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Lt. Col. T. shows showing maps of distances and crossing points at a
Michigan Friends of the IDF briefing in West Bloomfield.
A Secure Effort
Don Cohen
Special to the Jewish News
I
t was clear that Lt. Col. Eliezer
T. wishes he was with his Israel
Defense Forces unit in Gaza.
Currently studying at the U.S. War
College near Harrisburg, Pa., he now
is part of Israel's hasbara (informa-
tion) network, but it's not the role he
wants.
"I've seen the reality of the last
eight years from a very, very close
perspective says Lt. Col. T., whose last
name is withheld for security reasons.
He lives in a community near Gaza
with his wife and four children.
Within rocket range, they have had
to scurry into a shelter or hallway
when a "Code Red" alarm sounds,
leaving them about 15 seconds before
an incoming shell hits. As a soldier, he
has seen more than 100 of the tunnels
dug from Gaza into Israel and Egypt.
"The absurd reality is my absurd fam-
ily life for the last eight years:' he said.
In the past four years alone, before
the current fighting, more 6,000 rock-
ets have been launched at Israeli civil-
ian targets.
Presenting an IDF briefing for
the Michigan Friends of the IDF at
Congregation B'nai Moshe in West
Bloomfield on Jan. 11, he dutifully
made the points that Israel's goal is
peace and quiet; that Israel disengaged
from Gaza in 2005; that Palestinians
elected Hamas, which later seized
control of Gaza from the Palestinian
Authority; that the Hamas Charter
calls for the destruction of Israel; and
that Hamas uses the areas that Israel
removed its settlements from to shoot
at Israel.
The Backdrop
But after showing maps of distances
and crossing points, Lt. Col. T. made
it clear he needed to go beyond the
PowerPoint presentation to effectively
convey what is happening and why. He
explained that both Hamas and Israel
used the six-month cease-fire to pre-
pare and equip its forces. Vastly out-
armed Hamas developed the tunnel
system under Gaza City and the tun-
nels coming from Egypt to smuggle
in arms and goods. It also extended
the range of the rockets and missiles it
manufactured.
"Israel also needed time,' Lt. Col. T. said.
He thought Israel had spent it well.
It had gathered intelligence, trained
hard and restructured itself. "We had
pity or mercy for those [Palestinian]
civilians used as human shields," he
said, "but we didn't have enough pity
or mercy for our soldiers and our
civilians."
Israel has now acted to protect
itself and renew its deterrence. "The
assumption Hamas held until now is
the Israeli military is a paper tiger; now,
they are talking about the tiger in other
terms:' Lt. Col. T said. "I don't want to
be a tiger at all; but if the dog is corn-
ing, I don't want to be a pussycat"
Lofty Goals
T. was not surprised that Hamas got a
real shock when Israel attacked as it
did. He said it had gotten to the point
where "the enemy will assume you will
engage them in a gentle way, and will
not exercise a real military operation!'
The air attacks on Gaza, the desig-
nation of the action as a war situation
and the immediate start of mobiliza-
tion of reserves sent a clear message
that Israel would not go back to a situ-
ation that allowed Hamas to launch
rockets with near impunity.
"Last time, we started by declaring
very high objectives," he said, referring
to the 2006 Lebanon War. This time,
he says, the objective of "improving
security conditions in the South" is
A Secure Effort on page A20
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January 15 • 2009
A19