Former Israeli army general on civilian deaths in Gaza | UpFront

General Yakov Amador, thank you very much for accompanying me on the front, thank you very much for inviting me. After the October 7 attacks, Israel launched a devastating counteroffensive in Gaza. It caused unprecedented levels of destruction and, of course,

civilian

deaths

, now one of the major concerns of the international community, human rights organizations and indeed other nations has been that Israel has not followed the rules of the war, particularly this question of proportionality at the moment. For every Hamas soldier killed, at least two

civilian

s have died in Gaza. Does this seem like an acceptable ratio? No, it is not acceptable and that is why we think that Hamas is committing crimes against humanity by fighting against civilians, something that is not allowed under international law.

The fact that Hamas is using human shields. women, children and the elderly to defend themselves by fighting from their homes and from their streets and not letting these people leave the battlefield area, there is no doubt that it is a crime against humanity and Hamas must be punished and even more. On top of that, we gave the population time to leave the area and we designated safe skies and Hamas blocked the way to those safe skies, so with that we pushed civilians to the battlefield, so you are saying that the murder of Palestinian civilians by Israel is a war crime. committed by Hamas and not by Israel.

I mean, if I understand you correctly, you are basing that argument on the idea that Hamas is now using human shields first, something that has not been proven by any human rights organization, in fact, even if what you say What you are saying it is true, that does not exempt you from your responsibility to avoid killing civilian targets. You can't just say, Well, they're hiding among civilians, so we're going to kill civilians, and you can't just say, "Well, it's Hamas." blame, okay, first of all, as you know and everyone can see, we found the Hamas operational centers and the hospitals in Gaza, so if this is not a human shield, I don't know what the human shield is, we have pictures of Hamas which has not done so. has been that hasn't been proven sir no I don't my friends well so I don't need your approval um wait wait you haven't offered the world you haven't offered the world any proof I I want him to finish his answer, but I just want make clear for the benefit of the audience that, under international law, to change the status of a hospital to a military target, the burden of proof falls on Israel to prove that it is a Hamas commands CER it is not enough to say that there is a fighter of Hamas there it is not enough to say that there are some members of Homas to change the status you have to prove it and you can't just say, take my word, just to clarify Where is the evidence?

Who is who? Who has proven this? Please let me respond to the response we found in the Hamas Command Center hospitals. If you want photographs, you can ask the IDE spokesperson. We sent you many of them. We found weapons systems under the hospital and we know for sure that at least one hospital was murdered by Hamas people. It is not the only hospital under which there are Hamas commanders and control headquarters. We have photos of Hamas people going with them. children around them so we can, we can't kill them if you want the picture I'll send you and the fact and please and the fact that you don't do it I don't I don't I know you won't show it know your network, you won't show it anyway um and the fact that we are killing civilians what is the alternative that we won't kill any civilians and we can't fight Hamas because Hamas is fighting from behind the civilians so the alternative is not killing civilians.

The practical meaning of this is not to kill Hamas, but to allow Hamas to rule Gaza Street after this Declaration of more atrocities and primitive and barbaric actions that was carried out by Hamas and you call me General because they are hiding. very well behind civilians and you can't kill civilians to make them immune. We do not believe the logic and we will continue to destroy Hamas and if the payment is paid by the civilians of Gaza, they can request it from Hamas. Hamas, is Hamas there? chosen by them and they can run for Hamas and ask Hamas to fight to stop the wi by the way, if they surrender immediately we will not kill any civilians uh 44% just over 44% of the Palestinian people voted for Hamas as a plurality in 2006 , about half of the Palestinian population right now is under 18, meaning that most people in Gaza did not vote for Hamas at all.

That is also factually incorrect. His vision of security is based on a military strategy that, as he has just described, will inevitably kill civilian citizens and lead to the destruction of more monuments, more cultural sites, more parts of civil society. If all this happens, don't worry, it will only ferment more resistance, more violence, more people who have antipathy towards the Israeli government. I mean there are security and terrorism experts who really warn about this. They say Israel's widespread killing of Palestinian civilians increases the risk of violent attacks against Israelis. How do you respond to these warnings that what you are doing is that the Israeli bombing of Gaza will actually make Israel less safe I see that you do not remember the situation before October 1 before October 1 there was a ceasefire Israel does not took Gaza Israel gave many people from Gaza to come walk to Israel They were given financial help to go to Gaza.

Not many people, but you sure don't let me ask the question, but I can't let you say things that aren't true. Less than 1% of the gazin. population had work permits, what was the number of Gins who could work in Israel? I'll give you the number 18,000 people. There are 2.2 million people in Gaza, that is not a large number. Most people in Gaza cannot leave or cannot enter or exit. they say huge I never said percentage I said Israel tries to help promote Gaza's economy by letting 1% of the people in Okay, go ahead, please finish, you finished the statistics, which is not true, what do the children do not go to children?

They are not going to walk in Israel, women are not going to go walking in Israel, the only man after 24 or 30 years old, so with all the statistics, please correct your statistics. I don't have connection. to reality, but let me answer, stop me again and again, that is because you said once again respectfully sir, once again you said something that is not true in fact, but I will allow you to continue, no, it is true, I did not say what is it. a high percentage, I say, 18,000 people from Gaza went out every day to walk in their this is a number if you say it is very little maybe we should give more people to walk in Israel without the atrocities and the violation of the ceasefire byas probably today we had 25,000, I don't know, probably because that was Israel's intention to give more workers to leave Gaza and walk in Israel and we gave all permission to Qatar and other countries to bring money to G and the Palestinian Authority sent money to Gaza because our interest was to promote the economy of Gaza because people believed in Israel, a big mistake in saying that Hamas has some responsibility for the people of Gaza and in promoting the economy well by rejecting Hamas' plan to attack Israel, we made a mistake.

