A Jerusalem Post editor who served for 15 years in an IDF artillery unit comments on yesterday’s disaster in Beit Hanoun:
After serving in IDF Artillery, I can only say that this is every gunner’s nightmare scenario: killing innocent men, women and children….
In response to Kassam rocket attacks on southern Israel following the IDF withdrawal from the northern Gaza town of Beit Hanun on Monday, gunners were ordered to “fire at the source” – the spots from which the rockets were launched.
And they did, firing a dozen or so shells. That, however, is a recipe for disaster so long as Palestinian gunmen launch home-made rockets at Israel from within residential areas, without really knowing where they will land, and what casualties or damage they will cause….
There’s a key difference between the Hamas and Hizbullah fighters and Israel’s. They intentionally fire rockets at civilian targets, hoping for maximum casualties and damage.
We don’t. The artillery troops who fired shells at Beit Hanun yesterday weren’t hoping to hit civilians. They were targeting terrorists firing rockets.
This editorial in The Guardian takes a diametrically opposite view:
But Israel’s actions, as in Lebanon this summer, have ignored the obligation to act in proportion to the threat, to avoid civilian casualties, and comply with international humanitarian law, which includes the personal responsibility of commanders for war crimes and crimes against humanity.
