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Israel Has Created a New Standard for Urban Warfare. No One Will Admit It (www.newsweek.com)

submitted 7 months ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

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All available evidence shows that Israel has followed the laws of war, legal obligations, best practices in civilian harm mitigation and still found a way to reduce civilian casualties.

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[–] Questy 9 points 7 months ago (1 children)

Russia is using a similar strategy, it's been in practice since WW2. Destroy everything and move forward into the rubble. Innovation in urban warfare is the type of low collateral precision combat that became a feature of counter insurgency fighting during the "War On Terror". Also, the statement that "all evidence shows..." is blatantly false.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 7 months ago

The author mentions Russia and the US and says they do not go to as great lengths to reduce civilian deaths as Israel does, because of maneuver warfare that relies on surprise:

The predominant Western theory of executing wars, called maneuver warfare, seeks to shatter an enemy morally and physically with surprising, overwhelming force and speed, striking at the political and military centers of gravity so that the enemy is destroyed or surrenders quickly. This was the case in the invasions of Panama in 1989, Afghanistan in 2001, Iraq in 2003 and the failed illegal attempt by Russia to take Ukraine in 2022. In all these cases, no warning or time was given to evacuate cities.
In many ways, Israel has had to abandon this established playbook in order to prevent civilian harm. The IDF has telegraphed almost every move ahead of time so civilians can relocate, nearly always ceding the element of surprise. This has allowed Hamas to reposition its senior leaders (and the Israel hostages) as needed through the dense urban terrain of Gaza and the miles of underground tunnels it's built.

He then goes on to detail the lengths Israel goes to in order to warn civilians and the tactical and strategic consequences to doing so, and suggests the US should study their approach to reduce civilian casualties to historic lows as they have even if it means losing the element of surprise.

It's an opinion piece by a West Point graduate, soldier, military advisor, and analyst. The title and description for the post were automatically generated by Newsweek and presumably part of his opinion.