When it came to "defending Israel", Europe did not waste time falling in line with the US in adopting the Israeli narrative of the Al-Ahli Hospital bombing. The one holdout was Canada, but it did not take long for the Canadians to parrot those nations.

“Analysis conducted independently by the Canadian Forces Intelligence Command indicates with a high degree of confidence that Israel did not strike the hospital on October 17, 2023. The more likely scenario is that the strike was caused by an errant rocket fired from Gaza. We will continue to provide updates as new information becomes available.”

The Toronto Star adds to the statement above:

“…the Department of National Defence on Saturday evening said that the analysis was based on open source and classified reporting.”

Considering how fast the assignment of blame came from "Israel’s" allies, such classified reporting is most likely Israeli-sourced, not independent, and should be highly suspected.

I am going to exclusively rely on open-source information (because governments mostly lie) in my analysis to show that with simple common sense, it can be demonstrated, almost beyond a reasonable doubt, that the bomb was a premeditated Israeli action.

A good place to start would be the crater that the bomb left in the hospital’s courtyard. The photograph of the crater is widely available from many news sources. The carter is fairly small, and, based on the surrounding debris, I estimated its size to be about ten (10) centimeters in diameter.

One thing that is important to mention is that, regardless of what size it is, the crater did not exhibit any evidence of shrapnel development radiating from its center. Emphasis, no shrapnel.

French language spokesperson for the Israeli army, Olivier Rafowicz, gave several interviews on the subject to French TV. In one of the interviews, he stated that "Israel" could not be the perpetrator because there was no crater and that Israeli bombs leave large craters.

In another interview, Rafowicz, in trying to explain the damage that was caused, stated that the Palestinian missile that "errantly" fell on the hospital ground caused fires with its fuel and caused fatalities when its 300 kg payload exploded.

I agree with Rafowicz’s first interview. A ten-centimeter crater does not qualify for a common Israeli crater, but the payload of 300 kg mentioned in the second interview is typical for an Israeli bomb and should have left an Israeli-sized crater.

I guess we need to thank Rafowicz for bringing our attention to the fact that the crater’s size is wildly disproportional with the level of damage and lethality. I personally thank Rafowicz for his inconsistencies and for being the catalyst behind this analysis.

The two interviews of Rafowicz can be found at the following locations: Daily Motion and BFMTV.

To summarize what we know:

1.      Small crater with no shrapnel evidence

2.      Casualties in the hundreds

3.      Intense fire

4.      Inconsistent Israeli stories

What we need to examine now are the types of rockets that the Palestinian side uses. Based on open-source information from GlobalSecurity.org, the Israeli forces website, and Wikipedia, a Qassam rocket was allegedly used. When there was disagreement between the sources, the data used was the one that favored the Israeli version of the story; more than fair.

It is important to stress that all Palestinian rockets use solid fuel. Solid fuels cannot spill upon impact. In the case of no explosion of the payload upon impact, the solid fuel would simply burn until exhaustion and might cause localized fires and not the reported intense fire. Moreover, the only Palestinian rocket that could be associated with the small dimensions of the crater is the Qassam 2 rocket, which has a payload of 5 to 9 kg.

Still, whether 5 or 9 Kg, the crater should exhibit shrapnel marks radiating from its center.

The lack of shrapnel marks is highly puzzling.

Is it possible to assess the lethality of the Qassam rocket?

A comparable incident took place when multiple Qassam rockets accidentally exploded within a crowd of people in a parade setting, and it was reported in a research paper by The Begin-Sadat Center for Strategic Studies, Bar-Ilan University, Mideast Security and Policy Studies No. 91 titled: The Missile Threat from Gaza: From Nuisance to Strategic Threat by Uzi Rubin.

“In September 2005, during a victory parade in downtown Gaza to celebrate the Disengagement, a truck carrying Qassam rockets exploded killing 19 civilians and wounding 80.”

