Israelis are used to their immoral foes accusing them for acting immorally. These foes, unfamiliar with universal terms like "Civil Liberties" or "Human Rights", go even further to claim that the Israeli defense forces are targeting innocent civilians. When you repeat such outrageous accusation too many times, even good and honest people start to believe it.
The latest such claim was done by no less than the United Nations Fact Finding Mission on the Gaza Conflict. That initiative was chaired by Justice Richard Goldstone, acting on behalf of the UN Human Rights Council. The outcome of that initiative was a report based only on the testimonies of the Palestinians side of the equation. Israel would not cooperate. Appointing a judge known mainly for investigating war crimes by the UN Human Rights Committee which is notorious for its biased attitude towards Israel was a clear enough indication as for the outcome of the initiative.
The claim that Israel has targeted intentionally innocent Palestinian civilians was later refuted and retracted by Justice Goldstone himself in an article he published in the Washington Post. But the damage to Israelis and to Israel's international standing and reputation was devastating. "But Goldstone is beside the point — a symptom of something larger," wrote a few days later Washington Post's columnist Richard Cohen. "That his report was accepted in much of the world testified to how much Israel’s moral standing has plummeted. (It has also led countless Israelis and others to conclude that they are damned when they do the wrong thing and equally damned when they do the right thing.) Much of the world believed Israel would purposely kill civilians." (Richard Cohen, WP, April 4, 2011).
While Palestinians terror is specifically aimed at killing civilians, us, Israelis, would never seek an eye for an eye. It has to do with morality. We carry inside of each and every one of us tons of it and it does not really matter what the world think of us or how many Goldstone's Reports would be thrown at our face – this would never change!
Claiming that the IDF's soldiers are educated and trained to keep high moral standards at all times, and even proved it time and again throughout Israel's history, might sound biased and unauthentic coming from an Israeli. So, I decided to present you with excerpts from my second novel, Fate's Perfect Justice, written long before the Goldstone's Report saw the light of day. It describes a true chain of events leading an Israeli officer to make a moral decision. I came across this testimony while conducting the research for the book:
“I was still a young officer stationed inside the buffer zone in south Lebanon,” he began as I parted from his embrace and stared at him attentively, “when shots were fired at us from one of the buildings. It hit my radio operator. We took cover and returned fire while my paramedic tried to save his life. He couldn’t.” I held my hand over my mouth in horror. “The bullet had hit his neck and he was dead within minutes.”
A lump suddenly formed in my throat which months ago would have choked me completely.
He took a deep breath. “Any other army would have taken the building down in seconds without even blinking – the Americans, the Brits, certainly anyone less… moral,” he nearly spat out the word. “You know international law better than I do. It allows a proportional degree of civilian casualties in combat zones. But this does not apply to the IDF. Our orders are strict and they oblige us to make sure there are no innocent civilians around.” He placed his hands on mine and fondled them looking at me with pain in his eyes. “I held fire and ordered my subordinates to check if there were civilians in the building. Someone thought he heard a child crying. We urged the civilians in Arabic to get out promising we won’t shoot if they did,” he continued. “Meanwhile we located the fire source. It came from a room on the second floor. I had a choice to fire a missile into the window and destroy whatever was shooting at us or try to surround the place and wait for their surrender. My soldiers wanted revenge for the loss of Rami. They were all for firing the missile and storming the place. I decided not to and called out in Arabic for the child to come out. He didn’t. By now we could see someone small standing by a window. Eventually, we outflanked the building and had a storm of bullets raining on us. One of my sergeants was hit in the head. He died instantly,” he said with a cracked voice. My mouth had petrified into the shape of a huge “O” comprehending a mere fraction of what this sensitive soul of a man was implying and what he had been through during his lifetime. He looked at me helplessly, his hands shivering. “Even then I didn’t agree to take the house down. There was an innocent child inside,” he continued with a harsh facial expression. “Suddenly we saw the child, a boy of about eight or nine, fleeing the place. Only then did I give the order to destroy the house. An Israeli air force fighter dropped a bomb on it. Among the rubble we found the bodies of five heavily armed terrorists. They had been using the child as one of those human shields you hear about but never believe.” (Ofer Mazar, Fate's Perfect Justice, Strategic Books Group, New York, NY, 2011, pp. 345-346).
So, please keep this in mind before forming an opinion about us Israelis.
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