Israel's Ambassador to the UN Gilad Erdan gave a briefing to the media prior to the United Nations Security Council emergency session on Operation Breaking Dawn, which ended yesterday.
Ambassador Erdan said that the Israeli Air Force aborted a mission three times during the conflict to avoid civilian casualties and showed evidence of this act of concern for the wellbeing of civilians in Gaza.
"The Israeli air force aborted the mission three times, I repeat three times due to the presence of children in the area. The evidence is right here and again I'll show you," he said.
He said that Islamic Jihad caused most of the civilian casualties in Gaza through misfired rockets.
"Prime Minister Golda Meir once said that peace will come when the Palestinians love their children more than they hate us Israelis. Unfortunately, this past operation proved just how true this statement still is. The Palestinian Islamic Jihad deliberately fired eleven-hundred rockets at Israeli civilians, with roughly two-hundred – two hundred – landing inside the Gaza Strip, killing innocent Palestinians and among them young children," Erdan said.
"While the Islamic Jihad was indiscriminately firing rockets at Israeli civilians over the past couple of days, its leader Ziyad al-Nakhala, was meeting with his Ayatollah puppet-masters in Tehran and getting orders from them….Israel was forced to carry out precise and surgical strikes against the commanders, launch pads, operatives and terror infrastructure of this fanatic organization to prevent them from targeting Israelis. Israel did so with astounding accuracy and extreme precision, taking precautions hardly ever seen in areas of conflict around the world. Listen to this. Due to the extensive precautions, there is no other military that has such a low collateral damage rate.
Ambassador Erdan criticized the members of the Security Council who initiated the meeting. He said, "How would Norway react to Islamists plotting to fire missiles at civilians in Oslo? How would Ireland react if Jihadi rockets were raining down on Dublin in an effort to wipe out the 'infidel'? I think we all know the answer."
Erdan said that not condemning Palestinian Islamic Jihad, which launched over 1,000 rockets and mortars at Israel over the two-day conflict, will only motivate them, and urged the UN Security Council to condemn the terror group.
"In today’s Security Council debate, if the Council truly wishes to improve the situation in Gaza, there must be one outcome and one outcome only – to condemn the Islamic Jihad for its double war crimes while placing the full accountability for the murder of innocent Palestinians on the shoulders of this radical terror group. If anything else comes out of this meeting, it will be a profound mistake…Holding a Security Council debate on the Palestinian Islamic Jihad and not using the opportunity today to fully condemn them and hold them absolutely accountable for their crimes will only motivate them to continue in their destructive ways," he said. "I truly hope the Council does the right thing."