Even in memory, in my mind, the tension is still palpable. Last summer I had planned a trip to Vail. As it turned out, the dates coincided with the rising tensions in Israel, with rockets raining down on Southern Israel, seemingly increasing by the hour. By the time I was driving up, the painful question on all of our minds was: Will Israel be forced to undertake a ground invasion? Would Hamas accept the ceasefire proposal on the table, or would Israel need to take action to defend herself?
This is every Israeli and Israel sympathizer’s worst nightmare. Will the IDF soldiers be put in harm’s way?
On a human level, you always want to avoid war. Even for the enemy’s sake. Even for the Palestinians’ sake. We are all part of the human family, creations of G-d. To be sure, there are innocent Palestinians, and you don’t want them to be the ones to pay the price.
Between that sentiment and the more visceral one — one always feels closer to the nuclear family and, in this case, wants to protect the nation — was a war no one wanted and everyone prayed to avoid.
With Shabbat’s conclusion came the catastrophic news of 13 IDF soldiers killed. The Palestinian death rate was rising.
I left Vail after Shabbat, abruptly. I couldn’t continue with my usual fruitless search to spot a moose, take in the majestically beautiful scenery, smell the colorful wildflowers or enjoy a New York Philharmonic symphony.
I simply needed to get back. Back to what? Leaving Vail wasn’t going to make a dent in helping the war effort. But for myself, I needed to leave.
This week, in its review of “Operation Protective Edge,” the latest UN war crimes report against Israel has been released, dredging up the memories of last summer.
Surprise, surprise. Israel is mostly vilified; Hamas is mostly vindicated. These reports are the classic definition of deja-vu.
From the little I have read, I admit to literally wincing at some of the Palestinian interviews. Some of them lost their entire families. It’s beyond horrendous. On a human emotional level, this kind of staggering loss stands on its own, without apologetics.
Yet, once the task of investigating the war is undertaken, certain basic facts must be included. However, in this report, they seem to be conspicuously absent.
For starters, to give context, a timeline and sequence of events.
• There is no mention of Hamas having initiated the conflict. Certainly, the losses are overwhelming. But then, if one wants to limit civilian casualties, why was a conflict started in the first place?
• Also missing is any mention of the ceasefire offered in advance of Israel’s ground invasion but rejected by Hamas, to be brokered by Egypt. Again, here was an opportunity to avoid unnecessary, innocent deaths.
• Statistics regarding IDF operations are bandied about, but the IDF did not participate in the UN report, so what is the source of the information?
Mainly, though, the thorny moral issue of human shields is avoided altogether by the UN report. If Hamas intentionally situates missile launchers and tunnels in residential neighborhoods — like Denver’s Stapleton, for example — how can the tragedy of civilian deaths be avoided?
The report dismissed the IDF’s effort to warn civilians of impending attacks, asserting that regardless of the warnings the civilian deaths are the IDF’s responsibility.
I ask, why is this moral outrage of human shields, which does, heartbreakingly, lead to many unnecessary civilian deaths, not addressed by the UN report?
Like any other Western military, the IDF will and should protect its soldiers above any consideration of civilians placed in harm’s way by the enemy, by design.
As General Israel “Relik” Shafir, spokesperson in times of emergency for the Israel Air Force, told me last summer:
“We instruct the IDF soldiers with two directives. ‘Ha-ba lehorgecha hashkem lehorgo,’ one who comes to kill you, rise and kill him first (self-defense). The second directive is: ‘Kol ha-matzil nefesh achat…, ’ one who saves even one life, it is as though he has saved the world.’”
It is betwixt and between this space, this ultimate stake in a dialectical tension, in which the IDF soldiers live during wartime.
The UN report, by avoiding the crux of the issue, the root of the problem — the coddling of a terrorist regime and the relentless critique of the organized moral military force, the IDF, and instead narrowly focusing on the symptom, the civilian deaths, as brutal as that symptom sadly is — the UN not only contributes to its own ethical decay but contributes to the next round of fire that will come.
Instead of reaching out, trying to advance a genuine peace, or at least non-violence, what the UN has done with this report is to pat terrorists on the back, so they can confidently initiate another round of terror, another round of violence. Again, Israel will have no choice but to respond and defend herself, with another round of tragic, devastating loss of innocent civilian Palestinians and unbearable loss of IDF soldiers.
Instead of insightfully trying to find a way to use its diplomacy to mitigate bloodshed, the UN has again found a way to create more bloodshed in the Middle East.
The UN committee that was tasked with a report as serious as this one should not be able to get away with playing fast and loose with the facts, not to mention, ignoring the critical moral issues.
I would have liked to think that the committee actually valued human life, both Palestinian and Jewish, and would have written the report not only more factually, but also more richly, more sophisticatedly, to take even one step forward in the all too dangerous reality of the Israel-Palestinian conflict.
No matter how much one tries, some civilian deaths are inevitable in war. Which is why war was avoided by Israel as long as possible, until there was no choice. War should be the absolute final resort, after every other avenue is exhausted. Unnecessary, unnecessary, civilian deaths add the even saltier salt to the already festering wound of war.
So what has been gained by this UN report? The emboldening of another terrorist group to initiate conflict with Israel, to continue placing innocent civilians among military targets, and to stand smugly secure in the knowledge that it will be coddled and treated on equal footing with a legitimate military.
Whether I will find myself in Vail or Timbuktu during the next conflict — because, painful though it is to write, there will be a next conflict — I weep for all the innocents who will be caught in the snare.
This irresponsible UN report has just put a price on many heads, the heads of the innocents, on both sides.
Copyright © 2015 by the Intermountain Jewish News
