War at the comfort of a buzzer
Neanderthals and even Scots Clansmen fought bloody battles face to face and eye to eye. Modern technology enables armies to fight the enemy at the push of a button. Technology in the hands of humans kills other humans less equipped with sophisticated tools and strategies. War has become a technical venture in which still real blood flows and destinies are cut short.
Yesterday (23.09.2024) Israel sent out by their own account 80.000 phone call warnings to Lebanon before striking again to save innocent lives of the enemy. In Gaza, Israel ordered Palestinians to move to safe zones so as not to fall victim to their attacks against Hamas later invaded with ground forces these safe zones asking the innocent Palestinians to move again to unreal safe zones.
The military leadership of the IDF Israel Defence Force claims Hamas terrorists use innocent civilians, especially women and children as human shields and launch their attacks on Israel from these positions. They argue unfortunately innocent civilians get killed in the course of it. Modern wars and their technologies like drones and precision rockets almost weapons like surgical instruments are at the disposal of the sophisticated IDF.
In the light of the high-tech weapon arsenal of the Israel Defense Force, the question arises why are they not targeting only the enemy, the Hamas terrorists who use innocent humans as shields behind the shields, and not the shields as well? If their tactics or weapons don't facilitate a war to spare innocent lives in their numbers should they not go back to the drawing board to develop a tactic that saves innocent lives? International law allows casualties to be part of a just-fought war yet does not state the proportion of innocent deaths to the killing of the enemy.
When an army overpropurtunately kills innocent lives and does not change tactics to seriously prevent it and does not resist to strike when the risk of harming more civilians than killing the enemy in a given situation is too high the world community should determine for the future how to label such war and the parties involved and draw strict consequences for the world to come.
PD Dipl.-Pol. Karl-Heinz Heerde (Political Scientist and Historian, Hamburg University 1980-1985), married to Alberta Heerde born Mensah, Ashanti from Kumasi with Ewe roots from Volta Region, Ghana, Entrepreneur and Author of several novels, the new constitution draft for Ghana and various Articles.
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