IDF soldiers are given strict orders in terms of combat procedures as per IDF moral code; the IDF tells them when it is appropriate risk their lives, to save others, and to shoot. The details are numerous, but the basic outline is as follows:

IDF soldiers have three priorities in combat, and they are listed here in order of priority (all quotes in italics are taken directly from the IDF Moral Code):

1. Accomplish the mission

"The IDF soldiers view their service in the IDF as a mission; They will be ready to give their all in order to defend the state, its citizens and residents."

2. Protect oneself and comrades

"The IDF servicemen and women will act out of fraternity and devotion to their comrades, and will always go to their assistance when they need their help or depend on them, despite any danger or difficulty, even to the point of risking their lives."

"The IDF servicemen and women will act in a judicious and safe manner in all they do, out of recognition of the supreme value of human life. During combat they will endanger themselves and their comrades only to the extent required to carry out their mission."

3. Avoid collateral damage (damage to civilians and their property)

"The IDF servicemen and women will use their weapons and force only for the purpose of their mission, only to the necessary extent and will maintain their humanity even during combat."

Believe it or not, it's moral and lawful for those guns to be used. Among other things, implicit in the IDF moral code is the fact that soldiers risk their own lives in two cases: in order to accomplish a mission and in order to save the lives of their comrades. Individual soldiers are not permitted to risk their own lives in order to avoid collateral damage or to save civilians, and there is nothing peculiar or immoral about this in terms of military protocol. The United States Army, along with most standing armies, have the same principle.

The IDF warns civilians about incursions and goes through leaps and bounds to plan missions, on a strategic level, that are designed to keep civilians in mind. During Operation Cast Lead, the IDF even went as far as to reroute missiles already on their way to targets in Gaza, due to the fact that too many civilians 'gathered' (they were most likely being used as human shields by Hamas) near the original targets. Individual soldiers, however, must first accomplish their missions and protect themselves and their comrades-- these are the rules of war, and you'll be hard-pressed to find a military that does not follow the same protocol. Naturally, in this case, there are civilian casualties.

Even though the IDF's moral code is listed on its official website and is written in various publications for all to see, the IDF's PR front doesn't exactly advertise the fact that combat soldiers have a defined list of priorities that does not call for sparing the lives of civilians in all cases. Given the indisputable fact that this moral code is lawful, it should be advertised. During Operation Cast Lead, those speaking for the IDF repeatedly said that the IDF does 'everything that it can' to prevent civilian casualties. This is overwhelmingly true when it comes to senior officials planning missions, but the IDF failed to make it clear that there are situations in which it views civilian deaths as unfortunate, but justified. The obvious example is one in which civilians are killed because they were used as human shields by Hamas, who wouldn't allow them to vacate buildings, homes, schools, and other areas that Hamas used as military targets, despite having been warned before attacks by the IDF; the IDF considers these deaths to have been caused by Hamas, and rightfully so. The other example of civilian deaths that the IDF considers within the bounds of morality and legality is less obvious, and those are the deaths that happen due to a soldier's adherence to the IDF moral code and its list of priorities. Why should the IDF make this clear in the press?

The fact that IDF Moral Code is not made clear worldwide is a major part of the reason that much of the media call the IDF a bunch of liars, though not always in so many words. We say that we do everything possible to avoid civilian deaths, and next to these quotes from senior military officials, you'll find photos of dead Palestinian civilians. The truth is that, like any other military at war, we have a list of priorities. Contrary to popular belief, the principle of proportionality within the realm of international law does not relate to the number of civilians that are killed during war. Rather, it demands that the civilian casualties and property damage must be in proportion to the significance of the military target as it directly relates to the completion of military objectives. If the IDF kills 15 civilians when bombing a house that a Hamas operative once visited for a cup of tea, that is disproportionate. If , during a war whose objective is to decrease the ability for Hamas to carry out attacks against Israel, 15 civilians are killed when the IAF bombs the Hamas Government Complex, from which the planning of terror attacks occurs, this is not disproportionate. In addition, a soldier's life comes before a civilian in enemy territory, and even those that ideologically massacre principles of war in the name of 'international law' specifically when talking about the IDF, can't argue that this principle is illegal. As such, it would be to the IDF's benefit if it were forthcoming about its moral code. Those tragic photographs of dead civilians may be tragic, but why make it easy for the media to call us liars? Our moral code doesn't state that we protect civilians in all cases, and we need to explain that to the world.

Israel would have much less of an image problem if its PR front had the strength of the IDF's convictions.

