Al Qassam website - The Zionist military has charged two of its soldiers with endangering the life of a Palestinian boy during the Zionist offensive against Gaza.

The army said the soldiers, who had been searching a building, had instructed the nine-year-old to open bags suspected of containing explosive materials.

Use of civilians as human shields is widely considered a war crime.

The Israeli rights organization, B'Tselem welcomed the indictments. But the group repeated its call for an independent investigation of the army's war in Gaza.

The war lasted for 22 days starting on 27 December 2008.

Also, in January, the Israel military said it had reprimanded two top army officers for authorizing an artillery attack using white phosphorus shells which hit a UN compound in Gaza last year.

B'Tselem called again for an independent investigation into the war in a statement: "Military police investigations are not the appropriate instrument to investigate allegations regarding the war on Gaza."

In September 2009, South African judge Richard Goldstone delivered a report to the UN Human Rights Council that concluded that war crimes had been committed by the Zionist military.

He accused the Zionist entity of deliberately targeting civilians and civilian infrastructure during the conflict.

Human rights groups say about 1,400 Palestinians were killed in the war, though the Zionist entity puts the number at about 1,100.