F-35s Bombing Gaza

by Manlio Dinucci*

(4 June 2021) The US, which has four ammunition storage bases in Israel, also provides an extensive arsenal there. Israel, which already has one of the most powerful air forces in the world, is currently testing F-35 fighter-bombers in combat operations against the Palestinians.

Israeli Forces spokesman Zilberman announced the start of the bombing of Gaza, specifying that “80 fighters are taking part in the operation, including the advanced F-35s”.¹ It is officially the baptism of fire for the US Lockheed Martin’s fifth-generation fighter, whose production Italy also participates in as a second-level partner.

Israel has already received twenty-seven F-35s from the US, and last February decided to buy no longer fifty F-35s but seventy-five. To this end the government has decreed a further allocation of 9 billion dollars: 7 were granted by a US to Israel free “military aid” of 28 billion, 2 were granted as a loan by the US Citibank.

While Israeli F-35 pilots were being trained by the U.S. Air Force in Arizona and Israel, the US Army Engineers built in Israel special hardened hangars for the F-35s, suitable for both fighters’ maximum protection on the ground, and their rapid take-off on attack. At the same time, the Israeli military industries (Israel Aerospace and Elbit Systems) in close coordination with Lockheed Martin enhance the fighter renamed “Adir” (=powerful): above all its ability to penetrate enemy defences and its range of action which was nearly doubled.

These capabilities are certainly not necessary to attack Gaza. Why then are the most advanced fifth-generation fighters used against Palestinians? Because it serves to test F-35s fighters and their pilots in real war action using Gaza homes as targets on a firing range. It does not matter if in the target houses there are entire families.

The F-35s, added to the hundreds of fighter-bombers already supplied by the US to Israel, are designed for nuclear attack particularly with the new B61-12 bomb. The United States will shortly deploy these nuclear bombs in Italy and other European countries, and will also provide them to Israel, the only nuclear power in the Middle East with an arsenal estimated at 100–400 nuclear weapons. If Israel doubles the range of F-35 fighters and is about to receive eight Boeing Pegasus tankers from the US for refuelling the F-35s in flight, it is because it is preparing to launch an attack, even nuclear, against Iran.

The Israeli nuclear forces are integrated into the NATO electronic system within the “Individual cooperation program” framework with Israel. Although not a member of the Alliance, Israel is integrated with a permanent mission in the NATO headquarters in Brussels. In the same framework, Germany supplied Israel with six Dolphin submarines, modified for launching nuclear missiles.²

Italy’s military cooperation with Israel has become a law of the Republic.³ This law establishes comprehensive cooperation, both between armed forces and military industries, including activities that remain secret because they are subject to the “Security Agreement” between the two parties.

Israel has supplied Italy with the Opsat-3000 satellite, which transmits very high-resolution images for military operations in distant war theatres. The satellite is simultaneously connected to three centres in Italy and to a fourth in Israel, as a proof of the increasingly close strategic collaboration between the two countries.

Italy supplied Israel with thirty Leonardo Aermacchi fighters for pilot training. Now it can provide Israel with a new version of the M-346 FA (Fighter Attack), which – Leonardo Industries specified – serves at the same time for training and for “ground attack missions with 500-pound drop ammunition, and precision-guided ammunitions capable of increasing the number of targets to hit at the same time“. The new version of the fighter – Leonardo Industries underlined – is particularly suitable for “missions in urban areas”, where heavy fighters “are often used in low-paying missions with high operating costs”. The ideal for the next Israeli bombings of Gaza, which can be carried out with “a cost per flight hour that is reduced by up to 80%”, and will be very ”cost-effective“, that is, they will kill many more Palestinians.

1 The Times of Israel, 11 May 2021

2 Cf. “Der Spiegel” , 3 June 2012

3 Law of 17 May 2005, No 94)

Source: This article was originally published in Italian on «Il Manifesto», 17 May 2021

(Translation Centre for Research on Globalization)

* Manlio Dinucci is a geographer, political scientist, journalist and book author. His latest books are: Laboratorio di geografia, Zanichelli 2014; Diario di viaggio (three volumes), Zanichelli 2017; L’arte della guerra / Annali della strategia Usa/Nato 1990–2016, Zambon 2016; Guerra nucleare. Il giorno prima. Da Hiroshima a oggi: chi e come ci porta alla catastrofe, Zambon 2017; Diario di guerra. Escalation verso la catastrofe (2016–2018), Asterios Editores 2018.