Question: “They say that more than 70,000 people have been killed in Gaza, and that 90% of the homes have been destroyed. Is that moral? Are all the residents of Gaza Hamas-supporting murderers?
Answer: This isn’t accurate. We can divide the population into four groups..
A. The fighting circle – Hamas and Islamic Jihad terrorists, tens of thousands of people. They absolutely must be eliminated.
B. The assisting circle – people who hide weapons in their homes, provide intelligence, and also those who handed out sweets and celebrated on the day of the massacre. This is a very large part of the population.
C. The captive / silent circle – people who oppose Hamas or simply want to live, but are living under a murderous terrorist regime. If they speak out against Hamas in Gaza, they are sentenced to death. That is why it is hard to hear their voices.
D. The children’s circle – they are mainly subjected to murderous indoctrination, but at this stage it is impossible to decide that a small child deserves death.
In summary, it is impossible to decide that everyone there is a murderer.
Question: “Why didn’t the opposition leave there, like in Germany?”
Answer: In Germany too there were Germans who could not stand the Nazi regime, but they had no power to resist or to leave — and the same is true in Gaza. The exit through Egypt is also closed. In addition, they are poor and cannot afford the high cost of leaving.
Question: “So, did we do something immoral?”
Answer: No. After all, they attacked us. We had no choice. We are defending ourselves. Our army is the Israel Defense Forces.
Question: "Maybe we should have fought more carefully?"
Answer: My answer has three parts:
A. The enemy is extremely cruel and murderous, and if we show restraint toward them, it will open the door for them to commit terrible acts again.
B. It is impossible to risk soldiers’ lives in order not to risk civilians. Of course, we prefer not to endanger civilians, and we truly did everything possible, but if we have to choose between the lives of enemy civilians and the lives of our soldiers, morality favors the lives of the soldiers.
C. They used the civilian population as a shield. They positioned themselves in hospitals,schools, and children’s bedrooms. They are responsible for those who were killed. They are the immoral ones.
Question: "If that’s the case, should we still be happy about those who were killed there?"
Answer: We should be glad about the killers and their helpers, but regarding innocent people and children, we should not be glad. We would prefer that nothing happened to them. We do not go to war out of a desire to kill, but to eradicate evil, and thank God, we are very successful.
Answers by Rabbi Shlomo Aviner, published by Machon Meir.