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Sunday, August 17, 2014

How the Gaza War Began

From an Israeli Press Review, English translation:

In Friday's Yedioth Ahronoth's,
 military affairs analyst Alex Fishman lays out how Israel and Gaza got to where they are now and says it was by mistake. "A series of misunderstandings by both sides, along with mistakes in the IDF's intelligence estimates, led to a great confrontation." To begin with, he notes that the kidnapping of the three yeshiva teenagers surprised the Hamas leadership, which was not looking for an escalation in Gaza. But Israel's response of arresting Hamas MPs in the West Bank was not acceptable to them and they felt especially bad about the re-arrest of those released in the Shalit deal, Fishman wrote. He goes on to explain that until June 30th, there was no discussion of a military conflict with Hamas in Gaza and Hamas even denied shooting any of the rockets. But that night, Israel responded to rocket fire and attacked 34 sites in Gaza and killed, apparently by mistake, a Hamas activist, which Hamas saw as a provocation against the organization and it responded with rockets for the first time. On the 2nd of July, the Palestinian youth Mohammed Abu Khdeir was kidnapped and murdered and in response rockets were shot at Ashkelon and Beersheva. "Israel saw the increasing rocket fire by Hamas not as a response to what was happening in the West Bank or as revenge for killing one of its activists, but as preparations for a massive terror attack that was [supposedly - OH] supposed to take place under heavy fire. That was an error," writes Fishman. "In response to the rocket fire, Israel attacks numerous sites on 6 July, including tunnel shafts, in an attempt to thwart the massive terror attack. Hamas people are killed, their friends go wild and shoot dozens of rockets (at Israel). Israel no longer has any choice and it begins Operation Protective Edge. In retrospect, it is understood in Israell that there was an over assessment of Hamas moves and that the sites that Israel attacked were not part of that big (terror) event that Israel was waiting for." Fishman later writes,"Today it is completely clear that despite the great danger, none of the tunnels leads to any kibbutz. Most of the tunnels are known, and there was prior warningabout most of the infiltrations from the tunnels. With proper military leadership, most of the casualties from the tunnels could have been avoided."

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