How the Israel-Hamas War Tests International Law
“Even wars have rules," United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres said last week, repeating a maxim of international law that experience has shown to be more aspirational than operational. Hamas mocked the most sacrosanct of those rules when it intentionally targeted Israeli civilians earlier this month in an operation that killed more than 1,000 Israelis and took about 200 people hostage.
But Hamas’s atrocities can’t justify an unbounded retaliation. As Israel intensifies its response, from aerial bombardment of Gaza to a possible ground invasion of the Hamas-controlled territory, even the country’s closest allies are warning against the potential of a humanitarian catastrophe.
“Israel has the right to defend itself, and not only to defend itself, but also to make sure that to the extent possible, this can’t happen again," Secretary of State Antony Blinken said Sunday. “But the way that Israel does this is also very important, to include taking every precaution that civilians not be harmed and making sure that those who need assistance can get it." In densely populated Gaza, military operations are almost impossible to conduct without risk to civilians.
A body of rules, sometimes called the laws of war or international humanitarian law, sets the outer boundaries for permissible operations. What are the laws of war and where do they come from? Although the customs of war evolved over centuries, it wasn’t until the beginning of mechanized combat in the 1800s that the rules began to be codified into international treaties.
The core document remains the Geneva Conventions of 1949, which include rules for the treatment of noncombatants and prisoners. Both Israel and the Palestinian Authority, which doesn’t control
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