26-Jul-14: Video evidence of more Gazan death and destruction that could have happened but thankfully did not

For those of us with a Western cultural outlook, the willingness of the Islamist forces in Gaza to place their own children in harm's way is perhaps the most difficult aspect to comprehend of this ongoing war.

This video below was released by the IDF earlier today (Saturday). It's not especially graphic, it lacks a military-music soundtrack and it has no passionate slogans flashing across the screen. Still, for thoughtful observers, it's one small additional piece of evidence of the cold-blooded viciousness that characterizes the tactics of Hamas and those who choose to travel with it.

The video shows a house located a few meters from a clearly-marked Gaza school operated by the US. The building is rigged with explosives and wires to cause maximum damage to invading Israeli forces, and would - if triggered - cause death, damage, destruction and graphic images of dead and dying Palestinian Arab children if the men of Hamas had their way.

Fortunately, the soldiers and sappers of the IDF blunted the lethal threat, and so the video below has a dispassionate air about it, instead of documenting more unbearable misery imposed on their own side by the jihadists. This means it will be seen by a far smaller, but probably more discerning, audience than it would if it had been filled with screaming children, grieving parents and large quantities of blood.

The masses now taking to the streets [see "We are all Hamas"] to stand with the gunmen and vast rocket arsenals of Hamas need to know they are advocating for a jihadist strategy of human shields and more dead children.