Hamas did not care about its people. Hamas started war in Israel, declared war and massacred thousands of civilians, women, babies and women rings too, so we decided that it is no longer an option, we have no obligation. towards Gaza in relation to the civilian life of these people, they can apply to Hamas, we gave them every opportunity, uh, Hamas decided to start a war against Israel, Hamas will pay the price, okay, again. I wanted you to finish before offering this correction according to international standards. law Israel actually has a responsibility and a duty towards the citizens of Gaza, don't you agree with that?

Yes, I disagree because we are not conquering Gaza. We got all the Israelis out of Gaza in 2006. No soldiers in Gaza. No civilians in Gaza. Israeli who controls who controls the Gaza border who controls the Gaza border Egypt are you talking you are talking about the Rafa border what I am saying is that Israel controls or the border basically is Israel has redeployed its troops in 2006 from inside Gaza to the periphery of Gaza Israel controls what enters Gaza and what leaves Gaza Israel controls the population registry Israel controls the flow of people and the flow of money Israel controls Gaza by land, air and sea. everything I just said is false yes, what part of everything you said is not true Israel does not control the population registry of Gaza no Israel does not control the flow of goods in and out of Gaza no Israel does not have any military presence on the Gaza border between Israel and Gaza, but not between Gaza and Egypt, they can move through Egypt whenever they want, whatever they want, they can bring, okay, you go, you go, you can go, it's very easy, car.

You take a car, you go through Rafa, you go to Cairo and you take the plan and you go to Europe, we don't stop them, okay, sir, I think the international community will be surprised when they hear your word saying that Israel is no longer controlling the borders, the population registry, the electromagnetic sphere in every part of Gaza, but that's up to the international community when they see this interview, uh, let me take you, it's not a given if anyone from Gaza wants to go. They can go to Rafa if the Egyptians let them. I don't know the Egyptians, we leave them, but it's not in Israel, it's not in Israel, respectfully sir, a STW man, no one is questioning that Egypt has control over the Rafa border, which it was.

The question here was whether in 2006 Israel abandoned Gaza or whether it simply redeployed its troops in such a way that they still again control the flow of goods, the flow of people, the electromagnetic sphere, the population register in every part of Gaz. and life is still functionally controlled and occupied by Israel, which is why the international law of the International Community suggests that Israel still maintains effective control over Gaza, but we can agree to disagree. I want to move on to another question here if Israel is successful in its goal of dismantling if Israel is successful in its goal of dismantling or, as Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said, eliminating Hamas, what will happen next in Gaza.

First of all, I think your audience is not being given the real situation, um, on the ground, the real situation in the The reason is that Israel does not control what goes in and out of Egypt to Gaza Street. The border between Gaza and Egypt is controlled by Egypt, not just Israel. Respect, but Egypt does not occupy Egypt. Not OCC. Egypt does not occupy Gaza. Egypt. has not had control of Gaza in five decades, we do not occupy Gaza either, we do not control anything inside Gaza, we are not in Gaza, if you see a situation of 500 kilometers of tunnels under Gaza, if we were, I mean, ridiculous. story you tell here, do you think we would have allowed Hamas to develop its military capacity if you respectfully use its license in Gaza again.

I'm not arguing that you are in Gaza. I am stating that you redeploy troops from Gaza in 2005 at the end of the year to the border and you effectively control it by controlling what comes in and out, so I agree with you that it is not in Gaza, the point is that it is a control effective because of how he handles the perimeter, but again we can agree to disagree that the world can make its own determination. This is an empirical matter. No, no, we are not controlling the Gaza perimeter. When it reaches the Gaza-Egypt border, we are controlling the perimeter. border between Israel and Gaza, but not between Gaza and Egypt, sir, if we took out a map, you will understand that most of you will understand that most of the border is not with Rafa, it is not with Egypt, most of the border the one Gazin committed to is where Israel is number one and number two.

Egypt will not assert military and government control over Gaza even in five decades, so again pretending that you are somehow not responsible for what happens to Gaza if you continue to maintain effective control according to every human rights organization according to international law we see that This is an obvious fact and you seem to deny it but we don't have to agree on this fact. I'd like to move on so I can get an answer to my question which was no, I don't want to move on, no, I'm not going to move on, sir, sir, sir, because you're lying, no, you're lying, you know, you know it's okay. , sir, sir.

Let's move on to another question. I won't move on to another question. Well, you don't have it, sir, I respect you, sir, the B between Israel and Gaza is not controlling Egypt and Gaza. I understand that you made your point, sir, you made your point. Sir, you have made your point clear, if you say you are not willing to move forward unless I agree with you that Israel does not control Gaza, then we cannot proceed because that is not a fact and I will not and I refuse to recognize something that is not true: not controlling Gaza isra.

Haven't you made your point clear? Are you willing to move on to another question or do you want to? Are you willing to move on to another question? Yeah, okay, just admit that Israel is not controlling God,then you will have yours, okay, well, I'm not okay, sir, okay, sir, then, sir, understood, then, sir, I'm not going to admit that Israel doesn't control Gaza, so I'll thank you for your time and I appreciate you joining us from the beginning have a nice day