Many were amazed by the videos released by the IDF spokesman, which show our extreme caution not to harm children, to the point of canceling an assassination operation against mass murderers, due to the fear that children would be harmed.
But the truth is that these videos are more disturbing than awe-inspiring.
First of all, they provide our enemies with a perfect means of protection. All the murderers have to do is ensure that they are always surrounded by children, and then they are immune from harm. Second, one may wonder how much justice there is in this excessive morality, and whether it does not cause much greater bloodshed.
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Against false propagandists
The Jewish people are characterized by their degree of mercy. Our sages say that mercy is one of the defining characteristics of the nation. But mercy that is out of place is actually cruelty. Thus the sages stated: "Anyone who becomes merciful in a cruel place will end up becoming cruel in a merciful place.".
A mother who feels sorry for her children and wants to spare them the suffering of a visit to the dentist, is inflicting on them much greater suffering when they need root canals and extractions. A doctor who feels sorry for a patient and does not give him the painful treatment he needs now will cause his illness to worsen to the point of endangering his life. This is not compassion at all.
Conversely, when you harden your heart and take the right actions in advance, you save yourself much more suffering and sorrow later. This is true compassion – thinking about the future and not just the present. Remembering that it is better to suffer a little pain now than to deal with waves of pain that are many times more severe and dangerous.
Who knows how many counter-terrorism operations were prevented due to this excessive morality, which is prone to mercy? A murderer, who could have been thwarted even at the cost of harming civilians, is likely to later carry out even more brutal and deadly terrorist operations. Why are the lives of a few civilians surrounding him more precious than the lives of men, women, and children in our cities?
And are all the tremendous efforts we make to prove our morality actually beneficial to us? We are faced with propagandists who will peddle lies about us, regardless of what we do. Take, for example, the terrorists' failed missile strike in Jabalia and the killing of the children. Despite the video clearly showing that it was their missile strike, many media outlets around the world still blamed Israel for the act, and even called it a 'massacre,' no less.
The naive thought
And why go that far? The entire intolerable situation in Gaza was created by our naive thinking that if we just destroy all our settlements and withdraw from the Strip to the last centimeter, they will no longer be able to come to us with complaints. Seventeen years later, we are no longer there! And yet the world sees us as responsible for the situation in Gaza, and Arab members of Knesset dare, in their most impudence, to call us occupiers!
It is certainly appropriate that we preserve the human image within us, and avoid harming those who are not involved as much as possible, but going to extremes to the point of excessive morality is neither right nor helpful. The less we pity the cruel, the more we will pity those who truly deserve mercy – our citizens, our women, and our children.