One series of questions posed to Israeli soldiers in discussions of war ethics goes something like this: If you were ordered to blow up a house where a terrorist commander was hiding, and you had reason to believe that enemy civilians were in the house, should the order be refused? If you were ordered to blow up the house and you were told that an Israeli soldier was being held hostage in the house, should you agree to do so? If you were ordered to blow up the house and your father was being held hostage there, would you obey?

These hypotheticals are telling because they assume a moral instinct that journalists and commentators often forget, dismiss, or explicitly condemn: that all lives are not equal. But, as Sahil Mahtani points out, that’s the way the numbers work when we are talking about war and defense. And as Ross Dothat notes, rules about war will be useless—in fact, pernicious—if they does not take into account the realities of the moral choices faced not by armchair theorists but by leaders, commanders, and combatants charged with protecting their societies, soldiers, and friends.

That all lives are equal is a fundamental principle of law in Western societies, and rightly so. A government cannot be just if it values the life of some citizens over the lives of others without due cause.

But when faced with the life-and-death situations involving survival and war, this principle breaks down. Closeness makes a difference when we value lives. If I am told that an Eskimo is hanging from an Alaskan cliff and that a rescue operation would require risking the lives of a dozen alpinists, I could consider the case more or less dispassionately and might suggest that it is not reasonable to for twelve men and women to face death in order to save one man. If the person hanging from the cliff is someone I know and feel close to, I might point out that the members of the rescue team freely chose a risky profession and that they must rescue my poor friend. If the victim is my son, I would accept no moral calculus at all—no effort and no risk would be in any way equal to my son’s life.

This instinct of ours is not the vestige of primitive tribalism, a prejudice we should seek to cure ourselves of. It lies at the very core of our humanity and our ability to forge human relationships, communities, and cultures.

We should not be surprised, then, that most Israelis are not moved by the fact that hundreds of Palestinians have been killed in their country’s attack on the Gaza Strip as compared to only a handful of Israelis by Hamas rockets. Nor should we be surprised that many Palestinians are unmoved by the prospect that one of those rockets might strike a school, hospital, or supermarket and kill dozens of Israelis. If a high death toll on the other side brings peace, security, and justice to my people, most Israelis and Palestinians will tell you straight out, then it’s a price worth paying.

The mistake both sides make, the mistake that keeps the Israel-Palestine conflict going, is the assumption that death and destruction will in fact produce peace, security, and justice. In abstract terms, the Palestinians have every right to use force to defend themselves and to seek to right the wrongs they have suffered. And Israel has every right to use force to defend its population and its existence.

Both sides err in their valuation of the efficacy of force, in their belief that violence can achieve their goals. But if Palestinians blow up a bunch of buses, killing and maiming hundreds of Jews, yet do not achieve their goals, can that ever be forgiven? And if Israel kills hundreds in Gaza only to return, in the end, to a modus vivendi not all that much different from the one before the invasion, how can they claim that those Palestinian deaths were collateral damage in a justified military operation?

In fact, the reason Israelis condemn Palestinian violence so vociferously, and the reason Palestinians Israeli aggression so stridently, is that we both see the other side’s violence not just as bloody but as futile. Seeing the solidarity, determination, and fundamental justice on our own side, we cannot conceive of how a reasonable enemy could think that violence could achieve his goals. Therefore, we see violence with a justifiable purpose on our side, and gratuitous violence on the other.

Preaching to the Palestinians about the turpitude of launching missiles against Israel will get us nowhere, and neither will preaching to the Israelis about the incommensurability of the Palestinian versus the Israeli death toll. Leaders, and citizens, on both sides are quite right and justified in valuing the lives of their countrymen over the lives of their enemies. Moral condescension from writers outside the war zone whose families, friends, and fellow-citizens are not at risk will not change any minds.

If I’m to persuade my fellow-Israelis that this war is useless and wrong, the only way to do it is to show them that we are shedding blood and getting little or nothing in return. That may sound callous to the referees on the sidelines, but I’m not ashamed to say that I love my son more than my friends, my friends more than my fellow-Israelis, and my fellow-Israelis more than my enemies. What kind of father, friend, and Israeli would I be otherwise?

Read more by Haim at South Jerusalem

In the glutted landscape of Jewish communal life, no institution blusters with greater pomposity than the Organization That Claims To Speak On Behalf Of The Jews (OTCSBJ). What’s most frustrating about the OTCSBJ is that it often speaks not on behalf of “the Jewish People” but of the tiny percentage of Jews who sign up for its email lists. Most notorious in this category is the Conference of Presidents (“American Jewry’s recognized address for consensus policy”), which clamored vociferously for an invasion of Iraq (see its "Daily Alerts" of cherry-picked panic from 2002 and 2003) despite the fact that a majority of American Jews opposed the invasion.