From a CBS News report on the same incident, witnesses told Israeli Yedioth that the first explosion triggered several other blasts in nearby vehicles that were also carrying rockets and ammunition. The final tally of multiple trucks carrying Qassam rockets and munitions exploding of 19 deaths and 80 wounded in a parade setting where children were crowding those trucks pales in comparison to the hundreds of deaths at Al-Ahli hospital caused by a single Qassam-sized missile as "Israel" claims. The other thing we should take note of is the ratio of dead to wounded at the parade and compare it to the ratio from the Al-Ahli Hospital bombing.

A single Qassam rocket that could only produce a small crater is incapable of killing hundreds when truckloads under similar conditions killed only 19.

The big question is, what kind of weapon can be consistent with such a small crater, no shrapnel marks at crater, intense fire, and such a large death toll?

The clues come from video evidence in the public domain.

The Israeli authorities referenced an Al-Jazeera video as evidence of a Palestinian missile hitting the hospital grounds. In return, Al-Jazeera decided to do its own detailed technical analysis of the video "Israel" cited.

A video analysis indicated two explosions from the direction of the hospital. One small explosion came 2 seconds prior to the large explosion associated with a large ball of fire.

The other videos were those that I personally viewed on Al Mayadeen.net TV coverage.

In one of the videos of the cars ablaze on the hospital grounds, you could see in an alleyway halfway between the camera and the cars (about 50 meters from the cars) the lifeless body of an adult with a very eerie appearance; the body was flattened barely a few inches above the ground. It seemed as if his rib cage and the skull had collapsed. Because of the repeat coverage of that news item, I viewed that clip about 4 times, and, no matter how gut-wrenching it was, I focused on that corpse to make sure of what I was witnessing.

The other video on Al Mayadeen was a compilation of videos sourced from Israeli army videos of Gaza aerial bombings. In about 20% of the videos, the bomb explosions exhibited similar fireballs as the fireball in the Al Jazeera Al-Ahli hospital video.

A third video was an interview conducted with a reporter who had just lost most of his family. He mentioned how, while at home with his family, an explosion nearby sucked his child out of his own hands, how he found his father a large distance away from the house, tens of meters away, and that he was missing his brain, while his mother was found at a different location also missing her brain.

What weapon is consistent with the following?

1.      Two explosions, first one much smaller to disperse flammable material, the second associated with a large fireball.

2.      Explosion causing a vacuum that can suck a child out of a father’s grasp.

3.      Explosion that damages connective and soft tissue.

4.      Explosion without shrapnel but still capable of causing a large death toll.

5.      A weapon that would not necessarily cause a crater.

Answer: The only weapon that is consistent with the above criteria is a Thermobaric type bomb.

The Conversation offers a concise description:

What are thermobaric weapons?

Thermobaric weapons are generally deployed as rockets or bombs, and they work by releasing fuel and explosive charges. Different fuels can be used, including toxic powdered metals and organic matter containing oxidants.

The explosive charge disperses a large cloud of fuel, which then ignites upon contact with the oxygen in the surrounding air. This creates a high-temperature fireball and a massive shockwave that literally sucks the air out of any living being in the vicinity.

Thermobaric bombs are devastating and effective in urban areas or open conditions and can penetrate bunkers and other underground locations, starving the occupants of oxygen. There is very little that can protect humans and other life forms from their blast and incendiary effects.

A report by the International Red Cross revealed:

“The thermobaric explosion is initiated by an anaerobic detonation of the explosive core, which distributes a plasma cloud of the fuel-rich composition across the target, whereafter, a secondary aerobic post-combustion ignites and detonates the cloud of fuel, which is now combined with the ambient atmospheric oxygen. Thermobaric weapons create large, powerful combustion zones that burn at extremely high temperatures. These weapons are optimized to produce a destructive force by generating dynamic negative overpressure.”

This confirms that two explosions are a hallmark of these bombs, one to disperse the fuel and a second one when the fuel detonates upon ignition as observed through the technical analysis of Al Jazeera video.

The International Red Cross report further revealed, “Most conventional weapons use explosives to propel metal fragments or a shaped-charge jet to destroy targets. By contrast, thermobaric weapons are typically designed with light casings that may, as an additional effect, cause harm when secondary fragments are formed by shearing or spalling of nearby solid objects affected by the blast.”

