The accusation is as outrageous as it is persistent: that Israel killed most of its own civilians on October 7, under the guise of a military doctrine known as the “Hannibal Directive.” According to detractors, the IDF enacted this protocol in the opening hours of Hamas’s invasion to stop abductions — even if it meant killing Israelis themselves. The claim has been spread widely by those eager to whitewash Hamas and pin as much blame as possible on Israel.
But it fails a basic moral and factual test.
On October 7, more than 250 Israelis were taken hostage into Gaza. In the days and weeks that followed, Israel launched the most intense urban campaign in its modern history — and yet, it did not choose the expedient path of writing off those hostages as ‘collateral damage.’ It did not carpet bomb their locations. It did not treat them as expendable.
If Israel had truly intended to kill its own civilians to prevent hostage-taking, it had a far simpler and far more deniable option: do nothing to avoid their deaths once they were taken. Bomb...
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