America’s lesson from Gaza: prepare for disinformation war
A pair of retired top American officers say Israel did not respond quickly or effectively enough to the information war waged by Hamas earlier this year.
By Charles Wald, Robert Ashley and Blaise Misztal on November 12, 2021 at 11:31 AM
Following the May outbreak of fighting in Gaza, the Jewish Institute for National Security of America gathered 10 former top American military officers to study the conflict and draw conclusions for how it could apply to Pentagon operations in the future. In the op-ed below, Charles Wald, the retired Deputy Commander of United States European Command, and Robert Ashley, the retired Director of the Defense Intelligence Agency, write with Blaise Misztal of JINSA that the biggest lesson learned related to information warfare.
While the US may be turning its focus towards the Pacific, the Middle East still has military lessons to teach. This is particularly true of the May 2021 conflict between Israel and armed Palestinian groups in the Gaza Strip. Israel has termed its operations the “first artificial intelligence” war, but perhaps the most important takeaway has to do with disinformation.
May’s 11-day conflict, the fourth major round of hostilities since Hamas violently took control of Gaza in 2007, made up for its brevity with intensity. Hamas’ deployment of advanced capabilities, civilian shields, and disinformation are characteristics of tactics US forces will likely encounter. And while Israel’s ability to dominate Gaza’s finite battlespace was an advantage American planners cannot count on, Israel’s operational and technological innovations, and its challenges in the informational domain, should help shape how US forces prepare for their next conflicts.
https://breakingdefense.com/2021/11/americas-lesson-from-gaza-prepare-for-disinformation-war/
