20 July 2015
Gantz and other senior Israeli officers are seen touring an area near the boundary fence with Gaza during last summer’s Israeli assault.
The clip comes from a longer video released by the Izzedin al-Qassam Brigades recounting an operation last year in which its fighters infiltrated from Gaza into present-day Israel, attacked a military outpost and ambushed a patrol killing at least two Israeli soldiers and injuring several others.
It is unclear why Hamas fighters did not attempt to target Gantz on this occasion. It may be that they did not have the right weapons with sufficient range in place, or other operational reasons. But the UN Human Rights Council’s independent inquiry in to the Gaza assault notes that Qassam fighters did apparently try to target Gantz during other visits to boundary areas.
The longer video, below, is called Behind the Lines: Abu Mutaibiq Outpost.
The 35-minute video, in Arabic, recounts the 19 July 2014 attack on an Israeli military installation near Kissufim, on the Israeli side of the boundary fence with Gaza, from the perspective of the Palestinian fighters.
It includes personal testimonies of some of the participants – their names are not given – and a realistic and at times graphic reenactment of battle scenes. All of the reenactments are labeled as such, so there is no confusing them with real footage, such as that of Gantz.
According to the video, a group of nine Qassam fighters infiltrated Israeli lines via tunnels.Their target was an installation – which they call “Abu Mutaibiq” – which housed Israeli military surveillance and communications equipment. The nine fighters broke up into three groups, one for demolition and two to provide security and engage the enemy.
In addition to sabotaging the Israeli equipment, the men then lay in wait for six hours to ambush an Israeli military patrol.
The reenactment shows the fighters attacking the patrol with rocket-propelled grenades. They then engage in close combat in which Hamas claims that it killed a total of eight Israelis, destroyed two vehicles and disabled a third. The Palestinians also captured two Israeli rifles.
However, according to Israel, only two of its men were killed. One, Major Amotz Greenberg, was a high-ranking officer in the reserves.
The Palestinians say they lost two of their fighters: Ahmad Nathmi Saada was killed in close combat and Hasan al-Khamisi was killed in an Israeli strike after the fighters had withdrawn back to Gaza. A third fighter was injured, according to the video.
Human face
The video is notable for several reasons. It shows that one year after the Israeli assault on Gaza, the military wing of Hamas is maintaining the media and public communications strategy it conducted during the war.
Its social media and communications strategy was key in rallying domestic Palestinian and broader regional support. It depicted the Palestinian resistance as a highly trained force capable of effectively confronting Israel using clever tactics and strategic surprise to make up for a vast deficit in equipment and technology.
After less than 24 hours, Behind the Lines already has more than 120,000 views on YouTube and has received wide coverage in Arabic-language media.
Palestinian resistance groups are necessarily secretive, so this video also aims to put a human face on some of the fighters who engaged Israel in battle.
In the opening scenes, for instance, it shows one fighter preparing for battle, putting together his kit, saying his prayers and speaking about parting from his family. He says he feels privileged and lucky to have been chosen for such an elite mission.
A lot of effort was put into the production and the battle scenes, complete with stunts and special effects, are quite realistic.
Tunnels
The tunnels were indeed the big strategic surprise of the 51-day-long Israeli assault. Palestinian fighters were able to use them numerous times to carry out operations behind Israeli lines.
Israeli propaganda, faithfully echoed in the reporting of The New York Times’ Jodi Rudoren, presented these as “terror tunnels” whose purpose was to attack kindergartens and Israeli living rooms.
This was also the justification Israel offered for its massive ground attack into Gaza in which it killed hundreds of Palestinian civilians in several notorious massacres, including the one in the Shujaiya neighborhood of Gaza city one year ago today.
But the independent inquiry published in June by the UN Human Rights Council concluded that “the tunnels were only used to conduct attacks directed at IDF [Israeli army] positions in Israel in the vicinity of the Green Line, which are legitimate military targets.”
The Behind the Lines video presents the Abu Mutaibiq operation very much in this mold. Indeed, in its press release on the operation last year, Qassam stated that its men had the opportunity to attack Israeli civilian “settlements” in the area, but chose not to.
According to the UN inquiry, 2,251 Palestinians, the vast majority civilians, were killed in the Israeli assault. Of about 70 Israelis killed, all but six were soldiers.
