RICHARD FERNANDEZ: The Unexpected Hostage Rescue.

Part of me wants to know how the assault force achieved the surprise needed to forestall hostage execution in two separate locations. They had to make entry practically simultaneously at a mutually optimal moment. Since I can’t know I will guess. The rescue operation elements may have seemed to be part of the random environment until the rescue moment. The key disadvantage of holding hostages in populated areas is that Hamas cannot entirely prevent random and ambient access by the public to places nearby, access the IDF can exploit by continuously flowing assets through the vicinity. The presence of civilians cuts both ways. It provides human shielding against an assault force, but it can also conceal those same elements.

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