared a combat zone."

This is a position shared by other experts as well. "International humanitarian law requires that a distinction be made between military and civilian objects," says Christoph Safferling, a professor of international humanitarian law at the Friedrich Alexander University Erlangen-Nürnberg. "You cannot define a zone and declare everything within it a military target."

On several occasions, the Israeli armed forces have called on the population in Gaza to leave certain areas via online messages, text messages, leaflets and announcements over loudspeakers. Those who do not leave are automatically considered enemies. The fact that soldiers shoot civilians in these areas without sufficient investigation became abundantly clear in December 2023. That is when Israeli troops in Shujaiya erroneously killed three Israeli hostages.

Such an evacuation order was apparently also in effect for the area in which the two snipers "Sergeant D." and Daniel G. were operating. "But that isn’t enough to legitimately declare everyone in this area a military target," says Kenneth Roth, a professor at Princeton and the former head of Human Rights Watch.

Concern about Civilians

Diplomats at the German Foreign Ministry also voiced "growing concerns" in November 2024 that Israel is not taking all the necessary precautions to avoid civilian victims, according to a confidential report from the German representation in Ramallah. The position of German diplomats is also clear when it comes to the question of warzones: "Civilians who remain where they are despite a warning" do not forfeit their right to protection.

The man who made the suspected war crime public is no whistleblower. Rather, a trap was set for "Sergeant D." He was lured in front of the camera by being told he could talk about the "heroes" of the Israeli military and spent hours giving the interview in summer 2024. He was shown video footage of the shootings in Gaza and provided extensive commentary on them, incriminating both himself and his zemed, Daniel G., in the process. He also spoke at times when he thought the camera had been temporarily switched off.

But the purported interviewer was a young Israeli, whose name is known to DER SPIEGEL. Palestinian journalist Younis Tirawi published the statements made by "Sergeant D." in a video clip he posted on X in October 2024.

Tirawi and his team were also successful in identifying some of the other soldiers belonging to the same unit as "Sergeant D." and Daniel G. To do so, they managed to infiltrate an Instagram group of Israeli soldiers, where they collected photographic and video material. Tirawi shared dozens of these images with DER SPIEGEL and backed up his statement with an affidavit. DER SPIEGEL is in possession of the entire interview with "Sergeant D." – nine video files extending for a total of about 160 minutes. In addition, there is a recording of a telephone call between "Sergeant D." and the interviewer.

DER SPIEGEL and ZDF had the most important statements examined by the Fraunhofer Institute for Secure Information Technology in Darmstadt to exclude the possibility that the data had been manipulated. The institute found no evidence that the content had been tampered with.

The footage thus seems to be authentic and incriminate both »Sergeant D.« and Daniel G. Both are alleged to have deliberately shot and killed unarmed Palestinians.

Germany feels closely tied to Israel, with a special responsibility for the country stemming from the Holocaust. "The existence and security of Israel are and remain our reason of state," said Chancellor Friedrich Merz during his first keynote speech after being inaugurated.

At the same time, however, Germany considers itself bound by humanitarian international law. According to the principle of universal jurisdiction in international criminal law, investigations into crimes against humanity or war crimes can be initiated in Germany even if neither the perpetrator nor the victim nor the scene of the crime are located in Germany. That principle has been invoked in Germany on previous occasions to try perpetrators of torture in Syria and African warlords.

If the new investigations provide sufficient evidence to substantiate the suspicion that Daniel G. shot unarmed civilians to death in Gaza, it could constitute a war crime – making it a possible case for German federal prosecutors. "It’s about prosecuting war criminals, no matter which side they are fighting on," says international law expert Safferling.

And at least one criminal complaint has already been filed against Daniel G. Public prosecutors in Munich forwarded it to federal prosecutors in January 2025. DER SPIEGEL has learned, however, that the case was quickly closed – "due to insufficient initial suspicion."

Neither Daniel G. nor "Sergeant D." were interrogated.