Ex-PM Barak throws support behind offensive

“We have to respond forcefully, with determination and reason,” former prime minister Ehud Barak says. “Israel cannot afford to have millions of civilians under rocket threat.”

Speaking at the Israeli Conference on Peace, Barak — who served as defense minister during the 2012 Operation Pillar of Defense — refuses to make concrete policy recommendations on how to deal with the current rain of rockets, but said that Israel’s military leadership consists of professionals who understand these issues better than the government.

— Raphael Ahren