Buildings where the rockets are stored?
According to the Israeli Defense Force Blog, "Over 5 million Israelis are currently living under threat of rocket attacks. Even worse, "More than half a million Israelis have less than 60 seconds to find shelter after a rocket is launched from Gaza into Israel. Most rockets launched from Gaza into Israel are capable of reaching Israel's biggest cities, including Tel Aviv and Jerusalem."
But what if Hamas sets up its rocket launchers next to hospitals? Stores its rocket inventories in schools? What if it places and fires its rockets from densely populated civilian areas? From among women and children? Is Israel barred from retaliating because women and children are likely to be killed?
Two recent reports from the U.N. Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) -- hardly a pro-Israeli organization -- should make clear to every American the Hamas propaganda tactic of using Palestinian women and children as human shields.
On July 17, its site reported under the heading "Agency demands full respect for the sanctity of its premises in Gaza":
"Yesterday, in the course of the regular inspection of its premises, UNRWA discovered approximately 20 rockets hidden in a vacant school in the Gaza Strip. UNRWA strongly condemns the group or groups responsible for placing the weapons in one of its installations. This is a flagrant violation of the inviolability of its premises under international law. This incident, which is the first (U.N. documented) of its kind in Gaza, endangered civilians including staff and put at risk UNRWA's vital mission to assist and protect Palestine refugees in Gaza. ...
"Palestinian civilians in Gaza rely on UNRWA to provide humanitarian assistance and shelter. At all times, and especially during escalations of violence, the sanctity and integrity of UN installations must be respected."
Then, on July 22, 2 UNRWA reported in "UNRWA condemns placement of rockets, for a second time, in one of its schools. Agency demands full respect for the sanctity of its premises in Gaza":
"Today, in the course of the regular inspection of its premises, UNRWA discovered rockets hidden in a vacant school in the Gaza Strip. As soon as the rockets were discovered, UNRWA staff were withdrawn from the premises, and so we are unable to confirm the precise number of rockets.
The school is situated between two other UNRWA schools that currently each accommodate 1,500 internally displaced persons."
In a July 24 op-ed in the Wall Street Journal, retired U.S. Marine Corps Commandant, Gen. James T. Conway wrote, "Earlier this month Hamas spokesman Sami Abu Zuhri appeared on Al-Aqsa TV and encouraged Gaza residents to act as human shields. They appear to have heeded the call: Israeli Defense Forces combat video has shown Palestinians rushing to rooftops after receiving warnings from Israel -- via phone calls, text messages and unarmed 'knock-knock' projectiles striking a target building -- that a missile attack is imminent.
"Since the beginning of ground operations into Gaza, the IDF has uncovered approximately 30 ... tunnels leading into Israel, in addition to the more than two dozen discovered prior to Operation Protective Edge. Hamas operatives have been intercepted emerging from such tunnels in Israel carrying tranquilizers and handcuffs, apparently hoping to replicate the successful 2006 kidnapping of IDF soldier ... for whom Israel exchanged 1,000 Palestinian prisoners in 2011."
To me, this isn't complicated. Israel has a right to act in self defense. As long as Hamas opts to make war from behind women and children, Israel has a right to do what is reasonable and necessary to protect its people from the Hamas' rocket and tunnel attacks -- even if Palestinian women and children are killed in the process of Israeli self-defense.
Hamas can stop this "collateral damage" very easily and quickly. It can end the rocket attacks, or it can move the rockets away from civilian areas -- away from schools and hospitals. And it can stop building tunnels into Israel. As long as Hamas tries to kill Israelis using women and children a "human shields," it bears 100 percent of the blame.
American news organizations which blame Israel every time a Palestinian child is killed, are intentionally portraying Israel in a pejorative light. Writing simply that "1,000 Palestinians have been killed" suggests that Israel is responsible for indiscriminately killing women and children. But if Israel was being "indiscriminate" instead of "surgical" the deaths should by now number in the tens of thousands. Gaza is small (141 square miles) and densely populated (1.8 million). If the Israelis are really trying to kill women and children, they are not very good at it.
Perhaps they need lessons from Russia's president. Comrade Putin and his henchman in the Ukraine were able to kill 298 civilian passengers aboard a Malaysian airliner in less than two minutes!
Posted Online: Aug. 08, 2014, 11:00 pm - Quad-Cities Online
by John Donald O'Shea
Copyright 2014
John Donald O'Shea
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