Intelligence: Technological/Human

 

Israel is amazing, isn't it?  Its intelligence, its human intelligence that is, is so compelling that it is able to pinpoint the time and location and the identity of a sought-after terrorist with amazing accuracy.  What is truly amazing is that Israeli security can depend on the reliability and faithfulness of those willing to risk their lives to pass vital information on to Israeli authorities for the penalty of failure to protect their identity is wretchedly fatal.

Without being able to rely on human intelligence to convey inside information not nearly as much could be accomplished as has been evidenced in the past and more latterly.  If the fear and loathing of the virulent brutality behind Hamas's terrorist agenda isn't powerful enough to restrain those who seek to limit their predations on both Palestinian society and that of the Jewish State, it must indicate that there are those for whom the need to stop the deadly mission of Hamas remains vital.

But of course the need to maintain monitoring tools, drones that comprise an "eye on the sky" remains of paramount importance as well.  And those surveillance techniques do not compromise human lives.  Other than those targeted, responsible for taking human lives.  Israel makes good use of its Heron TP drone, a high-altitude, long-endurance drone, its largest and most sophisticated weighing in at 4-1/2 tonnes, aloft for a straight 36 hours of surveillance time.

These drones are also capable of carrying a 1,000-kilogram payload, capable of flying at altitudes of 12,200 metres, making them impossible to spot from ground level, if and when they attain higher levels.  Necessity makes for invention and as such Israel finds itself at the leading edge of such advanced military equipment design and production.  It has drones flying over the Gaza Strip, West Bank and south Lebanon.

Informing Israel's intelligence elite with real-time images and information on the location of potential targets and enabling them to get a heads-up on what those planning to do the country harm can be up to.  "Israel doesn't have an ability to track things in real time using satellites from space.  But they are able to track moving targets through drones for hours at a time", explained Scott Johnson, senior analyst at IHS Jane's intelligence and defence consultants.

Last year roughly $14.5-billion, 6.9% of the country's gross domestic product was allocated to the military with an increasing focus on intelligence gathering and high-tech weaponry.  The country's location, its contiguity with hostile neighbours demands such sacrifices.  That funding could be put to other uses, more compatible with the needs of a country that has sufficient internal problems of its own to solve from desalinization and energy solutions to medical advances.

Forced by circumstances beyond its control other than to defend its territory and its citizens, Israel has military laboratories staffed by physicists and engineers "all of whom hold scientific degrees ... are currently conducting research on lasers, so as to improve the technology used by forces in the field", according to the IDF website.

Lasers have a vast multitude of uses, both civilian and military.  In Israel's case, its military uses include the use by infantry units to locate objects and people in the field and for ensuring the accuracy of their weapons.  Targeted assassinations among them.