As the ongoing conflict between Israel and Hamas persists, numerous media reports fixate on the grim “body count” of both sides.
At the moment, more than 1,300 Israelis have lost their lives, primarily civilians executed by Hamas’s death squads, and some 200 Israelis have been taken captive. According to the Palestinian Health Ministry in Gaza, which is controlled by Hamas, 3,300 Palestinians have perished with roughly half of them being women and children.
The suffering of each innocent human being is a catastrophe and should not be weighed according to their nationality, ethnicity or religion. However, when assessing the complete situation, one cannot relieve oneself from taking a careful look at the direct cause of the death and suffering.
Both legal and moral assessments should focus less on numbers and more on the intentions and motives behind the violence.
It is important to begin by asking: What was the objective of Hamas’s orchestrated attack on Israel on October 7th?
When considering the broader context, it is clear that while military installations and observation cameras were targeted at the outset of the assault, these were merely means to achieve a more sinister end—gaining unrestricted access to undefended civilian towns and kibbutzim near the Gaza border.
Once this access was achieved, Hamas forces made no effort to locate and engage Israeli military forces positioned farther from the border. Instead, death squads infiltrated these communities, moving from house to house, to slaughter entire families. In many cases, this violence was accompanied by torture and rape, with children bound together and, horrifyingly, burned alive. Elderly individuals and children were kidnapped and taken to Gaza.
This was no covert operation. On the contrary, live videos were uploaded in real-time to social media, sometimes even on the victim’s own smartphone. Such horrifying scenes recurred in various kibbutzim that were raided. From an international law perspective, these attacks leave no room for doubt about intentions: the leaders of Hamas executed a widespread and systematic strategy that directly targeted the civilian population with the aim of terrorizing not only the victims but also their surviving family members, neighbours, and the Israeli population to discourage them from returning to their homes. In other words, this was an act of ethnic cleansing, genocide, and a crime against humanity. But don’t take my word for it: the evidence is available on your phone, TV and iPad.
Now let’s turn to what causes civilian casualties among Palestinians. The Israeli Air Force conducts airstrikes in Gaza with the goal of achieving military objectives and targeting the military infrastructure of Hamas, often situated within civilian neighborhoods. Attacking such targets is legally acceptable unless the expected loss to civilians is excessive in relation to the military advantage anticipated. The more vital the military necessity to neutralize the target, the narrower the scope for taking precautions to protect civilians in the vicinity. Assessing this balance is challenging from an external perspective since the military commander’s judgment relies on classified intelligence and real-time developments on the ground. The unfortunate harm to civilians, while regrettable, cannot, in and of itself, serve as an indicator of wrongdoing.
When we scrutinize intentions after this analysis, the contrast becomes stark: Hamas targeted military sites as a means to an end, namely, attacking the Israeli civilian population. Meanwhile, Palestinian civilians are unintentionally harmed as a consequence of efforts to neutralize Hamas’s military infrastructure.
Contrary to media coverage, war should not be viewed as a sporting event, and the relative “score” of civilian casualties should never be used as a moral yardstick. The media must also be cautious about being quick to lay blame. We have already seen a modern blood libel following the explosion at al-Ahli Arab hospital in Gaza that was the result of an errant rocket fired by Palestinian Islamic Jihad and verified by U.S. intelligence.
In this challenging time for the Israeli people as our military seeks to restore our security and safety in a very dangerous region, we ask Canadians and citizens of all liberal democracies for their support and to focus on intentions. There are times when a clear and unequivocal legal and moral judgment is imperative. A quotation that has often been attributed to Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. (drawing from Dante) says it best: “the hottest places in hell are reserved for those who, in times of moral crisis, maintain their neutrality.” There comes a time when silence becomes betrayal.
Do not remain silent; stand with liberal democracies; support Israel.
