Report: Israel's heavy reliance on technology failed to protect it

Israel’s heavy reliance on technology to protect its borders has failed to protect it, Yedioth Ahronoth newspaper yesterday.

According to the paper, the Israeli army used the world’s most advanced technology to secure the new Separation Wall along the Gaza-Israel fence and spent billions of shekels on it, equipping it with sensors and smart surveillance cameras, autonomous firing points and advanced surveillance systems, however, all these failed to stop a few fighters using simple weapons.

“Hamas brought down the most advanced high-tech wall in the world in an instant, through primitive means from World War I, except for one means: drones that can be purchased from any store. Thirty-five drones were used in the opening strike, including suicide drones. They attacked the firing points and neutralised them,” the paper said.

According to the paper, the Palestinian resistance relied on a military rule implemented in the eighteenth century by Carl von Clausewitz, who had developed a combat theory stating that whoever assembles quick and sufficient forces at a certain point through a surprise attack can throw the opponent off balance.

The paper quoted a former senior army officer, Professor Yitzhak Ben Yisrael, as saying that he had warned the army against over-reliance on technology because it has weak points.

“How will the surveillance rooms see if they snip the cameras? You can not rely on laboratory solutions in the field. The experiment that was tried in the laboratory does not necessarily succeed on the battlefield; advanced technology is centralised, specific, and subject to exposure. Damage happens by causing damage to a specific point, and it will have a significant impact on many abilities,” Ben Yisrael, who now works as a security studies officer and head of the Cyber Research Centre at Tel Aviv University said.

“Heavy reliance on technology without understanding that it has weak points, such as accessing it or jamming it, is a very grave and serious mistake. I expressed my concern about that two years ago, and warned the competent authorities against that,” he added.

“Every military organisation must ask itself a question: What will happen if I do not receive a warning, and if there is a malfunction in the systems that I rely on today?” he added.

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