IDF debates use of white phosphorus shells

[cybrsage]

I figure I will remove the phosphorous smoke some have placed on this discussion by posting the actual rules:

Protocol on Prohibitions or Restrictions on the Use of Incendiary Weapons (Protocol III). Geneva, 10 October 1980.
Article 1

• Definitions
  
  For the purpose of this Protocol:
  1. "Incendiary weapon" means any weapon or munition which is primarily designed to set fire to objects or to cause burn injury to persons through the action of flame, heat, or combination thereof, produced by a chemical reaction of a substance delivered on the target. (a) Incendiary weapons can take the form of, for example, flame throwers, fougasses, shells, rockets, grenades, mines, bombs and other containers of incendiary substances.
  (b) Incendiary weapons do not include:
  (i) Munitions which may have incidental incendiary effects, such as illuminants, tracers, smoke or signalling systems;
  (ii) Munitions designed to combine penetration, blast or fragmentation effects with an additional incendiary effect, such as armour-piercing projectiles, fragmentation shells, explosive bombs and similar combined-effects munitions in which the incendiary effect is not specifically designed to cause burn injury to persons, but to be used against military objectives, such as armoured vehicles, aircraft and installations or facilities.
  2. "Concentration of civilians" means any concentration of civilians, be it permanent or temporary, such as in inhabited parts of cities, or inhabited towns or villages, or as in camps or columns of refugees or evacuees, or groups of nomads.
  3. "Military objective" means, so far as objects are concerned, any object which by its nature, location, purpose or use makes an effective contribution to military action and whose total or partial destruction, capture or neutralization, in the circumstances ruling at the time, offers a definite military advantage.
  4. "Civilian objects" are all objects which are not military objectives as defined in paragraph 3.
  5. "Feasible precautions" are those precautions which are practicable or practically possible taking into account all circumstances ruling at the time, including humanitarian and military considerations.
  
  
  Article 2
  Protection of civilians and civilian objects
  
  1. It is prohibited in all circumstances to make the civilian population as such, individual civilians or civilian objects the object of attack by incendiary weapons.
  2. It is prohibited in all circumstances to make any military objective located within a concentration of civilians the object of attack by air-delivered incendiary weapons.
  3. It is further prohibited to make any military objective located within a concentration of civilians the object of attack by means of incendiary weapons other than air-delivered incendiary weapons, except when such military objective is clearly separated from the concentration of civilians and all feasible precautions are taken with a view to limiting the incendiary effects to the military objective and to avoiding, and in any event to minimizing, incidental loss of civilian life, injury to civilians and damage to civilian objects.
  4. It is prohibited to make forests or other kinds of plant cover the object of attack by incendiary weapons except when such natural elements are used to cover, conceal or camouflage combatants or other military objectives, or are themselves military objectives.

• 
  http://www.icrc.org/ihl.nsf/FULL/515?OpenDocument
  
  So now we know the rules, and what is and is not an incendiary weapon. From the OP's link, let us look at what the Israelis are thinking of using:
  
  

  During Operation Cast Lead in Gaza in 2009, the IDF fired a number of 155 mm shells – called M825A1 – which are used to provide a smokescreen for troop movements or to mark targets.

  http://www.jpost.com/MiddleEast/Article.aspx?id=255182
  
  These appear to fall into 1(b)(i), making them NOT incendiary weapons and therefor the ban on their use is not applicable.

Just in case someone has doubts about the shells:

The M825A1 White Phosphorus shell deploys 116 WP impregnated felt wedges that provide screening for about 5-10 minutes over a 125-250 meter area that obscures enemy vision or screens maneuvering elements.

http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/systems/munitions/m825.htm

 

[JEDIYoda]

what are you babbling about? the P&N shills (like yourself). try to illicit a response by trapping a poster into a corner. then they take what was said out of context, twist it into lies, and belittle the poster from here to eternity. i know how your type works infopigeon, oh yes..i know. i will stick around PN for awhile until I see some fair responses from fools as yourself.

Corner Infohawk asked a good question. Yet, we all know the answer-- You have a hard on for Israel!! Just admit it!!

 

[Hayabusa Rider]

Stop complaining about being oppressed by a tyrant, people in other countries. Be slaves and don't think about rebelling. That's un-American. How sick.

How ironic.

 

[irishScott]

How ironic.

All comes down to one's personal definition of freedom I guess.

 

[EagleKeeper]

As some miss the point, White Phosphorous has some legitimate war usages, but its defined an international war crime to use it in areas populated by many civilians.

A clearly defined international war crime still hanging over Israel and well documented.

1) what is the % to be many

2) when the civilian population is deliberately integrated into the militant/hostile combatants; should that release them of responsibility?

The complete Gaza strip is populated. One building may be a bomb factory with a hospital over it. Which should the building classified as

 

[EagleKeeper]

i dont know man. id really like to visit there sometimes, but i dont want to get harrassed or stoned to death.


nothing personal against israelis, palis, jews, mooslims. i just have nothing better to do.

if i make a list of folks here and you publicly apologize, i promise to not come back to PN, deal? :sneaky:

Maybe if you change your attitudes, you will have nothing to fear.

Your actions is what brings scorn upon yourself

 

[SandEagle]

Maybe if you change your attitudes, you will have nothing to fear.

