In this Institute for Humanities and Social Sciences talk I host Neve Gordon in a discussion about Human Shielding, his brilliant new co-authored book with Nicola Perugini on the history of Human Shielding. From Syrian civilians locked in iron cages to veterans joining peaceful indigenous water protectors at the Standing Rock Sioux Reservation, from Sri Lanka to Iraq and from Yemen to the United States, human beings have been used as shields for protection, coercion, or deterrence. We cover the use of human shields in key historical and contemporary moments across the globe as a way of interrogating the colonial and racial underpinnings of international law, while highlighting how warring parties use human shields to cast the use of lethal violence against vulnerable people as humane.