A UNIQUE ARMY

 

Knowing the extraordinary measures the IDF will take to protect innocent civilians, Hamas deliberately positioned its military assets among the civilian population. They hid weapons in tunnels under schools and hospitals, placed rocket launchers alongside apartment buildings, then forced those civilians to stay in areas they knew would be attacked. They also instructed their people to report the lie that every Gazan killed was a civilian, even if they were actually fighters. Numerous Internet sites show Palestinians elaborately staging sniper victims and smashed ambulances, among other phony horrors.

One of my grandsons who was a pilot and an expert on drones is now a farmer living on a moshav only seven kilometers from Gaza. Since he finished his nine and a half years of compulsory service in the air-force he does reserve duty one day every week (like every ex-pilot), operating drones over Gaza. The following are his words, written some time ago, but just as relevant today as it was then:                                                                                            

"I took part in the Protective Edge campaign (Iron Dome)  as an operator of a drone, an aircraft manned from afar. During the whole of the fighting, one of our jobs was – to protect the Palestinian population in Gaza. To protect against whom?  From  airstrikes  of the Israeli airforce. You ask  yourself,  why does the airforce blow up houses in Gaza on one hand  and, on the other hand, use all their resources in order to prevent hitting the civilian population? I will try to explain why.

The IDF is a unique army. The only army which allocates  a considerable amount of its resources to prevent harming innocent citizens. Airstrikes which are clever, small and very accurate, via intelligence resources which can pinpoint the “bad guys” within the population, together with trained soldiers. Because the Israeli army is trained not to harm innocent men, women and children. 

So how, for all that, do citizens get hurt?   Hamas understands that that is the “legitimate” way to fight us. They know that it is our weak point. So they exploit it by hiding lethal weapons underneath any place which we are prevented from hitting.

Who endangers the Palestinian civilians? Hamas. Not the IDF and not Israel. Hamas are the ones who make their own  people become reluctant participants in  the  war arena. Hamas is responsible for the blood being spilled in the Gaza Strip."

In the words of Colonel Richard Kemp: “…..Israel is a small country, with a small professional army. To fight a war it depends on its conscripts and its reservists. These are ordinary citizens, from professors to plumbers, called upon to defend their homes. They don’t want to be fighting and they don’t want to harm others.” 

In complete contradiction to Hamas which, not only does nothing to protect their own citizens, but purposely puts them in harm’s way. There is not a single bomb shelter in Gaza.