Israel’s aim is to give vent to rage, revenge and self-defence
It has been raining bombs on Gaza for the last two weeks. Bombs dropped by the Israel Defence Forces (IDF) in response to the shocking murder of 1,400 Israelis by Hamas on October 7, an armed attack against which Israel is entitled to defend herself.
Hamas’ attack and murder of unarmed civilians, including infants and pregnant women, was beyond murder; it was cruel and humiliated the victims beyond belief. It shocked Israel into a state of rage and Gaza into a state of siege.
It is impossible to comprehend the reluctance of some people to condemn Hamas’ massacre of innocents. Condemning Hamas’ unspeakable atrocity does not mean condoning Israel’s policy towards the Palestinians before or after October 7. What it means is that one condemns Hamas when the victims are Israeli, as one condemns Israel when the victims are Palestinian.
The treatment of Palestinians in the occupied areas has been appalling; particularly after the murder of Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin in 1995, for his willingness to agree a Palestinian State in the West Bank and Gaza. Since then Israeli’s policy towards the Palestinians has been cruel and inhuman and designed to drive them to resettle in Jordan or elsewhere as happened in 1948 – the Nakba or catastrophe in Palestinian folk memory.
I knew two Palestinian families that came to Cyprus after the 1948 war. The children attended the American Academy in Larnaca, at which we were students in the 1960s. We became friends with both Palestinian and Jewish kids at the school, and I leant early on how to tip toe round their differences and avoid treading on their corns. So here are some home truths about the current crisis.
The need for military support that Israel is receiving from the US and Britain in this crisis is surplus to requirements. I can understand moral support and empathy for the catastrophe two weeks ago, but the military support provided has gone completely over the top.
I am as old as Israel and know that she won all four wars against her Arab neighbours in 1948, 1956, 1967 and 1973 and invaded Lebanon in 1982. She won convincingly on each occasion and in 1967 conquered East Jerusalem and the West Bank from Jordan, Gaza from Egypt and the Golan Heights from Syria in six days.
The invasion Israel is about to launch in Gaza is asymmetrical. Her daily bombardment by super modern fighter bombers has complete domination of the skies over Gaza, while the iron dome defence system provides protection for Israel’s civilian population. Its tanks are poised to invade without fear of attack, and Gaza has sustained saturation bombing that has killed at least 3,000 defenceless civilians.
Gaza’s hospitals are full and running out of power, medical supplies and water; a million Gazans have been ordered to move south regardless of their inability to do so. On top of which last Tuesday an Anglican hospital in the centre of Gaza City was hit, killing hundreds of innocent civilians.
The Israelis vigorously deny they were responsible. They insist they are civilised and do not target hospitals whereas Hamas are terrorists. They rushed to a forensic analysis of the bombing from which they deduced it was a rocket from Gaza fired by Islamic Jihad.
However, it is important to subject their claim to skeptical scrutiny. The Israeli air force has been raining thousands of bombs on Gaza since October 7, killing a large number of civilians. Besides, targeting hospitals can take different forms, including starving them of power, water and medicines and ordering their evacuation knowing it is impossible. So, I do not buy the argument that they are civilised and do not target hospitals. Furthermore, the IDF has itself said Hamas uses hospitals and schools as human shields, presumably to justify bombing them.
On that analysis, the burden is on the IDF to prove that the bomb that killed so many innocent civilians sheltering in the precinct of the Anglican hospital was not one of their bombs. We are being asked to believe that of all the thousands of bombs the IDF dropped on Gaza, unusually, this one came from a rocket fired from inside Gaza that misfired after a short trajectory and landed on the hospital. It may not be impossible, but it requires very strong proof rather than evidence gathered in the fog of war or provided by Israel’s allies. The starting point of any analysis is that it was IDF that had been deliberately bombing Gaza continuously since October 7.
Many in Arab countries concluded early on that it was an Israeli bomb. It is not an irrational conclusion given the intensity of the Israeli aerial bombardment and the rage that has gripped Israel. However, the truth will out in the end, so it is best to suspend judgment.
Israel’s retaliation has three intertwining strands. They are: incessant bombing, siege and a ground invasion. Their aim: to give vent to rage, revenge and long-term self-defence.
The IDF claim that while they are gripped by rage they are rational and have not been so overwhelmed by the enormity of the atrocities of October 7 as to flout the rules of war. The siege and relentless bombing of Gaza, however, tell a different story.
International law allows the use of force by states in self-defence provided the force is reasonable and proportionate, subject to whatever measures the UN Security Council takes to maintain peace and security. It therefore falls on Israel’s allies, three of whom are permanent members of the Security Council, to calibrate Israel’s self-defence so as to ensure the people of Gaza are not collectively punished. Most had nothing to do with the massacre on October 7, which they would condemn unequivocally if they knew the depths of depravity to which Hamas had sank.
Collective self-defence saw western leaders flock to Israel to show solidarity. That was all very well until they realised that their active support of collective punishment was in breach of the laws of war – a war crime no less.
UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres had warned them many times that the siege of Gaza may lead its population of two and a half million to perish. He concentrated the minds of western leaders on the legal consequences for them if the Palestinians were indeed to die of thirst and starvation. What then?
Hence the shift in favour of self-defence tempered with humanitarian relief for Gaza and compliance with the rules of war. But still no humanitarian aid got through, so on Friday Guterres went to the Egyptian border with Gaza to plead for humanitarian aid to be allowed through to the people of Gaza as it was, he said, a matter of life and death. The West is morally rudderless!
Alper Ali Riza is a king’s counsel in the UK and a retired part time judge
