Israel constantly steps hard on its own foot.
Bombing The Enemy In 2003
On September 6, 2003, Israel received a golden intelligence information report about a meeting of Hamas’ top brass in an apartment in Gaza: Ahmed Yassin, founded Hamas in 1987, Mohammed Deif, head of the Izz al-Din al-Qassam in Gaza, Abdel Aziz al-Rantisi, co-founder of Hamas, Ismail Haniyeh, chairman of the Hamas Political Bureau, de facto Hamas Prime Minister and 8 other senior figures in the organization – all in one apartment and within reach of the Israeli Air Force to send them to the Creator.
While the Air Force jets were in the air, on their way to execute the mission, the Air Force’s performance research personnel warned that there were civilians in a building near the bombing target. They recommended canceling the operation. Finally, following intelligence information received about the meeting room, it was decided to attack using only one quarter-ton bomb.
The end is known: the information about the meeting on the third floor of a building was inaccurate and the entire Hamas leadership was spared from being killed.
Bombing The Enemy In 2024-25
On May 13, 2025, the Israeli Air Force used dozens of bombs, weighing a ton each, to bomb a terror tunnel and eliminate Muhammad Sinwar, a militant who has served as the leader of Hamas in the Gaza Strip and the leader of the Ezzedeen Al-Qassam Brigades from October 2024, after his brother, Yahya Al-Sinwar was killed in the same month, succeeding him in both roles.
In July 2024, the Israeli Air Force used dozens of one-ton bombs to eliminate Muhammad Deif. The same was true in the elimination of Hassan Nasrallah, a Lebanese Muslim cleric who served as the third secretary-general of Hezbollah, in Lebanon. Over 80 one-ton bombs, according to estimates, were dropped on Nasrallah’s hideaway bunker; and on al-Hashem Safi al-Din, a Lebanese Shia cleric and a senior leader of Hezbollah, over 70 one-ton bombs.
What About International Law?
And here the question arises: How is it possible that international law, which supposedly prohibited the use of one one-ton bomb to eliminate the entire Hamas leadership in 2003, now allows the use of dozens of one-ton bombs to eliminate Sinwar, Deif, Nasrallah and Safi al-Din?
After all, in all these assassinations it was clear that there was a reasonable chance that “uninvolved” civilians would also be harmed, especially in the assassinations in Beirut where entire building complexes were destroyed.
And how is it that the same – universal – morality of the Israeli Air Force and the Military Prosecution Service that prevented the use of a single ton bomb in 2003, do not oppose the use of dozens of ton bombs in 2024-25?
The answer is that nothing in international law has changed. And of course, the Air Force and the Military Prosecutor’s Office do not see themselves as less moral today than their counterparts 22 years ago.
What Has Changed?
What has changed is the scope of the willingness of Israeli society and the decision-makers to submit to distorted and baseless interpretations of international law when it comes to the legitimate collateral damage of eliminating many murderers and enemy leaders.
And the same is true with regard to the willingness of Israeli society to submit to pundits and intellectuals and sycophants who claim to have such developed morality that they grant moral immunity to the worst of the enemies of the State of Israel.
The Israeli society understood, after thousands of victims, injuries and bereaved families, that there is no restriction in international law that prevents the elimination of senior terrorists simply because they use civilians as human bullet proof vests and hide behind them.
And the Israeli public understood, after decades and thousands of tragedies, that there is no moral superiority in this castrating of the law approach pretending to be moral, rather the exact opposite.
The preference of the lives of the enemy’s citizens over the safety of Israeli citizens and IDF fighters is a moral disgrace that has cost the State of Israel bereavement, suffering and grief.
What Did Not Change?
And for those who think that after October 7, 2023, the citizens of the state of Israel changed their thinking disk, I am sorry to disappoint you. The lessons they have learned are partial and extremely limited.
The IDF Military Advocate General (JAG), Major General Yifat Tomer-Yerushalmi, now claims that international law prohibits Israel from distributing humanitarian aid only in certain designated areas of the Gaza Strip. This is a step that Israel is about to take that aims to move the population there and isolate the local terrorists in other areas.
According to Yerushalmi, international law requires Israel to ensure food distribution throughout the Gaza Strip, and it is not enough for the IDF to allow the population to move to areas where aid will be distributed to them.
Here again, one must distinguish between interpretation and facts. There is no article in international law that prohibits the transfer of the population to a safe area, in this case to the southern Gaza Strip where humanitarian aid will be distributed to them, while imposing a blockade on other areas in the Gaza Strip where terrorists are hiding or operating from.
The Geneva Convention
Article 23 of the Fourth Geneva Convention (1949) “concerns the consignment of medical supplies, food, and clothing for civilians. It mandates that each High Contracting Party allow the free passage of these items, even if they are intended for civilians of an opposing High Contracting Party. This obligation is subject to certain conditions regarding the potential for diversion or misuse of the supplies.”
In explicit contradiction to the position of the IDF JAG, the Article permits Israel to do exactly this: “The obligation of a party to the conflict to allow free passage as aforesaid is subject to the condition that the party is not convinced that there are serious reasons to fear: (a) that the shipments may be diverted from their destination; (b) that the supervision of the supply shipments will not be effective; (c) that the shipments may lead, directly or indirectly, to a clear military advantage for the enemy side.”
However, although the IDF JAG’s interpretation is unfounded and jeopardizes Israel’s ability to win the campaign, leaks from government’s cabinet’s discussions indicate that IDF Chief of the General Staff Eyal Zamir chooses to adopt JAG’s position and ignore other interpretations, which, as mentioned, are based on Article 23 of the Fourth Geneva Convention.
The meaning of JAG’s distorted interpretation of international law is that Israel should continue to transfer logistical supplies to Hamas that will complicate and jeopardize this war’s very victory.
This interpretation is just as wrong, baseless, and morally invalid as the interpretations of JAG’s past counterparts regarding the assassinations of senior terrorist figures some 20 years ago.
The fact that Israel is now dropping dozens of tons of explosives to eliminate its enemies is an important and welcome change after decades of legal and pseudo-moral castration.
Israelis Do What Needs To Be Done To Live
However, if Israelis truly desire life, and if they truly have drawn the necessary lessons from October 7, 2023, then they must stop succumbing to the whims and baseless interpretations of law by mediocre and rather pathetic jurists like JAG Yifat Tomer Yerushalmi, who has no understanding of the Fourth Geneva Convention and international law.
Morality And Bombing
Again, how is it possible that the same universal “morality” of the Israel’s Air Force and Military Prosecution Service personnel who almost prevented the use of a single ton bomb in 2003, do not oppose the use of dozens of one-ton each bombs in 2024-25?
The answer seems to be simple: before the October 7, 2023 massacre in southern Israel, they felt free to act upon their hubris, at the expense of the blood of the Jews living in the Holy Land. Now a little less. But most importantly, the citizens of Israel must continue to stand guard and remove the murderous political progress from among them!
On May 13, 2025, the area of the European Hospital in the city of Khan Younis, southern Gaza, was struck by Israeli airstrikes. The Israeli military stated that the target was a Hamas command center, located in a tunnel beneath the hospital and where Muhammad Sinwar and other Hamas high rank members were meeting.