Message to Israel
The video also undoubtedly aims to send a message to Israel. The shorter clip – purportedly of army chief Benny Gantz – seems calculated to draw the attention of Israeli media, which has indeed given it prominent coverage.
Another key element of the shock value for Israel is the freedom with which the Palestinian fighters apparently moved around behind Israeli lines. The video includes, for instance, Israeli surveillance footage showing the Palestinian fighters who carried out the attack returning to Gaza unhindered.
The goal may be to send a psychological message to Israel that its fighters, including its most high-ranking commanders, are still vulnerable to Palestinian forces that remain intact and ready a year after the assault.
Dena Shunra provided additional research.
Comments
If Hamas could have killed
Permalink Voice of Reason replied on
If Hamas could have killed Gantz, why didn't it?
The assassination of such a high-ranking IDF officer at the hands of a poorly-equipped militia would have been an incredible defeat to Israel.
Israeli morale would have cratered and the Arab peoples would have seen that Israel, for all its F16s, isn't so tough.
That's the part that doesn't make sense. Also -- how can we verify how really took this video? Couldn't it have been filmed by a Gaza civilian and then turned over to Hamas?
The video is very low
Permalink Anonymous replied on
The video is very low resolution, so it seems to have been taken from quite a distance from the Israeli soldiers. The explanation for not carrying out the attack offered by EI — that the operatives didn't have a sufficiently high velocity gun — seems reasonable.
Very few civilians can leave Gaza, so no matter who took the video, they likely left Gaza illegally. And even if a civilian took the footage, alarm bells ought to have rang. Israel would have taken any filming of their soldiers as a threat. This is very embarrassing for Israel.
The full video
Permalink News Feed yt replied on
The full video is here : https://www.youtube.com/watch?...
This is ridiculous
Permalink Kat replied on
Why do I see why showing this video may help encourage some Hamas members to continue their militant path, this is only a single example of a non-failed operation executed by Hamas.
The truth of the matter is, and many Palestinian have heard it and are smart to have internalize it, that most such operations either miserably fail, resulting in the killing of most participants, or fail to achieve any real goal.
Other than resistance for the sake of resistance, there is no logic behind these operations. The Palestinian people will continue to suffer.
It would be much better, to try to seriously talk to Israel, now that it's international standing in the world has declined.
It would also be far far better to talk to Egypt. But you are set in your ways. And Israel is set in its ways. Neither will cave, as neither has for the past 60 years...
No
Permalink Caleb replied on
Nonsense. Anyone who has paid any attention over the past few years knows that the Sisi regime which currently rules Egypt is filled with what can only be described as ardent Zionists who would rather support Israel than the beleaguered Palestinians in the Gaza Strip and their representatives Hamas. As for "resistance for the sake of resistance", it is not only for show. It is a moral duty, as aquiesense leads nowhere as has been demonstrated in the West Bank where all the land has essentially been gobbled up by Israel for illegal settlement. If the West Bank would adopt the tactics of Hamas, Palestine would have a better chance for liberation.
It would also be far far
Permalink D. replied on
It would also be far far better to talk to Egypt. But you are set in your ways. And Israel is set in its ways. Neither will cave, as neither has for the past 60 years...
...As we 'talk and talk and talk'...Israel continues with impunity to steal and occupy Palestinian land. Let us not forget to discern and know this for a fact. As for caving/surrendering...perhaps it would be wise to have experienced this despicable violence from like depots/Israel before claiming similarities to the oppressed, imprisoned, terrorized and murdered people of Palestine. But of course you must know this! FREE PALESTINE
Israel Egypt conspiracy to destroy Hamas defensive tunnels
Permalink Ayaz Ahmad Islahi replied on
Israel conspired against theses tunnels with the support of Egypt under Sisi the the traitor after they faced big losses due to them during Israeli terror attack on Gaza in 2014................In fact Sisi men destroyed these tunnels in recent days to support Israel against Palestinian freedom fighters. This is a crime committed by Israel funded Sisi against the Palestinian resistance and that is a black chapter of Egyptian history.What has been done by so called Egyptian president and dictator Sisi to harm the Palestinian cause I consider that as a backstabbing to the Muslim Ummah.