A Close Look at Some Key Evidence in the Gaza Hospital Blast
A Close Look at Some Key Evidence in the Gaza Hospital Blast
A widely cited missile video does not shed light on what happened, a Times analysis concludes.
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This is the best summary I could come up with:
The footage has become a widely cited piece of evidence as Israeli and American officials have made the case that an errant Palestinian rocket malfunctioned in the sky, fell to the ground and caused a deadly explosion at Al-Ahli Arab hospital in Gaza City.
Israel has responded to the Hamas attack with a relentless artillery and bombing campaign that has killed 5,700 Palestinians, according to the Hamas-run Gazan Health Ministry, as the Israeli military prepares for a ground invasion.
Israel also has cited several other pieces of evidence that have not been made public, including logs of military activity, information gleaned from radar systems, other audio intercepts and other videos.
In the posts, the Israeli military identified the moving aerial object as a “rocket aimed at Israel” that “misfired and exploded” at nearly the same time as the Al-Ahli Arab Hospital blast.
Using satellite imagery to triangulate the launch point in those videos, The Times determined that the projectile was fired toward Gaza from near the Israeli town of Nahal Oz shortly before the deadly hospital blast.
In addition, the videos show that the projectile in the Al Jazeera footage was launched after the barrage of Palestinian rockets Israeli officials assessed was responsible for the hospital explosion.
The original article contains 1,469 words, the summary contains 207 words. Saved 86%. I'm a bot and I'm open source!
Important context that the bot misses:
The Times is only explaining that this video is not of the projectile that struck the hospital. They are not claiming to know the source of that one, only analyzing this video to disprove that it supports Israel's claims.
If Israel’s story is wrong, doesn’t that pretty much mean it had to be Israel’s doing?
Is there any other theory supported by evidence?
While I agree it's pretty damning, I'd point out that both parties are pretty desperate not to be blamed for the incident (or just generally sow confusion). It's likely we won't ever know definitively.
I'd also point out that because of the immense power imbalance (including the iron dome and broad western support) and a history of strikes against civilian targets generally (that Israel routinely warns Gaza about preemptively), it is more likely that it was an Israeli rocket responsible for the incident. But this is also conjecture and not conclusive.
If you're looking for rationale to defend one side or the other, this probably isn't it.
I have also seen one or more comments on another post about this situation (I think on Hexbear) saying it might have been one of the Iron Dome missiles. That the supposed failed rocket from Hamas failed to launch correctly, but was maybe high enough to still have caused a lock-on by the ID. Though I don't know enough about how the dome works to really say how likely it would happen. As it could be an opportunistic moment for Israel to launch a few non-ID attack missiles. While the media would be more likely to be streaming the air-explosions from the intercept missiles.
We don't know definitively, but the IDF has been the one spreading FUD and repeatedly lying about the incident, so...
Hamas has been remarkably consistent in their claims and recent OSINT analysis is overwhelmingly in support of an Israeli strike.
No other story is supported by evidence, but people don't want to blame the IDF because it'll undermine support for Israel.