Daily Alert Archives

Israel Hones Airstrikes

[Reuters] Nidal al-Mughrabi and Dan Williams - On Monday, Palestinian rocket crew commander Amer Qarmout was killed in an airstrike and two of his comrades were wounded. As Israel escalates its aerial campaign against militants in Gaza, it is employing hi-tech tactics designed to reduce the damage and the number of bystanders hurt. "There is a trend in terms of the very dramatic improvement in hitting the terrorists and not non-combatants," a senior air force commander said. The air force says its strikes now cause around one civilian casualty for every 20 militants killed or wounded, compared to a roughly 1-to-1 ratio when the practice was introduced in 2002. The strikes are generally at night and employ ordnance of such low explosive power that cars that are hit often remain largely intact. "The impact is only on the target," he said, but sometimes munitions in militants' vehicles go off unexpectedly, causing "secondary" casualties. "I think the intel (on Gaza) is getting better and better," he said. The most valuable information is in real time - images of the ground fed to the Israeli war room by surveillance drones.
2008-02-06 01:00:00
Full Article