By using schools, hospitals and homes as military sites, Hamas is guilty of the war crimes that a United Nations human rights official has wrongly laid at Israel's feet, a former mayor of an Israeli West Bank settlement told
Newsmax TV on Wednesday.
Former Shiloh Mayor David Rubin, in an interview with "MidPoint" host Ed Berliner, rejected a
charge by the U.N.'s top human rights officer that Israel is indiscriminately killing civilians in Gaza in its latest military offensive against Hamas.
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"What I call war crimes is the Hamas and Islamic Jihad terrorists hiding their missiles — their missile launchers — hiding their weapons, hiding their bomb factories in schools and hospitals and in people's homes," said Rubin, president of the Shiloh Israel Children's Fund and author of
"The Islamic Tsunami."
Militants have fired more than 1,000 rockets into Israel over the past two weeks from the densely populated Gaza Strip, where Israeli is directing troops and air strikes in an effort to break Hamas' military ability.
As the body count among Palestinian non-combatants — including women, children and families — climbs into the hundreds,
international pressure is rising on Israel to halt the operation.
Rubin said a familiar pattern is emerging, as it has in past clashes with Hamas: critics "call for a cease-fire while Israel is finally winning."
He said Israel
should not be cowed by public opinion — which he called an "unfair game" rigged against Israel by "a left-wing media" — and should keep fighting.
"[I]f those civilians who are hiding the terrorists behind them and refusing to evacuate when Israel sends leaflets and text messages and loudspeakers to warn them 48 hours in advance that the Israeli army is coming — [if] they refuse to leave those locations, then obviously some civilians are going to get killed, OK? Welcome to war," said Rubin.
"This is the real world," he continued,"and for six years we've remained silent. We've foolishly, I think, allowed the terrorists to bomb our cities, to fire rockets — thousands upon thousands of rockets — at Israeli cities, aiming at civilians. We don't aim at civilians. We aim at military targets. If civilians are hurt in the process, well, that is something that unfortunately happens in war."
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