Hamas is a cruel and cynical enemy, but as an IDF veteran, I ask if Israel has lost respect for human life.
It has been almost four weeks since the military operation “Protective
Edge” commenced in Gaza, and the region yearns for quiet. Three
civilians were killed at the hands of Hamas Militants and the rockets
they fire at Israeli population centers, in the time these sentences
were written.
Sixty-one soldiers and officers were killed throughout the duration of
the operation thus far. As our hearts fill with pain and concern for the
deaths of these young people, the lives of civilians in Southern Israel
have been disturbed for three weeks now by sirens warning against
rockets approaching from Gaza. Many civilians living near the Gaza Strip
have left their homes and are moving between the houses of friends and
family until this fury blows over.
Who fires rockets at a civilian population in Israel? The answer is
clear. The governing force in the Gaza Strip today is Hamas. It is their
will for Israeli civilians to live under the terror of rockets, and it
will take their resolve to diminish this very threat. Hamas presents
their struggle as one for the liberation of the Palestinian people,
though they effectively eliminate Israeli civilians’ right to lead
liberated lives.
The relatively low number of civilian casualties in Israel is not a
result of this tenderhearted terrorist organization, but rather of the
low quality of their rockets and Israel’s advanced defense capabilities.
As a Jew and a Zionist living in Israel, I know that Hamas threatens
me, my family, my friends and the values to which I am committed.
These things are clear and correct. Yet as a veteran of the IDF and an
Israeli citizen, I don’t bear responsibility for Hamas’ actions, but
rather for those of the Israeli society of which I am a part. So let’s
focus on Israel, my country and my home.
Imagine a big family gathering in a home during days of war. Fear fills the air but it’s easier when everyone’s together.
Suddenly a bomb hits the home – and the family is erased. On July 20th,
twenty-five members of the Abu Jamei family, from the town of
Bani-Suheila in Gaza, lost their lives to a bomb dropped by the Israeli
Air Force. Why was the Abu Jamei home bombed? Why have other families
lost their lives in recent weeks in similar bombings? Among them eight
members of the Kawara family, six of whom were children; six members of
the Hamad family who were killed in their sleep and eight members of the
Al Haj family.
The IDF explains that Hamas members, or members of another organization
that the IDF wished to harm, were in these homes – and at least in some
cases a warning was given to the family in the form of a telephone
call, or the dropping of a smaller bomb on the house.
Hamas is a cruel and cynical enemy. But what have we become? Is it not a
cynical act to bomb Hamas members’ family homes that don’t constitute a
“ticking bomb” threat – that is to say, don’t pose an immediate threat
to soldiers or civilians – with the knowledge that there are innocent
family members who will be harmed inside? Does the fact that a family
didn’t heed our telephone request to leave a building grant us the right
to sentence them to death? When we choose to do so, are we not
functioning as executioners who have lost respect for human life? When
we choose to act this way, can we really continue to boast the claim
that we do everything in our power to avoid civilian casualties? The
answer to the last question, to my dismay, is no.
I wrote that Hamas controls Gaza, but Hamas isn’t alone. Israel also
continues to control Gaza. Israel controls the daily entry and exit of
goods from the Gaza Strip; prevents access to Gaza from the air and the
sea, limiting the fishing area for Palestinians; Israel even controls
the population registry in the region. According to the UN,
approximately 1,800 people were killed in the Gaza Strip these past few
weeks, around 250 of whom were minors. Most of the dead did not take
part in hostilities against Israel. Can we as Israelis earnestly shrug
off our responsibility to the residents of the Gaza Strip?
I believe that we cannot shake off this responsibility.
As an Israeli citizen who loves his home, I hope that many other
citizens will join me in calling on Israel to stop this practice of
bombing homes with their inhabitants inside – an act that causes
unreasonable harm to Gazan civilians. We must stop sending our friends
and our soldiers on operations that will definitively harm civilians. We
must end Israel’s protracted control over the Gaza Strip.
The writer served as an infantry combat soldier and commander in
the IDF, and is a founding member of Breaking the Silence, an Israeli
NGO of veteran combatants who through published testimony,
lectures, meetings and tours attempt to give the Israeli public a fuller
picture of everyday life in the Occupied Territories since the start of
the Second Intifada.
