The struggle to live up to an ethic of Jewish power - opinion

After two millennia of passivity, of living by sufferance on the margins of the host society, Jewry opted to take power to shape its own fate by creating the State of Israel.

Taking power required a 180-degree turn in Jewish ethics. Jewish morality had high standards, but it was the ethical code of the powerless. We were totally innocent because we had no army and there were no people under our control.

The choice to take power was challenging because it meant giving up moral purity. Having an army and waging wars meant that, inescapably, there would be innocent civilian casualties. The heartbreaking truth is that in the real world, the definition of a moral army is that it kills as few innocent civilians as possible.

The majority of Jews were mature enough to realize that we must give up the self-righteousness of being victims. Creating a state and army would enable Jews to be primarily responsible for their own fate. Israel set out to be a democracy, and its army undertook to live by a high standard of morality. The IDF adopted a strong code of tohar haneshek (purity of arms) in the belief that this was the right way to act – and out of the conviction that soldiers who understand the morality of their cause, fight better.

The code started with the accepted principles of international law. An army goes to war out of necessity – i.e., only if warfare is the only way to enable life to go on. The army is committed to the principle of distinctiveness – to carefully distinguish civilians, leaving them alone while attacking only military targets and soldiers. Finally, if the enemy mixes civilian and military so that it becomes impossible to fight without putting civilians at risk, then the principle of proportionality prevails. If an attack would cause more harm to civilians than military advantage gained, then it is not carried out.

The IDF code is communicated to every soldier, and officers spend serious time instilling these values as part of the basic training process. These teachings were backed by a Judicial Advocate General office that monitored behaviors, investigated  deaths or abuses of civilians, and held people accountable before military tribunals. The Israel Supreme Court took over ultimate review of military justice and tactics to assure that the army fully lived up to its code. A free press and media also investigated excesses and checked potential violations.

As time went on, warfare shifted from mass armies clashing to guerrilla warfare and fighting terrorists, who were often embedded among civilians. The IDF sought ways to minimize  collateral damage. It developed smart bombs to assure that only the targeted military sites would be hit and special munitions that reduced explosive scatter. This reduced the chances of hitting civilians in the vicinity of a military target. The classic case is the Iron Dome missile defense system, which neutralizes rockets’ ability to destroy civilians and civilian life.

Reducing civilian casualties

The IDF developed tactics to reduce civilian casualties. These included scratching missions in actual operation where it was determined that too many civilians would be hurt; making mass telephone calls, warning local inhabitants to get out before their area was bombed or invaded; dropping flyers warning of coming military actions; and knocking on roof shells – which did not explode, but gave a last warning to civilians to get out before their building was struck. Many of these tactics allowed terrorist fighters to get out of harm’s way, but the IDF was determined to minimize civilian casualties at all costs.

THE REAL measure of the IDF’s accomplishments was articulated by Richard Kemp, who led the United Kingdom’s armed forces in Afghanistan. Driven by the need to gain the support of the population against the Taliban, the Allied forces made an all-out effort to reduce civilian casualties. By strenuous effort, the Allies brought the ratio of civilian deaths to that of fighters down to a historically unprecedented level – three to four civilians killed for every fighter. In comparison, by 2021, in every military conflict with Hamas – a terrorist group that deliberately places its military installations and fighters among civilian populations – one fighter was killed by the IDF for every civilian killed.

Kemp’s testimony shows that it is literally true that the IDF is the most moral army in the world – with the heartbreaking understanding that a moral army kills as few innocent civilians as possible.

The October 7 massacre of Israelis by Hamas was so massive and cruel that it generated a wave of anger. Many Israelis called for revenge and retaliation. Extremist ministers called for indiscriminate collective punishment and wholesale destruction of Gaza. The IDF rejected these ideas. The government and the IDF determined that Hamas must be destroyed and its governance over Gaza ended – but the war would be fought according to the IDF’s code of ethics, including minimizing civilian casualties. The air bombing targets only military sites. The IDF called upon the inhabitants of northern Gaza to evacuate the area in order to sharply reduce civilian losses. (Hamas soldiers blocked civilians from leaving, while its media department spun the announcement to be ethnic cleansing). An estimated 70% of Gazans exited northern Gaza.

Why, then, are Palestinian deaths so high? The first answer is that the Hamas-controlled Gaza health department inflates the figures. In the Shifa hospital incident, Hamas blamed an IDF strike and claimed there were 500 deaths. Later evidence shows that the strike was a failed Islamic Jihad rocket aimed at Israel that broke up and blasted the hospital’s parking lot, resulting in about 50 casualties. The Gazan report includes the 1,500 Hamas fighters who were killed inside Israel during the IDF counterattack to the massacre. It also includes all the casualties caused by Hamas and PIJ rockets. Over 8,000 rockets have been fired toward Israel, and an estimated 20% of them fell in Gaza and caused Palestinian casualties.

The definition of proportionality has also changed. In the past, a terrorist leader with a few civilians nearby would be spared. Now, knowing that this man, spared, could order the killing of hundreds of civilians, the strike goes on – justifiably.

The major reason for the increased casualties is that Hamas multiplied its military installations in Gaza. It dug kilometers of attack tunnels in civilian neighborhoods and placed rocket launchers in proximity to schools, hospitals, etc. It turned blocks of civilian buildings into military posts. This mixing is a war crime. Hamas has made Gaza’s citizens into human shields. The terrorist group intertwined its military with civilians to the extent that any and all attempts to stop the assaults causes civilian casualties. The deepest cynicism in this strategy is that Hamas has set up Gaza to maximize Palestinian civilian casualties in the belief that civilian deaths bring sympathy and support to its cause.

In the classic chutzpah narrative, a man kills his father and mother and pleads for mercy on the grounds that he is an orphan. Hamas has done better. It sets up tens of thousands of civilians as human shields. Then, after massacring 1,000 civilians, it demands a ceasefire, saying that no one should fight back against its terrorism because civilians will be hurt. 

Millions around the world demonstrate for Hamas on the grounds that Palestinian civilian deaths must be stopped. President Biden has led a group of democracies telling the truth that a government’s primary duty is to protect its citizens and prevent future massacres. Therefore, Israel legitimately fights to destroy Hamas even though tragically, this causes civilian casualties.

THE GREATNESS of Israel is that even as we fight back, we struggle to live up to the ethic of Jewish power. The world should know that in the face of staggering barbarism, Israel is still making every effort to minimize Palestinian civilian casualties. When Israel took up the burden of defending Jews’ right to live, we did not imagine the devastating cost of that defense in Palestinian lives. Since every human life is of infinite value, we deeply feel the pain of every innocent Palestinian life lost. The fault is all Hamas’s, but we should feel the sorrow of every loss of our own fighters’ lives and of the Palestinians’ as well. We persist because we know that we are saving the lives of innocent millions – in Israel and over the world – who would be doomed if Hamas continued unchecked.

The author is an oleh. He was a leader in US modern Orthodoxy and active in expanding pluralism and Jewish education for the entire Jewish community.