This explains the lack of shrapnel marks at the crater’s edges. The casing of a thermobaric weapon is just strong enough to contain the fuel. If, for example, the fuel is a powder, the casing can easily be made out of cardboard or plastic which would cause no shrapnel marks, and, literally leave little or no trace when the fuel detonates.

Yet again, from the International Red Cross report:

“The lethal effects of thermobaric explosions are often related to the bronchial trauma caused by the negative pressure; however, soft targets close to the ignition point of the thermobaric explosion are likely to be crushed or obliterated, while those further away will potentially suffer internal injuries as the thermobaric explosion compresses, stretches or disintegrates by overload any tissue interface of varying densities, elasticity and strength.”

Very much describes the state of the flattened human body in Al Mayadeen’s video of the cars on fire.

From The Lieber Institute for Law & Warfare at the West Point Military Academy, upon review of the International Red Cross report mentioned above, the reviewer concluded: “The application of the IHL rules governing the conduct of hostilities has progressively increased the protection of the civilian population, notwithstanding the military utility of particular weapons. There is, accordingly, an obligation on belligerents, where thermobaric weapons are used, to minimize [SIC] or avoid injury to, or incidental loss of, civilian life and damage to civilian objects. As with any other heavy explosive weapon, the use of thermobaric weapons should, wherever possible, be avoided in urban or populated areas, as the multiple mechanisms to inflict harm and their dispersed wide area effects make it extremely difficult to mitigate or appreciably reduce their harmful effects on civilians.”

My conclusion:

It is evident that the fingerprint of the weapon used at Al-Ahli hospital and its lethality do not match any of the Palestinian militants’ rockets that are used against "Israel". What was used against the hospital is a weapon that committed what it was made for and not an errant Palestinian rocket. One would think, if Palestinians had such a weapon, they would have already used it against Israeli military targets.

If the weapon is not Palestinian, the only other entities with access to the war zone are "Israel" and potentially the US.

Thermobaric bombs are primarily deployed against bunkers and hardened targets. Under acceptable international understandings, such military targets are acceptable targets for such a weapon.

In Gaza, these weapons were used in urban settings. Hamas was concerned about civilian casualties and requested early on that all bombing raids be accompanied by a warning to the civilians. "Israel" turned down that request. In previous wars, a knock-on-roof warning was adopted to minimize civilian casualties, and Gaza inhabitants are familiar with this practice.

In the case of the Gaza bunkers, even though "acceptable targets" - unless being able to target them based on actionable intelligence - carpet bombing or firebombing the entirety of Gaza just because "Israel" does not know exactly where they are is absurd, a violation of the laws of war, and nothing less than genocide.

If the goal is to deny Hamas and their partners the use of their rockets, the Israeli effort is obviously a failure; the continued bombing has zero military effect and has become a punitive act against civilians. Again, a war crime.

What is different about the bomb that targeted Al-Ahli hospital?

The bomb used at Al-Ahli Hospital has a distinct fingerprint. It is a thermobaric bomb that is optimized as an anti-personnel weapon.

As such, it is most likely smaller in size than a bunker-buster bomb with a much lighter casing that does not develop shrapnel.

It is important to compare the Al-Ahli bomb fingerprint to others in Gaza. If this fingerprint is unique, it would mean that the act was intentional and not accidental. It makes it a premeditated act with the intent to cause maximum injuries and deaths at a location that is a hospital crowded by civilians sheltering in its presumed safety; it is a war crime of the highest order.

If the fingerprint is found elsewhere and its main target is the civilian population, it becomes clear that a thermobaric weapon was designed to be used specifically against civilians and that becomes a true genocide.

It is important to make medical professionals in Gaza aware of the typical injuries caused by thermobaric bombs.

Thermobaric weapons are not banned under treaties but are still governed by laws that govern all other weapons. Misuse of Thermobaric weapons in Gaza or use of those weapons by a US ally outside the guidance of The Lieber Institute for Law & Warfare at West Point Military Academy should cause such weapons to be immediately withdrawn by the US.

If a large-scale war crime is being perpetrated, as is the case in Gaza, it is imperative for all nations to ask for an immediate cease-fire and find and implement an equitable solution.