1.
There has been much talk in the press in recent days relating to “revelations” about the behavior of some members of the IDF in Gaza. I put the word revelations in brackets above because nobody who knows anything about warfare can have imagined that sending large numbers of well-equipped combat troops to fight against irregulars in built up areas was going to produce anything but a significant number of civilian deaths.
2.
All armies depend for their effectiveness on channeling the most aggressive and brutal instincts of large groups of young men and, therefore, there can be little real surprise that some members of the IDF appear not to have taken sufficient care to protect the lives of civilians and to have damaged and destroyed civilian property just because they had the opportunity to do so with impunity. It is to be hoped that this story in Haaretz serves to see any abuses or crimes investigated and the guilty punished.
3.
The armies of the UK, the USA, Canada and the Netherlands are engaged in large-scale operations in Iraq and Afghanistan. Any infantry unit from these countries that finds itself in difficulties immediately summons air support. What this means in practice is that large bombs are dropped on the area from which the European or North American forces are being fired on. This area may also be raked with fire from helicopter gunships. As warfare is an uncertain and confusing business, this constant resort to airpower regularly results in the death of large numbers of civilians. This loss of civilian life is reported in the press in Europe and North American and there appears the occasional op-ed piece lamenting it. Not much more than that. One sees little evidence of anyone being shocked or surprised. Few find it odd that, given a choice between risking their own lives and risking those of civilians, British, Canadian, Dutch and American soldiers decide they’d rather go on living and call in an F16 to destroy the location they are being fired on from or, for that matter, that they shoot the unidentified individual approaching their position in case he turns out to be a suicide bomber. In due course we’ll find out about acts of vandalism and insults to religion of the enemy too, because that’s what war is like.
4.
When Israeli soldiers behave in a similar manner the reaction is different. There is much talk of “the truth coming out” and such like. Why the difference? Perhaps because for many commentators it’s only permissible for the Jews to have a state and an army if that state and that army comply with standards of behavior far higher than that required of other states, including their own. Any failure to live up to these standards tends to be taken as evidence of the basic illegitimacy of the Zionist enterprise. Our own armed forces can be permitted and, if the need arises, forgiven for the killing of civilians and the destruction of their property in campaigns being carried out thousands of miles from our shores while we luxuriate in phony outrage occasioned by similar behavior on the part of Israelis fighting a short bus ride from their front doors in operations against an organization which is determined to liquidate their independence and which enjoys the support of a neighboring militant theocracy, a state that daily roars its determination to have done with the “Zionist entity” - and which is making rapid strides towards acquiring the means to make its dreams come true.
Superb commentary, Eamonn; to my mind, another must-read on the issue is here:
http://docs.google.com/Doc?id=dgxshts6_50dn5vfxfh
Do you have a comparative ratio of civilians over fighters that have been killed by NATO (or other western armies)in ex-Yugoslavia, Afghanistan or Iraq, in comparison to of Gaza?
In Gaza it was about 1:1, according to the HAMAS.
I see, so even after these appalling accounts, reflecting a culture of impunity and thoroughgoing dehumanization of Palestinian civilians, we’re still talking about “the inevitable costs of war” and such. You’re missing the forest for the trees, Eamonn, and you’re allowing the extremo anti-zionists to warp your own judgment.
David, no problem if you disagree with my views but this kind of thing
“…you’re allowing the extremo anti-zionists to warp your own judgment.”
is out of order. I at least deserve credit for being able to think for myself
Forgive me, Eamonn, but what I mean is this: not everything is a back-and-forth debate between Israel and George Galloway - as I argued in my Gaza post from a while back. Given the gravity of these latest accounts of IDF abuses, I find the tone of your post cavalier.
In the early 60’s as a student I did the OTC Cert B ie infantry subaltern’s “ticket.” It was a bit of extra money, a weekend a month in the country at HMG expense, and if the balloon had gone up we would all have been called up anyway.
At question time to the lecture on village clearing - mindful of some nastier incidents in WW II - I asked the half colonel giving the presentation what we were to do about any civilians in the [battle] area. He replied matter of factly that any civilians in a battle area were there at their own risk. Then still somewhat embarrassed after 20 years admitted that he had once shot a Belgian farmer who had come round the corner of a building a bit too quickly [given the nerves of everybody engaged in live firing for their lives at the time].
