Thread by @Aizenberg55

🧵Israel issued response to UN report claiming 6 IDF incidents “may” have violated int’l law. This little noticed response is excellent rebuttal for all claims of war crimes. Israel also for first time identifies by name combatants included in Hamas casualty lists. Analysis: 1/

Israel demolishes UN claims several ways. First it notes UN relied entirely on media reports & public information, that inside information for details of military attacks cannot be revealed in middle of war. This is the fatal flaw of all NGO, media & UN claims of war crimes. 2/

Israel for the first time addresses how assessments of the 10/31 Jabalia attack are all flawed. They ignore that many Hamas assets were targetted not just a commander, and the “military advantage” assessed the combined benefit as a whole – which UN analysis willfully ignores. 3/

Israel points out that UN, as do all NGOs, don’t offer any actual military experts and do not know what weapons work in a specific situation to accomplish the military objective. It’s always speculation from amateurs who don’t know things like “fuse, angle of attack, timing.” 4/

NGOs, and media especially, act as if IDF has obligation to disclose information about each attack even during hostilities. It’s a preposterous expectation never demanded of any other army. When IDF does not provide real time details it's then seen as evidence of war crime. 5/

This appears to be first official Israeli document that is critical of UN reliance on “Hamas fatality figures.” Response lists many flaws that independent analysts have been exposing for months, such as children who were really militants and fake ID numbers. 6/

Israel also for the first time offers specific examples of identified militants included in the April 30 fatality list published by Hamas. Here are a few the Israeli report shows. Israel should provide a more complete analysis of the Hamas list. 7/

This paragraph in Israel’s response is an excellent reminder of how assessments of “proportionality” are difficult to assess without all the information, it’s not just about casualty counts, and always suffers from “hindsight bias.” 8/

International law on proportionality is based on “expected” loss of civilian life versus “anticipated” military advantage. A results only based analysis is fundamentally flawed. One has to know IDF’s analysis PRIOR to attack to assess if it violated int’l law. 9/

This is best reponse yet that Israel/IDF has published debunking UN claims. It shows how UN, NGOs & media are just making things up based on media reports, with no knowledge of military weaponry & tactics, relying on Hamas numbers. See report link. END embassies.gov.il/UnGeneva/NewsA…