Your actions is what brings scorn upon yourself

did I wrong you in another life, Eagle Keeper? Where does this intolerable hatred for me come from? Is it from knowing that... that our father loved me more than you? yes, EK. we are brothers. I have a brother!???

that is a joke. can we really all just not get along? i will change my attitude, but you and the other haters on both sides need to change as well. they know who they are. let there be balance in PN and I will contain myself to OT. :awe:

 

[airdata]

I guess they already use gunships to counter rock throwing. Why not use other deadly weapons?

 

[cybrsage]

One building may be a bomb factory with a hospital over it. Which should the building classified as

If it aids the Palestinians in killing Israelis, it is a hospital. If it does not, it is a bomb factory.

 

[Exterous]

WHITE PHOSPHOROUS IS ONLY ILLEGAL FOR EVERY COUNTRY

I am curious to know what countries have actually made white phosphorous completely illegal. Since you typed this in all caps I can only assume this is readily available information and I eagerly await your list and proof

 

[QuantumPion]

Geneva convention bans incendiary weapons in civilian areas.

No. The UN Convention on Conventional Weapons Protocol III (banning incendiary weapons) explicitly allows white phosphorus.

 

[yllus]

I get banning things from an academic point of view, but honestly, if it was my nation's soldiers in the line of fire, I probably wouldn't rule out anything that could be marginally useful either.

 

[Exterous]

I am curious to know what countries have actually made white phosphorous completely illegal. Since you typed this in all caps I can only assume this is readily available information and I eagerly await your list and proof

*crickets*

 

[JEDIYoda]

I get banning things from an academic point of view, but honestly, if it was my nation's soldiers in the line of fire, I probably wouldn't rule out anything that could be marginally useful either.

Thats the point!!!!!!!!! Finally somebody got it!!
War is war and you use whatever you have to win the war.
Hopefully civilian casualties are minimal, You should never target Civilians.
But how do you diferentiate if Civilians are aiding the soldeirs....

You may say well they dont have tanks or aircraft or bombs......
Well thay should be smart enough NOT to attack you.
If they are not that smart then they get what ever happens to them.

Nobody in an all out war is going to stop and say hey guys we can`t do that, the Geneva Convention says we can only use stones and sticks.....


Hey guys throw down your weapons. We can only use bow and arrows...UN Resolution 666 says that we have to fight with the exact same weapons as our enemy...lol

Who said war was suppose to be fair??

 

[Atreus21]

http://www.jpost.com/MiddleEast/Article.aspx?id=255182

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OKHQro9OO-o


wow, another anti-semitic article by the Jerusalem Post and YouTube. Why do these people keep writing these articles and hosting these videos? Is the author Yaakov Katz, a Jewish author, a self hating anti-semite? i mean, really, why would they write these sorts of things? why? seriously, why? i am at a lots. :|

oh, and nevermind the fact that white phosphorous is an internationally banned weapon and OMFG SANDEAGLE YOU FUCKING ANTISEMITE!! WHITE PHOSPHOROUS IS ONLY ILLEGAL FOR EVERY COUNTRY EXCEPT.....zzzzzzzz......snore.....

I love the terrorist sympathizers. Aghast at the notion that a nation should even argue with itself over whether to put the citizen's of its belligerent neighbor (you know, the one with the government that holds as its highest goal the destruction of Israel) at risk. Hamas, of course, deliberately targets Israeli civilians using suicide bombers, but whatever, you know? Israel, man. They're the bad guys.

This thread freaking delivers.

 

[woolfe9999]

I'm trying to understand why you're obsessed with Israel. You keep dodging the question.

You're asking him the right question, which is exactly why he won't give you a serious and direct answer.

 

[Abwx]

sandeagle, why are you so interested in Israel again?

The same reson others are interested in Al Capone..

 

[ShawnD1]

The same reson others are interested in Al Capone..

Because he's fat?

 

[kylebisme]

A few images from Google image search for white phosphorus Gaza to add some perspective:

 

[JEDIYoda]

I guess they already use gunships to counter rock throwing. Why not use other deadly weapons?

so they should throw rocks back??

 

[JEDIYoda]

No perspective found!!

 

[ShawnD1]

so they should throw rocks back??

They should resort to napalm and fire bombing. That'll get em to stop throwing rocks.

 

[monovillage]

oh gosh I saw a horrible picture from a war zone. That will of course change my mind.
As if a religious fanatic wouldn't dump lighter fluid on a kid and light it off for a good photo op.

 

[EagleKeeper]

I guess they already use gunships to counter rock throwing. Why not use other deadly weapons?

Gunships are not used when rocks are thrown.

Gunships are used when high powered missiles/explosives are used or to protect people from rifle attacks.

Israel tolerates the pin pricks.

When one wants to increase the lethality of the weapon used; expect eventually to get slapped down when the tolerance line is reached.

this has happened to Arafat's PLO, Hamas and Hezbollah.
Yet they all never learned that lesson.

 

[JEDIYoda]

According to the New York Times, a 16-year-old boy was critically injured while riding on a school bus, which was hit by laser-guided missile launched by Hamas. The Times reports that in addition to claiming responsibility for the attack, Hamas said it intentionally chose the target in revenge for an Israeli attack that left three “holy fighters” dead.

By calling its dead “holy fighters,” Hamas obliquely acknowledges that the Israeli attack was on a legitimate military target. And by stating that that it intentionally attacked a school bus, which is clearly a civilian target, Hamas has admitted to committing a war crime.

It doesn’t get any clearer than this.