As the Gazans voted for Hamas as Germans voted for Hitler; I am not quite sure what the fuss is about. Too many people think you can fight a war in the same calm way you can run a police operation against drunks. Not on… Just try doing some military training even when you are fit… never mind with real bullets pinging about you for real and not just for training “atmosphere”. Then of course the Arabs do not observe the Geneva Conventions (when did they let Red Cross visit Gilad Shalit or Ron Arad?) nor the UN resolutions anyway. They have been in breach of UN 181 ever since they said the Arabs would fight it all through the six months before it even passed the UN-GA.
David, please take the trouble to read the document to which I linked before: it’s written by Yaacov Lozowick, a historian who formerly was director of the archives at Yad Vashem; he himself had a son fighting in Gaza. I have no idea what leads you to claim that Eamonn “is missing the forest for the trees”, and your comment about “extremo anti-Zionists” is a mystery.
Eamonn is certainly right in many of his observations, and most definitely in his point 4: it’s plain enough that the IDF is held to a very different standard than other armies, including Western armies and NATO.
Which brings me to Yossi’s question: I think in the Nato campaign in ex-Yugoslavia, some 180 fighters and about 550 civilians were killed; and I read recently somewhere that it’s quite common that the number of civilian casualties is higher than the number of armed combattants.
One more observation on the double standards: at the same time that the IDF’s alleged misconduct in Gaza was reported in the international media, the NYT had a story that reported on the high number of sexual assault cases in the US military that often go unpunished — but of course, that wasn’t immediately reported all around the world.
Another interesting piece that shows what the IDF was up against in Gaza is here:
http://www.csmonitor.com/2009/0320/p09s01-coop.html
It mentions the Nahr al-Bared refugee camp in Lebanon — maybe it’s not so well known how the Lebanese army solved the problem they faced there, because it wasn’t all that much reported in the international press…
David Adler: “Forgive me, Eamonn, but what I mean is this: not everything is a back-and-forth debate between Israel and George Galloway…”
No, some of it is a back and forth between Israel and the antisemite,Dieudonné.
Who, “se déclare candidat “anti-sioniste” aux européennes,” who has become a candidate to the European Parliament.
http://www.lemonde.fr/elections-europeennes/article/2009/03/21/dieudonne-se-declare-candidat-anti-sioniste-aux-europeennes_1171178_1168667.html#xtor=RSS-3208
The dehumanization of Israeli Jews in Europe, and elsewhere, dwarfs anything you will find in Israel vis a vis the Palestinians. This is not to say that I excuse anti Arab sentiments in Israel. I don’t. I condemn it. I also look forward to the day when Israel will reform its election laws and stop giving a veto to small extremist parties.
Still, to vilify the Israeli army because some of its soldiers behaved badly while that same army is investigating those abuses is to have one’s priorities mixed up.
I therefore appreciate Eamonn’s spirited defense of Israel on this blog, and you should to.
Well David, as you seem to be in the mood for a little ad hominem let me say that I find your tone priggish and the substance of your remarks idiotic.
States depend on violence to sustain their existence and if you defend the right of a state to exist you defend its right to violence too. There are no states with clean hands. There’s no way of defending the existence of Israel or any other state that doesn’t leave you spattered with blood.
I have no clue as to what your remark about Galloway means.
As regards the “culture of impunity”; I don’t know what you are trying to say, soldiers fighting legal wars in a legal manner enjoy a huge degree of impunity for acts that would normally be regarded as being beyond the pale of acceptable behavior.
As regards dehumanizing attitudes to enemy civilians; that’s not exactly unusual in armed conflict either. It only seems to excite people when Jews are guilty of it.
And, as the article Petra links to concludes
“War is one of the worst occupations men can engage in – though genocide and some large scale injustices are worse, and their prevention justifies war. There is no such thing as a pretty war. The decision to be in war entails, always, the decision to do things that would be totally unacceptable in any other context. For this reason, the decision must be made with care, including detailed planning, meticulous training, permanent self reflection even under fire, and calm examination of everything afterwards so that mistakes not be repeated. Israel is currently examining itself, in a public, communal discussion. I cannot think of any other society which does this in such a frank and open manner; certainly never any of our enemies, but not any of our friends, either. The decision of our critics to cast this in a very different light tells mostly who they are, not who we are.”
My intention is not to “vilify the Israeli army” but to see it held accountable for blatant human rights abuses. Forget “holding Israel to a higher standard”; no commenter on this blog seems interested in holding Israel to any standard at all. War is hell, boys will be boys, a few bad apples - what trite and unserious stuff.
