Dr. Aaron Lerner is co-founder of IMRA, Independent Media Review and Analysis, an Israel-based news organization which provides an extensive digest of media, polls and significant interviews and events relating to the Israeli-Arab conflict. imra@netvision.net.il
Israeli lives take precedence over those of "terror shields"
By Dr. Aaron Lerner
December 31, 2004
Is it moral to decline to stop a terrorist shooting because of the risk of hurting his human shield?
That should be the question the IDF ponders as it consider the challenge created by the heavy Palestinian use of human shields.
But that doesn't seem to be the issue as the IDF sees it.
Time and again the IDF's extensive monitoring system in the Gaza Strip has identified terror cells as they prepared to fire but the commanders declined to give the order to either pre-empt their attack or permanently prevent them from being able to repeat the attack because the terrorists operated under cover of human shields.
Let's be clear about this: these human shields are not hostages, nor are they casual bystanders with the bad fortune of being in the wrong place at the wrong time.
If you see a group of men setting up a rocket launcher and decide to stay with them you aren't an innocent bystander -- you are an intentional human shield.
If you stand with gunmen as they prepare to engage in combat you aren't an innocent bystander -- you are an intentional human shield.
It is certainly obscene that Israeli civilians should be allowed to die at the hands of terrorists simply because they are operating under the cover of human shields.
But how about Israeli security forces? Should any Israeli be allowed to die at the hands of terrorists operating under the cover of human shields?
Service in the IDF is an expression of a pact between the soldiers and their families and the state in which the soldiers agree to risk their lives in the defense of the nation. That's the "defense of the nation" - not "PR considerations of the nation".
Giving priority to Israeli lives over human shields may cost Israel a few points in the popularity polls, but it is the moral thing to do.
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