CounterterrorismU.S. employs Israeli “roof-knocking” air strike tactic

The U.S. military is now employing a controversial air strike technique called “roof-knocking,” which was widely used by Israel during the war with Hamas in the Gaza Strip in summer 2014.

The approach involves dropping small munitions in the roof of a house in which terrorists are suspected to be hiding, or which is suspected of being a storing facility for terrorists weapons. The purpose of dropping the small, harmless munitions on the roof is to alert civilians in the house that they have a few minutes to escape to safety.

After a few minutes, a real bomb is dropped on the target house to destroy it.

Newsweek reports that the US tried out the tactics during a strike against an ISIS house in Mosul which stored large amounts of cash. 

The reason for the Pentagon’s use of the tactics was that surveillance drones noted that a woman and her children were living there in the house. 

Major General Peter Gersten, deputy commander of intelligence in U.S. operations against ISIS, said the United States dropped small munitions on the roof of the building to warn the woman to leave the buildings.

“We went as far as actually to put a Hellfire on top of the building and air burst it so it wouldn’t destroy the building, simply knock on the roof to ensure that she and the children were out of the building,” he said. 

“The men that were in that building, multiple men, literally trampled over her to get out of that building. And we watched her and observed her leaving the building. And she cleared the building, and we began to process the strike.”

The tactic, though, failed in avoiding civilian casualties. The woman ran back into the building as the second bomb was being launched and was killed, Maj Gen Gersten said. 

“We watched, very difficult for us to watch. And it was within the final seconds of the actual impact,” he said. 

The Pentagon officially acknowledge US has acknowledged killing forty-one civilians since bombing operations against ISIS began in 2014. 

Human rights group insist the numbers are much higher. 

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights says 391 civilians have been killed in Syria alone – but this figure includes civilians killed by other members of anti-ISIS coalition, and not only U.S. forces.

Newsweekquotes Israel’s military sources who say the tactics is effective in warning civilians of an imminent strike, especially since Hamas uses the Palestinian civilian population as a human shield.

During the 2014 Gaza war, Israel also texted warning messages to residents of buildings about to be attacked.

A UN report of the 2014 war concluded, however, that roof-knocks “cannot be considered an effective warning given the confusion they often cause to building residents and the short time allowed to evacuate before the actual strike.”

The report cited the case of an early morning incident when Israel knocked on the roof of a family home just a few minutes before striking. The bomb killed 19 of the 22 people inside the house.