“…no commenter on this blog seems interested in holding Israel to any standard at all. War is hell, boys will be boys, a few bad apples - what trite and unserious stuff.”
You are wrong there too, David.
I said that I was glad that the Israeli army is holding hearings on the behavior of its soldiers.
I am very much for holding Israeli soldiers to a standard of behavior compatible with international rules of engagements in war. I am against holding it to a higher standard and I am against its international vilification by the left on the grounds that it isn’t perfect.
If these same folk would shown even one tenth of the angst over Arab antisemitism, their daily dehumanization of Jews in the media or to ask that Hamas and Hezbollah followed the same rules of war demanded of Israel then I might listen to their criticism.
As it is their criticism is hypocritical at best and shows a level of malice not seen since the 30’s in Western Europe or in Stalinist Russia.
Maybe I’m being blinded by the fact that I respect and like all of you - Eamonn, Petra, David - so much, and therefore don’t want to read you trading barbs, but I am struggling to see the argument here. None of you seem to disagree on the principle that any illegal acts committed during war should go unpunished, whether by the IDF or anyone else. I thought Eamonn made that pretty clear in the last sentence of his second point.
Eamonn, at least you warned me your reply would be an ad hominem, but that was quite something.
Jacob, what you would know if you read my writing is that I do condemn the vilification of Israel by the western radical left; I do condemn Arab antisemitism and the terrorism of Hamas and Hezbollah as forcefully as anyone; I do condemn those on the far left who support Hamas and Hezbollah. Nothing about that is inconsistent with my reaction to the reported IDF abuses.
I do not care that such abuses are “not exactly unusual,” Eamonn; in fact, that makes them all the more disgusting. And don’t dare suggest that I only get “excited” when Israel commits crimes. I have protested human rights abuses, and leftist apologetics for human rights abuses, in many different global contexts.
Maybe it’s “priggish” to see something deeply disturbing in the pregnant-lady-bullseye t-shirt, and to be outraged that that sort of viciousness played itself out during Cast Lead - a conflict in which we were assured, by Eamonn and many others, that Israel was taking every precaution against harming civilians. No, it wasn’t.
“I do condemn Arab antisemitism and the terrorism of Hamas and Hezbollah as forcefully as anyone; I do condemn those on the far left who support Hamas and Hezbollah. Nothing about that is inconsistent with my reaction to the reported IDF abuses.”
Fair enough.
I do will condemn the abuses if they indeed turn out to be accurately reported. I will wait though till the final outcome of the hearings as I don’ trust most of the reports I have seen and the alleged testimony in Haaretz by a few soldiers isn’t the end of the story. Was the abuse systematic was it by out of control indivuals or is it a problem with some units. We don’t have the answers to these questions yet, David.
In any case, as I said, I am heartened that the IDF is conducting hearings which to me at least means a great deal.
Yes, all armies commit atrocities. I am confident the IDF is no exception, no matter how much we Jews want to believe that the IDF is “the most moral army in the world.”
The problem with stories like this is their cumulative impact on young progressive Jews in America.
Their feelings toward Israel are already tenuous at best. They can form their own judgments, and to them, certain undeniable events in Gaza are just another nail in the coffin, I am afraid.
Not to mention religious fervor fueling some new and disturbing trends inside the IDF, as documented in the piece in the Times today.
Eric, I am not worried about young progressives who are already alienated from the Jewish community as well as Israel.
The story in the Times about the IDF is a bit exaggerated since most ultra Orthodox don’t serve in the military. The way to counteract the few that do is for young Jewish progressives (especially in Israel) to also join the IDF. The IDF has traditionally been a progressive force which acted as kind of an egalitarian “Ellis Island” that acculturated new immigrants into Israeli society.
In some ways the whole discussion is an exposition of how Arab pigeons have come home to roost. After eight years of rocketing the south, 70 years going back to 1936 of attacking civilian buses - and the Scorpions’ Pass attack of Purim ‘53 is the first Israeli -Arab incident I am conscious of remembering in my own witness as a news item; spending the fifties border reiving Israeli villages within the Green Line and attacking the railway, at least 50 years of vilification remembering how Arab students even in the early 60’s could not say a sentence about Israel without including “fascist” and other political swearwords in every sentence - Oh! they did not say “Israel” then, only “Zionist entity” - and the continual slanging of Jews as pigs and monkeys; nobody should be too surprised that some Israeli soldiers have reacted with, “Could not happen to a nicer people,” type behaviour - which does not excuse this sort of behaviour being investigated and stopped as it is cowardly and self demoralising eventually.
