How far can you run?

How far can you run in ten minutes? They say an army moves at three miles per hour, which is a half-mile every ten minutes. That's a good walking speed. A half-mile is a good distance, and even an old out-of-shape fart like myself can probably cover that half-mile in ten minutes given the proper motivation. The Palestinians have good motivation. As Yaacov Lozowick explains:

According to the laws of war, placing military ordinance in civilian settings is forbidden because it erases the line between civilians and soldiers, and since getting at the soldiers so as to kill them is permitted, civilians will inevitably also be killed. Hezbullah, Hamas, and the Fatah-based Palestinian terrorists never put any store in any of that just-war theory or practice, since in their self understanding they are victims, period, and no matter what they do will always be justified. Their useful idiots in the West parrot this alongside them, thus demonstrating their rejection of the noble heritage of the Enlightenment.

The practice has booby-trapped Israel, of course. If we hit the terrorists along with their civilian shields, we're damned for waging war on civilians. If we refrain, so as not to be damned, the terrorists are safe, and sooner or later they'll kill Israelis.

That tells the tale. If the Israelis hit the valid military targets in the urban environment that is Gaza, they're putting civilians at risk because Hamas won't separate itself from the civilian population.

So, the IDF has been calling the people in the target area telling them that the area will be destroyed in ten minutes. Get out. Get out now.

The advance of technology, however, has created new possibilities. In the week of air-attacks, the IDF proved it had excellent intelligence, and in many cases targets hit from the air kept on exploding for a number of minutes after they were hit, as the ordinance stored there exploded. More significant, the IDF has figured out how to separate the civilians from the weapons: call the neighbors and give them ten minutes warning. The numbers prove how efficient this has been: prior to the ground invasion, more than 600 targets had been destroyed, fewer than 500 Palestinians killed, and fewer than 100 of those were civilians even by Palestinian and UN reckoning. Of course, there remain the pictures of civilians surrounded by devastation, but they're alive, and it wasn't Israel that stacked bombs in their cellars.

No one would blame the Israelis if they hit valid military targets and let the civilians become collateral damage. The practice of calling ahead gives the Hamas fighters the opportunity to flee and live to fight another day. The practice of calling ahead puts Israeli personnel at risk. Still, the Israelis make the calls because this is a war of information as much as anything. Not a single Palestinian mother or father can claim that the Israeli air force targeted them. They've been given fair warning. Grab the kids and go. In ten minutes, your house falls down.

The Isreali armed forces are proving that they're among the most moral military force in the world. Hamas is proving that it is among the least moral forces in the world. The Palestinian people would be wise to eject Hamas, even at risk of their own lives. There comes a time when you have to stand and choose, and the Palestinians seem unable to make a moral choice.