The Strategic Challenge of Feeding Gazans

On Friday, the left-leaning Israeli newspaper Haaretz—which is also the country’s most prestigious if not its most widely read—ran a story about Israel soldiers shooting at Palestinian civilians in Gaza who had come to receive humanitarian aid. The item was a showcase of the outlet’s flaws: a sensational headline, not justified by the actual content; an English version of the article that distorted the original; and a general rush to the most damning possible interpretation of the evidence. Haviv Rettig Gur delves into the story, what it exposes about Haaretz, what really happened, and, most importantly, the real failures of the IDF that it reveals—which might be moral failures but are certainly strategic ones. (Video, 48 minutes. Also available in podcast form.)