The excruciating math of the war in Gaza
The scene of destruction left by Israeli bombardment of the Gaza Strip in the Maghazi refugee camp Friday. Credit: AP/Hatem Moussa
Longtime readers know that I’m a math guy. I love math, always have.
I love the power and beauty inherent in numbers, their capacity for both mystery and clarity. Numbers sometimes are the answer to problems. Other times, they are the context. There is scarcely an issue in modern life in which they are not part of the equation.
I also love equations. They serve as statements about how the real world works. They describe the impact of a moving object, the speed of something falling, the force of a storm, the worth of money in another country, the pressure at the bottom of the ocean, the number of small objects you can fit into something larger, the length of wood needed for a home repair, the number of hours you must work to pay for that vacation.
Math offers a reliability and solidity the world needs, especially in uncertain times. Unfortunately, those also tend to be the times when humans succumb to their immense capacity to abuse and misuse math.
But sometimes, even when math and numbers are employed with relative earnestness, they fall short in offering the guidance we crave.
We’re discovering this again in the war in Gaza between Israel and Hamas, in the application of one of the basic principles of humanitarian law meant to protect civilians in war. This is the rule that says that attacks on military targets must not cause “disproportionate” harm to civilians. The gist of this dictum is that when a military attack is anticipated to result in “incidental” deaths or injuries to civilians and damage to civilian objects (houses, cars, etc.), that toll must not be excessive when compared to the military gain that is expected.
In other words, the harm must be proportional to the benefit.
At its root, that is a mathematical equation. But how do you solve it?
Some calculations are clear. The Oct. 7 attack by Hamas on Israeli civilians was indiscriminate and disproportionate, both horrifying and illegal. The gruesome deaths and injuries were not incidental; they were the very point of the attack.
But what about what has followed?
How does one calculate acceptable proportionality?
A bomb that takes out a low-level Hamas fighter and incidentally kills 400 civilians is one kind of equation. A bomb that wipes out a Hamas command center, killing several leaders and 50 terrorists, while killing 50 civilians, is another.
There is no minimizing this. This is excruciatingly difficult stuff, especially for people trying their best to make honest calculations, especially when the enemy is hiding among civilians thereby guaranteeing “incidental” casualties, especially when there is no shortage of people trying to manipulate the figures and the calculations to their benefit, especially when there is so much at stake.
Equations never adequately assess the value of a human life in the best of times. In the end, they lead to a judgment call and judgments are always subject to biases and interpretations.
So, disproportionate harm is calculated and debated and attacked and defended as the rest of us abhor the disturbing images on our TV and cellphone screens — all of the images on all of our screens — and we mourn the casualties as they mount.
And if we really dig into the numbers, the numbers that have accumulated over the many bloody years, we do understand that all of our equations tell us one thing for certain: This will not end until we learn to live together.
We don’t have to agree with one another. We don’t have to associate with one another. We don’t have to break bread with one another. We just have to learn to live with one another.
That’s another complex calculation, for sure. But if we don’t do it, we’ll continue to debate how much harm is proportional and how much is indiscriminate and the number of those who have died will continue to rise.
n COLUMNIST MICHAEL DOBIE’S opinions are his own.
Michael Dobie is a member of the Newsday editorial board.
