It was a bit previous midnight on Friday, and Israel’s Supreme Command Submit was racing to finish as many strikes as doable within the remaining hours earlier than a cease-fire with the Palestinian militant group Hamas was to take impact at 2 a.m.
On a wall coated with large screens, a three-dimensional diagram of a high-rise constructing with certainly one of its flats marked in pink popped up. On one other display, a reside video from the air circled above a constructing in Gaza that regarded quite a bit just like the one within the diagram.
This room is the nerve middle of a bunker dubbed the “Fortress of Zion,” a brand new Israeli Military command submit deep underground beneath its headquarters within the coronary heart of Tel Aviv. It’s designed to command the form of high-tech air wars which have supplanted floor invasions fought by tanks and infantry battalions.
The most recent battle with the Palestinians was the primary time the sprawling facility was used throughout wartime. It was additionally the primary time the military allowed overseas journalists inside one of the crucial fortified and secretive installations within the nation — an effort to showcase Israel’s army and technological prowess but in addition to counter criticism over civilian casualties.
From the bunker, the army oversaw 1000’s of assaults on the Gaza Strip, most of them from the air, but in addition from the ocean and land. The Israelis say they inflicted severe injury on Hamas, which controls Gaza.
These assaults additionally took a excessive toll on civilians. Of the 248 Palestinians killed, 66 had been kids, Palestinian officers say. That toll introduced a global outcry and strain on Israel from its shut ally, the USA, to finish the hostilities. The Israeli assault additionally trigger widespread destruction to buildings and different infrastructure within the already impoverished Gaza Strip, deepening a long-running humanitarian disaster.
A cease-fire continued to carry on Saturday afternoon as Egyptian diplomats tried to mediate a longer-term settlement between Israel and Hamas. There have been only a few protests towards the Israeli occupation and the struggle in Gaza, easing fears of a army flare-up.
The primary noticeable factor one notices upon getting into the bunker is the silence. Not one of the drama and tragedy of struggle is obvious, and other people seem alert, centered and calm.
The command submit is constructed for operations based mostly closely on intelligence and carried out from the air or by small teams of particular forces. It compiles data from disparate companies into one database and interprets it into operational phrases.
It’s a place the place individuals are measured by the variety of permitted targets — warehouses, tunnels or weapons that the army can assault. When a senior officer approves one, it’s added to a “Targets Ebook” that the chief of employees evaluations as soon as a month.
During the last 20 years, the “targets” have more and more been folks — like senior Hamas figures.
The army is nicely conscious of the criticism of its ways, and the lack of harmless lives, which have drawn condemnation from inside and out of doors the nation.
One senior officer, aiming to indicate that Israel had tried to reduce civilian deaths, factors to detailed aerial pictures of an operation that he mentioned had been canceled as a result of its goal was a Hamas facility close to a Gaza hospital. He mentioned many others had been equally canceled out of concern for civilian casualties.
The pinnacle of the Intelligence Division’s Targets Department, recognized as Lt. Col. S. as a result of the army doesn’t enable the intelligence officers to be named within the information media, mentioned he didn’t suppose troopers turned coldhearted by decreasing folks to “targets.”
One other commander working within the bunker mentioned, nevertheless, “You possibly can’t kill somebody with out one thing dying in you, too.”
Maj. Gen. Nitzan Alon, a former director of operations for the Israeli army, mentioned he understood that the space from the battlefield and the remedy of individuals as “targets” might create indifference to human lives.
“That is a part of the commander’s problem,” he mentioned, to make sure that the operation is efficient and “to know that there are human beings on the different finish.”
Israel additionally commonly accuses Hamas of hiding its services and weapons inside or close to civilian buildings, successfully utilizing civilians as human shields.
Throughout common instances, 300 to 400 troopers work there across the clock. When Israel determined to launch its air assault on Gaza, 1000’s from army headquarters above floor joined the bunker. Additionally current had been members of intelligence companies just like the Mossad and Shin Guess, Israel’s home intelligence company, and Overseas Ministry and police representatives.
For 10 days, they commanded operations from the bunker. Most of them scarcely left.
Contained in the nerve middle, about 70 folks had been arrayed on completely different ranges so that everybody might see the screens on the wall. Most had been in army uniforms and beneath 25, and people out of uniform had been largely older.
They sat at tables with computer systems, landline telephones or extra obscure communication units. A few of their keyboards fed information into the wall screens — an in depth breakdown of assaults carried out and injury achieved to Hamas.
Israel estimates that it destroyed 15 to twenty % of Hamas’s rocket arsenal and a few weapons manufacturing services. It claims to have killed about 200 Hamas operatives and eradicated 30 % of the tunnels beneath Gaza used for sheltering militants, housing command methods and transferring weaponry round.
The nerve middle additionally had a map with places of floor forces and army plane all through the Center East.
Within the hours simply earlier than cease-fire, it was clear that Israel was desperate to deal highly effective remaining blows to Hamas. One display tracked rocket launches from Gaza and a doable hit on a kibbutz in southern Israel.
At 2 a.m., the commander echoed the chief of employees’s order to stop hostilities. However nobody was going residence. The submit stays on fight alert till Israel determines that the delicate cease-fire will final.
“Fortress of Zion” took 10 years to design and construct. Dug deep into the earth, it is protected against quite a lot of threats, together with nuclear assaults. It has sufficient vitality, meals and water to perform even when its occupants can not get to floor stage for a very long time.
It’s an extension of an previous command submit, nicknamed “the pit,” that was expanded a number of instances however was deemed too small and gloomy and had electrical energy and sanitation issues.
Extra essential, Maj. Gen. Aharon Haliva, the present director of operations for the army, mentioned, “Over time, the Israel Protection Forces’ wants have modified.”
The massive floor wars of a long time passed by gave solution to extra frequent however smaller operations — often called the “struggle between the wars.” And that shift meant relying extra on know-how and a digital community to pool intelligence, Common Haliva mentioned.
The bunker is linked through know-how to a different underground command submit for Israel’s political leaders close to Jerusalem, the Air Drive’s underground headquarters and the Shin Guess’s command middle.
The complicated features a fitness center, a synagogue, a kitchen and eating rooms, and a bed room for company with a row of clocks from completely different elements of the world, Tehran amongst them. There’s additionally a lounge with meals and nonalcoholic drinks — the one spot the place troopers can use their cellphones.
One ground is occupied by the military’s excessive command, together with a non-public bed room for the chief of employees with easy furnishings mirrored all through the bunker.
Varied army and intelligence departments feed the nerve middle with data and have a consultant bodily current. The mixed operation permits for numerous strikes in an nearly steady stream.
Some efforts had been made to present the windowless bunker a nice ambiance, embellished with footage of scenic locations within the nation and a well-known quote by Israel’s founding father, David Ben-Gurion, that reads: “Within the arms of this military, the safety of the folks and the homeland will now be entrusted.”
Patrick Kingsley contributed reporting.