It’s being described as a “massacre,” a set of “morally indefensible war crimes” carried out by Israel that have gone far “beyond self-defense” against the Hamas terrorists who carried out the brutal assault Oct. 7 that has killed over 1,400 Israelis to date and captured another 199 hostages.
“History is watching,” United Nations relief coordinator Martin Griffiths warned Monday, cautioning Israel to think twice as it weighs a full-scale ground invasion of the Gaza Strip, a move that critics say will lead to humanitarian suffering on a scale rarely seen in recent human history.
As Israel weighs a military move to permanently dismantle Hamas, analysts say the terrorist outfit and its Iranian backers are already deep in the second phase of their carefully planned campaign, painting Israel as the aggressor in the fight.
Hamas leaders knew Israel would respond to this month’s deadly terrorist assault with a show of unprecedented military force in the form of airstrikes, a siege of Gaza, and likely a ground invasion using tanks and infantry forces. They believed, specialists say, that much of the world — especially Arab governments that prior to the attack had been actively warming their relations with Jerusalem — would soon turn their attention away from the Hamas attack itself and toward the plight of the Palestinians and the perceived brutality and inhumanity of Israel‘s response.
Indeed, media coverage in recent days has largely turned to the rapidly deteriorating humanitarian conditions in Gaza, which include tens of thousands of Palestinians desperately trying to flee the northern section of the enclave, hospitals running out of food and medicine, and young children without access to shelter or clean water. Hamas and its allies seem to believe they can capitalize on those images to do lasting damage to Israel, both in the public-relations arena and on the geopolitical front, perhaps forever poisoning the prospect that Arab powers such as Saudi Arabia would normalize ties with a Jewish state that is willing to use such tactics.
“Hamas is winning the YouTube war,” said Michael Doran, senior fellow and director of the Center for Peace and Security in the Middle East at the Hudson Institute. “The spectacle of civilian casualties in Gaza — it’s having a much bigger effect in the Muslim world than the atrocities Hamas perpetrated” in its attack on Israel.
“Hamas is backed by Iran, which has a very effective propaganda operation,” Mr. Doran said in an interview. “It’s global in nature, primarily focused on social media. Their propaganda makes a compelling argument that Hamas fighters are noble, don’t kill civilians, don’t kill babies, don’t rape girls, unlike the Zionists, who kill families and babies in their home.”
Mr. Doran said it’s clear Hamas “wanted to provoke a massive Israeli response,” and that Hamas and its Iranian backers had a plan “already in place” to try to turn public opinion against Israel immediately after it began its counterattack.
The Israeli operation continued Monday with more airstrikes against alleged Hamas targets in Gaza and the continued movement of troops and equipment to the Gaza border. For the third straight day, Israel said it established a safe corridor for civilians to move out of northern Gaza, which is expected to see the bulk of the fighting if Israeli troops mount a full ground incursion.
The U.N. and humanitarian groups say Israel‘s evacuation warning, and its total blockade of food, fuel, water and other basic goods, have created an intolerable situation in Gaza. Egyptian officials on Monday seemed to blame Israel for not allowing supply trucks loaded with basic goods to move across the single Egypt-Gaza border crossing post. Aid groups warned that hospitals are nearly out of medicine and fuel. The U.N. said more than 1 million people have been displaced, while officials in Gaza said nearly 3,000 Palestinians have died and nearly 10,000 have been wounded since Israel launched its counterstrike.
Images of those conditions in Gaza have flooded social media in recent days. They’ve also become prominent aspects of news coverage, including on some U.S. and European networks, as the Israeli military response begins to eclipse the Hamas terrorist attack as a major news event.
‘A big mistake’?
Israel has insisted it will not target civilians in Gaza. The Israeli government stresses that it has and will continue to go to great lengths to ensure the safety of noncombatants, though Israeli officials acknowledge that Hamas makes that infinitely more difficult by basing its operations in schools, hospitals, and other targets where humans can be used as shields.
Israel also has vowed it will move ahead on its own schedule, and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his allies have given little indication that they’ll be swayed by global public opinion.
“The Israelis will await the movement south of the maximum number of Palestinian civilians possible before launching the ground incursion — in the event incursion goes ahead. But they are not waiting because international opinion wants them to wait, but because the standard of moving innocent civilians out of harm’s way is central to the ethos of the Israeli Defense Forces and the Israeli people,” said Benjamin Anthony, a former Israeli Defense Forces combat reservist and CEO of the MirYam Institute, a U.S.-based Israeli think tank.
“Israel does not require any guidance from the international community when it comes to prosecuting defensive wars in the most humane way possible,” he told The Washington Times in a telephone interview from Tel Aviv on Monday.
The world has largely rallied behind the basic concept of Israel‘s right to defend itself in the wake of the Oct. 7 attack, which featured numerous atrocities targeting unarmed villages and public gatherings. But many prominent voices are also admonishing Mr. Netanyahu and his government in public forums.
“Don’t attack civilian infrastructure, protect civilians when they move,” Mr. Griffiths, the U.N. relief coordinator, said Monday. “Make sure they get the aid they need and make sure that there are corridors which allow them some respite from the relentless attacks that are happening upon them.”
Even President Biden on Sunday night offered his view of what the Israeli military should and shouldn’t do in the Gaza Strip.
In an interview with “60 Minutes,” Mr. Biden stressed that believes Israel will do everything in its power to spare innocent life. But he also cautioned Israel not to militarily occupy Gaza.
“I think it would be a big mistake. What happened in Gaza, in my view — the extreme elements of Hamas don’t represent the Palestinian people. It would be a mistake for Israel to occupy Gaza again,” he said.
Other world leaders have been much more critical. Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said late last week that Israel had already crossed the line.
“Preventing people meeting their most fundamental needs and bombing housing where civilians live — in short, conducting a conflict using every sort of shameful method — is not a war, it’s a massacre,” he said, according to Reuters.
Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi had a somewhat similar assessment last week, saying that Israel‘s actions “have gone beyond self-defense.”
Israel “should heed the call of the international community and the secretary-general of the United Nations to stop its collective punishment of the people in Gaza,” China’s state-controlled Xinhua news outlet wrote in an article describing Mr. Wang’s comments.
Criticism of Israel‘s response has also mounted in pop culture circles. British actor Riz Ahmed on Monday posted a lengthy statement on social media that decried the Hamas terrorist attack as “horrific and wrong,” but also blasted Israel‘s actions in Gaza.
“We are being asked to look away while the civilians of Gaza, half of them children, are running out of time. If we are on the side of humanity we must urgently speak up to try and avert the loss of innocent life,” he said. “This means calling for an end to the indiscriminate bombing of Gaza’s civilians and vital infrastructure, the denial of food, water and electricity, the forced displacement of people from their homes. These are morally indefensible war crimes.”
• Staff writer Guy Taylor contributed to this report.