For compare and contrast in 1914 - 18 the British army found (in round figures) it had to charge 30 000 of its soldiers for crimes carrying the death penalty ie NOT just cowardice and dropping one’s weapon BUT violence, murder, rape and assault on the [allied]civil population! 3000 were actually sentenced to death, and 300 executed; of whom fifty were on their second death sentence having been commuted of the first - and one was on his third!
‘It is to be hoped that this story in Haaretz serves to see any abuses or crimes investigated and the guilty punished.’ Certainly this doesn’t color the whole operation but the crimes, if they happened, must be punished appropriately. And now that this has become public, for whatever reasons, the results must be publicized. For ‘public hygiene’ as a previous State Comptroller said.
Frank Adam, I am not familiar with the WW1 British army account.
Do you have a reference for that? I would like to read more about it.
If I’m not mistaken, quite apart from the disturbing presence of a brutalized mentality among some IDF soldiers that is exposed by the Haaretz account, there are substantial allegations of IDF soldiers shooting a woman and two children, and an old woman, under circumstances that have not yet been investigated, and the facts have not yet been determined. It would be wrong to proceed with a “yes, but” line of argument in response to these disclosures, but context is important. Our newspapers are not filled with the preliminary results of any Hamas investigation into the circumstances of the dozens of innocent Palestinian women and men whose eyes were gouged out, or who were otherwise tortured, dismembered, crippled and executed by Hamas during those same horrible weeks. If there is a “double standard” at work here, there it is.
Eamonn devoted a great deal of his post to a sort of comparison with the tragedy of civilian casualties in Afghanistan and Iraq. In Afghanistan, the issue of civilian casualties is extremely divisive, sometimes explosive, but as is the case with the recent uproars about IDF brutality, the matter is far more nuanced than one would imagine from reading most accounts. Eamonn may have left the incorrect impression that it is only the UK, Canada, the US and the Netherlands with troops engaged in Afghanistan. In fact there are 39 countries with troops in Afghanistan, and there is a wide range of approaches to the challenge of avoiding civilian casualties. While NATO, UNAMA and Afghan human rights organizations are working with often widely diverging estimates on civilian casualties, all concur that most are attributable to “anti-government” forces such as the Taliban, and all usually overlook the Taliban slaughter of Afghan police officers (roughly 1,000 in 2008) since they are not considered “civilians.”
The important part is that even in the case of poorly executed American air strikes that so often and tragically result in the deaths of civilian non-combatants, Afghan opinion ( like NATO opinion and “western” opinion) is divided on the burden of blame in such incidents. Some Afghans fault the armies that called in the air strikes, others fault the Taliban that engage in their lawless violence from hiding places among civilians.
I would be curious to know the state of Gazan opinion on who bears the burden of blame for all the tragic civilian deaths during Operation Cast Lead. But I suspect it is similarly divided.
Eamonn has written a short, clear piece that shouldn’t be particularly problematic. He doesn’t dismiss any wrongdoing by Israeli soldiers that proves to be true, and he doesn’t excuse the culprits. He makes a point, in fact, of saying so, but the main focus of his article is on something else: He is concerned about the predictable, widespread and hypocritical reflex to use these allegations as a weapon against Israel — not simply the soldiers directly involved, or their squad leaders or commanders, but Israel.
David Adler seems to be upset because Eamonn wrote that article and not a different one, focussed entirely on the guilt of the perpetrators, and he protests that _he_ hasn’t singled out Israelis for unfair criticism. Well, well done you, David — then this piece wasn’t about you. I don’t think anyone had suggested it was. It remains true that this news is being welcomed as a stick to beat Israel with, by everyone engaged in the dirty war on Israel’s ability to survive, and it is both fair and necessary for Israel’s supporters to address that.
My opinion is that you can demonstrate that the IDF behaved better than any other army in a comparable situation by the fact that there were zero rapes of women in Gaza by IDF soldiers.
Show me a war in which there are no rapes, and you will find that only with the IDF.
That proves the IDF is the most moral army in the world.
Civilian casualties are inevitable in warfare in urban areas, however. Multiply that by the fact that Hamas uses women and children as suicide bombers, and you can’t know if the woman that approaches you is doing it on purpose or by mistake.
