Why all this flippant conversation from those who should know better. Thousands of innocent people on both sides have died in yet another useless bloody war. We don't know the truth as to how many are dead, but one dead, is one too many. The truth is between Hamas and the Zionists they have killed thousands.

Dear Paul,

This conflict as we've seen has certainly stirred
up people's emotions not only with inflammatory
remarks on the forum but protests and vigils
across the country.

Division is happening all around us. And it doesn't
matter whether you're a Jewish person or an
Islamic person you should feel safe in this country.

We don't need to add fuel to the already hot flames
with our comments.

I hope that this will come to an end - sooner rather
than later.

I've stopped watching the news.

It's too depressing

I have a number of relatives living in Israel, and two in the Military. So, I am concerned for their safety. They chose Israel for its freedoms and Values.

Dear Paul,

Here's the story behind a staged coexistence picture:

http://timesofisrael.com/famous-coexistence-pic-outed-as-fake/

This famous image shows two boys. One Israeli, the other
Palestinian embracing. They actually were two Jewish
friends from Jerusalem.

If only!

Dear Yuyutsu,

Indeed, which is why I made my comment after I posted the link.

But here are some of the other accounts that informed my position.

Yedioth Ahronoth, a major Israeli newspaper, reported that:
“The pilots realized that there was tremendous difficulty in distinguishing within the occupied outposts and settlements who was a terrorist and who was a soldier or civilian … The rate of fire against the thousands of terrorists was tremendous at first, and only at a certain point, did the pilots begin to slow down the attacks and carefully select the targets.”

Yoav Zitun, military correspondent for Ynet, the online outlet affiliated with Yedioth Ahronoth wrote: “Twenty-eight fighter helicopters shot over the course of the day all of the ammunition in their bellies, in renewed runs to rearm. We are talking about hundreds of 30 millimeter cannon mortars (each mortar is like a hand grenade) and Hellfire missiles,”.

Also: “The Hamas army, it turns out, deliberately made it difficult for the helicopter pilots and the operators of the UAVs: in the investigation it became clear that the invading forces were asked in the last briefings to walk slowly into the settlements and outposts or within them, and under no circumstances to run, in order to make the pilots think they were Israelis. This deception worked for a considerable time , until the Apache pilots realized that they had to skip all the restrictions.”

http://www.ynet.co.il/news/article/b111niukzt

Post-truth mhaze,

Quiet please. Rational people who care about the facts are having a discussion. We can return to your post-truth world in a moment.

Dear SteeleRedux,

Thank you for the article, and the translation is quite good too.

I consider both Haaretz and Ynet (Yediot) to be reliable sources.

According to ynet, two helicopters were the first to be dispatched from Ramat David to the region surrounding Gaza, while according to Haaretz there was only one at the site of the rave party. There is no contradiction - this simply means that they split and the other Apache helicopter went elsewhere within that region.

As the rave party was attacked first, at 6:32, arriving at the party site only between 7:30 and 8:00, means that by then nearly all victims there were already dead.

The Ynet article does not speak of friendly fire, but rather of the pilots' hesitation and how they spared the lives of so many terrorists, explaining why they mostly placed the protection of the Kibbutzim in the too-hard-basket and instead, with only a few exceptions, concentrated at shooting the Gazans as they were crossing the fence.

It is not pleasant to read how the Israeli airforce was tricked by Hamas, but it says nothing about Apaches shooting Israelis, how less so at the party's site, which Ynet does not even mention.