A relatively new OTCSBJ has entered the scene: The Jewish People Policy Planning Institute. Chaired by Dennis Ross, the JPPPI seeks to formulate an overarching “Jewish policy” with an eye towards strengthening the status of Israel as the “center of Jewish life.” As a sign of how it views the vitality of Diaspora Jewish life, the JPPPI has on its team the famed Israeli demographer Sergio DellaPergola, who clings to the widely-discredited National Jewish Population Survey of 2001, with its bleak outlook for Jewish life in America. After all, it's easier to promote Israel as the "center of Jewish life" if Jewish life everywhere else is falling apart.
Yehezkel Dror: Modern Day Jewish Prophet suspiciously resembles Larry "Bud" Mellman
Now the Founding President of the JPPPI, Yehezkel Dror, has written a stunning op-ed in The Forward about where he feels “the Jewish People” should head. Essentially, he argues, the "requirements of existence" must trump everything else. In light of Israel's (or "the Jewish People's") interests, Dror characterizes moral considerations as "political correctness and other thinking-repressing fashions." He singles out Jewish activism on China and on Turkey's genocide of Armenians, arguing that Jews must be supportive of China and Turkey, "or at least remain neutral," in light of Israel's strategic interests. Bewilderingly, he then takes the "end to morality" argument to the nuclear level:

Similarly, Jewish leaders should support harsh measures against terrorists who potentially endanger Jews, even at the cost of human rights and humanitarian law. And if the threat is sufficiently grave, the use of weapons of mass destruction by Israel would be justified if likely to be necessary for assuring the state’s survival, the bitter price of large number of killed innocent civilians notwithstanding.

Thankfully, Dror concedes that it's hard to define what constitutes "survival" ("there is much room for debate," he assures us. Gosh, thanks, Yehezkel!). But, he insists:

When important for existence, violating the rights of others should be accepted, with regret but with determination. Support or condemnation of various countries and their policies should be decided upon primarily in light of probable consequences for the existence of the Jewish people.

In short, the imperatives of existence should be given priority over other concerns — however important they may be — including liberal and humanitarian values, support for human rights and democratization.

If nothing else, Dror's outlook -- shared, presumably, by the JPPPI -- represents a remarkable devolution. Yesterday's popular Jewish cant about Israel ran along the lines of "Israel, and everything it does, is by definition moral." How far have we progressed if we no longer even pretend it's moral, instead insisting that morality itself must be relinquished as a vestige of an earlier age? What's more, we must weigh Israel's interests not only in discussions of the Middle East, but in ethical issues that come up anywhere in the world. Whatever the situation, says Dror, we risk imperiling the Jewish People's existence by aligning ourselves purely with morality.

One wonders how the term "survival" will be defined. With the proper argument, it can include not only nuking Iran, but rounding up all non-Jewish inhabitants of the West Bank (and hell, pre-Green Line Israel too) and shipping them off to the other side of the Jordan River. Slobodan Milosevic was interested in his people's survival too. Was he the intellectual and moral forefather of the JPPPI?

It seems almost providential that just last week, Albert Einstein rose from the grave to give us a warning about Jews and power. “As far as my experience goes," he wrote about Jews, "they are also no better than other human groups, although they are protected from the worst cancers by a lack of power.” Dror offers evidence that sixty years into what some people call "the Jewish return to sovereignty," it might be time for some chemotherapy.

Just Say "Sleaze": The JPPPI's Foxman and Kissinger -- Judaism's Moral Compass Just as importantly, with this op-ed, the JPPPI has shown that it has scant knowledge of "the Jewish People," most of whom do not base decisions, moral or otherwise, on the exclusive basis of what David Ben Gurion would wish for. But that won't stop the JPPPI from insisting it speaks on our behalf. In his description of the mission of the organization, Dror has written that "most Israeli policy-makers and also intellectuals and opinion-shapers, suffer from a lack of understanding, as well as ignorance about and misperception of, Diaspora realities, especially concerning the mindset and feelings of the majority of the younger generation." Let's see, how can we bridge this gap in understanding, especially with the "younger generation"? Hey, how about we propose an abandonment of morality whenever Israel is in the picture? That should work beautifully!

At least the JPPPI is consistent with other Organizations That Claim To Speak On Behalf Of The Jews. It's currently enjoying Stage Two of Jewish organizational process:

Stage One: Establish an organization that claims to represent "the Jewish People."

Stage Two: Espouse ideology that the vast majority of Jews would consider to be out-of-touch or morally execrable.

Stage Three: Lament, in limitless policy papers, the fact that so few Jews choose to "affiliate" with the organized community.

Stage Four: Go to Stage One.