Sorry, but there is nothing to see here. Or on the contrary, there is something to see: how to fight in the best moral way. The Jewish state continues to be a light unto the nations, and the nations continue to be blinded by it.
1.
I am, obviously, aware that the countries I mentioned are not the only ones involved in Afghanistan and I don’t think that my piece can reasonably be read as meaning that only the four countries mentioned are. However, they are the ones principally involved where the bulk of the fighting is being done, in the south and east.
2.
“In fact there are 39 countries with troops in Afghanistan, and there is a wide range of approaches to the challenge of avoiding civilian casualties.”
I’d be happy to have information about this wide range of approaches. By this I specifically mean; what alternatives to calling for air support does the hard-pressed infantry unit have at its disposal?
3.
“While NATO, UNAMA and Afghan human rights organizations are working with often widely diverging estimates on civilian casualties, all concur that most are attributable to “anti-government” forces such as the Taliban, and all usually overlook the Taliban slaughter of Afghan police officers (roughly 1,000 in 2008) since they are not considered “civilians.”
I am sure that this is correct but I don’t see its relevance in the context of what I was discussing. My comparison was between how the tactics of the Brits, Yanks etc are covered and the coverage afforded to comparable tactics employed by the IDF.
4.
“The important part is that even in the case of poorly executed American air strikes that so often and tragically result in the deaths of civilian non-combatants…”
The problem is not that poorly executed airstrikes cause civilian casualties, it’s that correctly executed ones do; commanders, acting under pressure and with incomplete information are obliged to decide between protecting their troops’ lives and protecting civilians.
Sorry for the long comment…
Jacob writes:
“I also look forward to the day when Israel will reform its election laws and stop giving a veto to small extremist parties.”
I have thought about this a lot but what is the solution? A five percent threshold like they have in Germany? How many Israelis would support something like that?
Eamonn writes:
“States depend on violence to sustain their existence and if you defend the right of a state to exist you defend its right to violence too. There are no states with clean hands.”
Yes, this is true, even in the case of democracies.
David, if you are looking for “serious stuff” in this regard, read Thucydides or Hobbes. If you prefer something more recent and lefty, try Charles Tilly’s “War Making and State Making as Organized Crime.” I also recommend the Tanakh. The world, especially the corner of the world where Israel is located, is a violent place.
Eric writes:
“The problem with stories like this is their cumulative impact on young progressive Jews in America. Their feelings toward Israel are already tenuous at best. They can form their own judgments, and to them, certain undeniable events in Gaza are just another nail in the coffin, I am afraid.”
Yeah, until these “young progressive Jews” grow up. Then they will wake up. It has happened to so many people (including me) that I have lost count.
Perta writes:
“It mentions the Nahr al-Bared refugee camp in Lebanon — maybe it’s not so well known how the Lebanese army solved the problem they faced there, because it wasn’t all that much reported in the international press…”
CK (Jewlicious) blogged about the incident here:
http://www.jewlicious.com/2007/08/lebanese-army-prepares-final-obliteration-of-refugee-camp-really/
“Now I know these Fatah al-Islam gunmen dudes are supporters of Al Quaeda and all - but with 40,000 people forced out of their homes, you’d expect some UN guys to say something or at least some cool footage of weeping civilians. With 40,000 people frightened away by intense violence, someone had to have wept. I’ll keep monitoring the news. I’m sure we’ll get the footage of this human rights catastrophe pronto. Any minute now, I’m sure.”
Check it out…
George Galloway is a self absorbed wanker, in many ways harmless, but anyone that raises money (45,000)is not permitted entry here into Canada.
But herein Canada and the UK there other threats. MWC News (media with a conscience)publishes anti-semetic cartoons and on its sister site modern writers.org offers an innocous discussion board called “respect”.
There appears to be few members. That is because man named Michael from somewhere in Oxford UK and MWC News use the site to bash “fithy Jews” quote and promote the Protocols of the Elders of Zion and to “send you filthy Jew to hell”.
George Galloway is harmless inasmuch as WE and ALL see what he is. MWC News and its modern writers group are more dangerous because it is more insidious.
I would suggest in a very real way MWC News is a very real threat very much more than the ordinary hate groups like “Storm Cloud” and First Amendment Radio and the like.
As for Michael or Michael Lee of Oxford just another of haters hiding amongst all