The Israeli government prefers to deny any responsibility for the fate of the two million Palestinians living in the Gaza Strip. Never mind that Israel has imposed a 15-year siege, with Egypt’s help, which oversees every entry and exit point to the strip; or that it controls the Palestinians’ population registry; or the constant humming of army drones flying over the residents’ heads; or the naval boats that fire at fishermen who stray too far beyond a designated zone.

There are plenty of reasons to disbelieve Israel’s line on Gaza — first and foremost because Palestinians themselves have disproven its mantra, sadly often on deaf ears. Not every day, however, do we hear those reasons confessed to by the soldiers who were responsible for carrying out the siege, reaffirming what Palestinians have long been describing about their oppression.

In a series of interviews with +972’s Yuval Abraham, four former soldiers from the IDF Intelligence Corps directly contradict the Israeli army’s claims that it takes extreme measures to protect Palestinian civilians in Gaza. In fact, according to one former soldier, not only does the army often know ahead of each operation that it will be killing non-combatants, but there is even an “allowed” number of children that is permissible to kill. As long as that amount is not exceeded, the killing can be approved in advance.

The soldiers also described how following an Israeli shelling, they are asked to monitor the phone conversations of family members in order to hear the moment they tell each other that their loved one has died — as a means of confirming who was killed. One interviewee described how some of these conversations are even used to teach other soldiers Arabic.

The soldiers further described to Abraham the coercive ways in which Israel is constantly amassing “collaborators” or intelligence gatherers in Gaza. “Today we control everything that goes in and out, whether physically, electronically, or in terms of people,” one person told him. “People in Gaza beg to be able to study abroad or visit relatives. This can be used to turn them into collaborators.”

Moreover, the IDF’s intelligence gathering doesn’t focus solely on the political higher-ups in Hamas or Palestinian Islamic Jihad — it trickles down to average people. “There is no such thing as privacy,” another soldier said. “You know everything about the person [in question]. What they like, what they have photographed, whether they have a lover, their sexual orientation.”

This is how Israel controls Gaza. It has mastered the art of long-distance killing and blackmailing people into collaboration. It has put the occupation out of sight and mind of Israelis, the majority of whom do not care what it takes to besiege millions of people. This is the daily violence that continues operating in Gaza long after and regardless of whether a ceasefire has been declared.

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