It would also save the lives of Israeli ground forces. If they don’t have to clear house to house, they won’t die in house to house fighting
I know, I was agreeing with your plan and methodology. I just don’t see that happening for a couple of reasons.
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It’s not clear to me that women & children would be allowed to actively leave. There is a lot of social pressure not to abandon your group regardless of the threat to your personal safety.
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Absolutely no fighting age men would be allowed into refugee camps or containment zones no matter what because checking every single one of them for weapons or IEDs is both extremely dangerous and time consuming. Plus they could be scouting or providing intelligence in other ways that would not be immediately clear.
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When you allow for a more humanitarian solution you are opening yourself up to scrutiny on multiple fronts based on how you are treating those within your care. It is easier to simply throw out leaflets or warning signals before bombing / clearing an area, and then let the chips fall where they may. It gives plausible deniability against the invariable collateral damage that is to follow.
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Lastly, war is always a dirty business. The truth is those within the military / government are always more willing to risk civilian casualties on the oppositional side rather than answering for casualties within their own forces. They also know the general public has an inbred need for revenge when these kinds of events occur. The silent majority often holds a “better us than them” mentality in the short term before cooler heads prevail, or people are exposed to the atrocities of their own military operations in the long term. Even then the damage has already been done, and most people simply move on.
There is no humanitarian solution coming. It is a nice thought, and a well intentioned one at that. But I can unequivocally guarantee you that there will be no financial or logistical appetite for saving Palestinian lives in this conflict, no matter what everyone repeats in the media. That is all for show. The hard truth is that many innocent people will die, the world will move forward, and Israel will collect it’s pound of flesh so it can save face on the world stage.
End of story.
You’re absolutely right. And I triple agree with the military urgency to get things done before international condemnation builds up. There’s currently a window of forgiveness open to Israel, and the military is incentivized to do as much as they can before that window closes and people start saying hang on you can’t do that.
Never waste a tragedy.
Even if the Isreali’s completely level Gaza they will then have to fight a Stalingrad-esque campaign of fighting militants and remaining commandos in the remains of the city. Not to mention whatever tunnels survived the raids.
No matter how you cut it, thousands will die on their side if they push. They don’t really seem to have a choice to back down now, but even if somehow they keep their casualties limited in Gaza, now the entire northern front has opened up with Hezb and other milita entering the frey. Its really a trap you can’t win.
Total military control of an area gives you lots of options. Especially if you have time to set things up.
You completely level all of the buildings, then you use your thermal imaging, drones, to remove anything that’s still moving.
To do a full cleanup, you could just wait, there’s no food or water coming in. Limited use of neutron devices, thermobaric bombardment, nitrogen gas displacement, all the things you can’t really use on civilian populations, become usable because the areas been evacuated. There’s a lot of options.
