(Fox News) Paul Alster - Very little credit has so far been given Israel for the care it took to avoid collateral damage during its recent vicious engagement with Hamas and Islamic Jihad in Gaza. Major G, the chief instructing officer of the Israeli UAV (Drone) School, contends that most non-combatant deaths were as a result of Palestinian civilians being used as human shields by Hamas. With an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV), "I am able to stay above and investigate the target for a long time, clear it of uninvolved civilians, and only when there is a clear path of fire do I call for the F16 or Apache helicopter," said Major G. "In a lot of cases we have regular houses where in the basement there is a lot of ammunition, bombs and missiles....In cases where there are people inside a house or building we never strike the target without prior warning. We make phone calls, send leaflet flier warnings, and sometimes use a technique called 'Knock on the Roof,' where we fire very, very small, very precise tiny bombs onto the edge of the roof and then they (the family) know that the attack is about to begin and everybody can go outside."
2012-12-31 00:00:00Full ArticleBACK Visit the Daily Alert Archive