For decades, popular wisdom insists that the Holocaust could have been prevented if only the German soldiers had refused to follow orders.  Of course, that naively takes for granted that your ordinary German had some moral objections to persecuting, dragging to ghettos and murdering Jews.

Two summers ago, in Israel, many soldiers were terribly upset by their orders to evict, exile innocent law-abiding Jews from their homes in Gush Katif and Northern Shomron.

Thirty-eight years earlier the world saw Israeli soldiers cry uncontrollably after liberating the kotel, the Western Wall.  What a difference when we saw soldiers crying, in 2005, as they didn't have the guts to go with their morals and feelings.  We saw soldiers breaking down, because they knew that they were obeying evil laws made by immoral politicians.  The Nazi soldiers didn't cry when they murdered Jews.

Many of the soldiers of Disengagement, two years ago suffered the worst of Post Traumatic Stress, and that's why yesterday IDF soldiers from an elite fighting unit refused to evict innocent, patriotic Jews from homes in Hebron.

Today's soldiers are stronger than their elder brothers. Yasher kocham!

Yesterday in the comments to my post about virginity and the fifteenth of Av someone calling themselves Soccer suggested that I “leave HAdar and go study at a yeshiva with Jewish values!”
When you Google Jewish Values: you get a lot of pictures of people looking triumphant
I don’t know anything about Soccer, and I don’t actually care. I wouldn’t have graced his/her hater comment with a link except that it amused me that Hadar was being called out for Jewish values. One might have a problem with Hadar halachically, but the truth is that Hadar does in fact consider itself obligated by halacha, it simply chooses to interpret halacha in a way somewhat different from how Rav Ovadia Yosef, for instance, might poskin. The core value is the same, though, right?
But Jewish law can’t be the only Jewish value, and I bet there are plenty of people who would argue that Jewish laws are completely irrelevant to Jewish values, so where do we go for more ethical direction?

Is it a Jewish value to be Zionist? What do Jewish values say about abortion? Ecology? Women’s rights? Slavery? War? Genocide?

If you were under the impression that any of those are questions answered simply, I think you’re way off base. As far as I know there are conflicting understandings and opinions regarding all of these issues, with people weighing in from around the world and throughout time. Luckily or unluckily the Torah doesn’t say anything that definitely requires you to recycle, or forbids a man from beating his wife. We take a few comments that may or may not seem relevant and extrapolate from them grand and impressive doctrines on, say, slavery and halacha, and how the Torah views slavery as repugnant and an insult to human dignity. But then we’re stuck with the fact that according to the Torah, it’s perfectly acceptable for a Jewish man to own slaves. Even Jewish slaves are allowed, though not encouraged. But today, if you wanted to go to Thailand and buy some girl to be your housemaid, I doubt your rabbi would be on board with the proposal. He’d likely say something about how it doesn’t jive with Jewish values and then lecture you on the mitzvah to rescue the captives.

Today, morality has been pretty much codified by humanistic terms, and most Jews, even Orthodox Jews, live according to a lot of rules and ethical guidelines that are never or rarely explicit in any Jewish texts. Technically, for instance, halacha allows a person to cheat a non-Jew out of money, but I don’t see many contemporary responsa urging Jews to pad their pockets with money they didn’t get fairly, and I can’t imagine any rabbi I know advising someone in business to go through with a shady deal just to make a mint at the expense of a Baptist coworker.

I guess my point here is the same as it was when I wrote about Jewish delis the other day. I wish people would be more specific when they used the word Jewish. It’s becoming something we just clip to whatever’s convenient, never considering whether it will be a good idea to call something with little or no connection to Judaism ‘Jewish.’

Score one for Edward O. Wilson and the commonsensical forces of sociobiology. Chimps and gorillas have sympathy and will sacrifice themselves for others:

Many philosophers find it hard to think of animals as moral beings, and indeed Dr. de Waal does not contend that even chimpanzees possess morality. But he argues that human morality would be impossible without certain emotional building blocks that are clearly at work in chimp and monkey societies.

[...]

“Sympathy is the raw material out of which a more complicated set of ethics may get fashioned,” he said. “In the actual world, we are confronted with different people who might be targets of our sympathy. And the business of ethics is deciding who to help and why and when.”

Remember that the next time you don't return Coco's calls. 

 

Peter SingerPeter Singer has made a career out of demanding that ordinary people take responsibility for the great power they wield. In a groundbreaking 1972 essay, Singer argued that when middle- and upper-middle-class people fail to donate their money to prevent children in the developing world from starving to death, they are guilty of a moral atrocity. Singer himself gives 20% of his Princeton professor salary to nonprofits, principally Oxfam. To lead an even minimally moral life, he argues, ...