Word: gaza
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...guns have been largely silent for more than six months now, but the battle to define what exactly took place during Israel's 22-day military operation in Gaza in January rages as fiercely as ever. Earlier this month, Amnesty International published the findings of its inquiry into the conflict, accusing both Israel and Hamas of committing war crimes. Just this week, Britain announced that it had banned the sale to Israel of spare parts for its Saar 4.5 class corvette, because of the way the missile vessel had been used by Israel during the Gaza operation. An official...
...basis in fact and are instead driven by agendas hostile to the Jewish State. But suggestions of bias and hostility toward Israel are a more difficult response when similar claims are made by Israeli soldiers involved in the operation. In March, a group of soldiers who had fought in Gaza told a forum at an Israeli military college of a number of instances in which Palestinian civilians had been killed as a result of overly permissive rules of engagement for the operation that made such mistakes far more likely. Those claims prompted the IDF's internal inquiry, which contradicted...
...from overly permissive rules of engagement. There are no allegations of My Lai-type deliberate massacres; rather, the unnamed soldiers paint a picture of commanders so determined to avoid their own troops being harmed that they demanded that their men take an overly aggressive posture on the ground in Gaza, not hesitating to fire on any potential threat in an urban environment where, as one quoted his commander as saying, "anyone is your enemy...
...military rabbinate warning that "exercising mercy towards a cruel enemy means being cruel towards innocent and honest soldiers," allegedly helped create an atmosphere in which there was insufficient concern for Palestinian civilians, say some of the soldiers who spoke to Breaking the Silence. (Watch TIME's video "Protesting Gaza, Carefully, in the West Bank...
Half a year after the offensive, Gaza remains a gaping wound, little changed from how the Israelis left it when they withdrew in January. Its recovery is hampered by an ongoing Israeli blockade that prevents most reconstruction materials from entering the territory amid ongoing political deadlock between Israel and Hamas over captive soldier Gilad Shalit and between Hamas and Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas over political authority in the area. And the publication of the soldiers' testimonies - whatever Israelis make of them - is more evidence that closure on the 22-day war may still elude Israelis...