Find Your Voice About:

PROPORTIONALITY


  • Proportionality in war is widely misunderstood to mean a simple equation of Palestinian vs. Israeli casualty numbers
  • We know from evidence that Hamas turns civilian targets into military targets by using them to shield themselves or their weapons
  • So when Hamas places weapons in schools, hospitals and mosques, it has made each of those a legitimate military target
  • That doesn’t give the IDF free reign to attack them but it does mean that under international law they are not doing anything illegal
  • International law requires that each strike needs to be analysed individually for balance to check the potential impact on civilians and that Israel minimises the number of casualties
  • Israel is doing so through: Targeted precision strikes, warning civilians to leave, using military lawyers independent of the IDF to ensure laws are being followed
  • Hamas is likely to overinflate the actual numbers. But by simply comparing body counts, this also doesn’t take into account how many were Hamas terrorists
  • For context, according to UN statistics, the average civilian to combatant killed ratio in al lconflicts is 9 civilians for every one combatant. Israel’s civilian to combatant ration is generally much lower

Proportionate response - X (Twitter)
Background Briefing: Operation Swords of Iron
Laura Kuenssberg on - X (Twitter)