Iain Hook

Coroner Dr Peter Dean opened the inquest at Ipswich Crown Court. In 2005, Irish activist Caoimhe Butterly gave written eyewitness testimony in the inquest into the killing of Iain Hook by an Israeli military sniper. After the court proceedings jurors unanimously delivered the verdict that the Israeli military was fully accountable for the unlawful killing of Iain Hook. Dr Peter Hansen, former Commissioner General of the UNRWA, said that "over the past four years 13 UNRWA workers, including Mr. Hook, had been shot in similar circumstances by the Israeli army". In a statement after the verdict, Paul Wolstenholme, a colleague of Hook who was in the compound at time of the shooting, said the Israeli sniper would have known he was not a Palestinian. "It was not a case of mistaken identity, it was a deliberate act," he said.

Iain John Hook (1948 – 22 November 2002) was working for the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) as project manager in the rebuilding of Jenin Refugee Camp in West Bank, which was home to 13,000 Palestinian refugees. He was shot and killed by an Israel Defense Forces sniper, during a battle in Jenin on 22 November 2002. A United Nations Security Council resolution condemning Israel was vetoed by the United States. In 2005, an English inquest jury returned a verdict of unlawful killing.

On 22 November 2002, Hook left a voice message with Israeli authorities that Palestinian militants ("shabab"-youth) had "knocked a hole in the wall" and "pinned down" his men. During a gun-battle with Islamic Jihad militants whom Israel says were firing at troops from inside the UN compound, an Israeli military sniper killed Hook. Israeli Army radio claimed that the sniper who killed him mistook his cell phone for a handgun or grenade. The United Nations stated that there were no gunmen at the compound, and claims that the shooting was a mere mistake; Hook was shot in the back by a sniper with a scoped rifle, from a distance of 20 meters. Co-workers evacuated Hook through the hole in the wall, but he died of a gunshot wound to the abdomen before reaching a hospital.

Born in Felixstowe, Suffolk, Hook was married and father of three sons and a daughter; two of his sons are British military officers. Prior to his work for the United Nations, Iain Hook was a British paratrooper. Hook supervised the reconstruction of a hospital complex in Pristina, Kosovo, in 1999, and also worked on projects in East Timor, Afghanistan, and Serbia.

Iain Hook was working for United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA), which is "created to administer Palestinian refugee camps set up after the 1948 Arab-Israeli war", and which was home to 13,000 Palestinian refugees, as project manager in rebuilding of Jenin refugee camp in West Bank. In October 2002, Hook arrived at the Palestinian refugee camp in Jenin to oversee the rebuilding of the camp.