The latest conflict between Palestinians and Israelis is highlighting a number of innovations in war fighting. Some of these advances are technological: Palestinians are employing more powerful rocket systems with greater ranges as well as a sophisticated tunnel system, and Israelis are using an array of modern war methodologies, including drones and precision weaponry. What might be more significant than these technologies, however, is the means of 21st century combat I call “lawfare.”

Lawfare has been defined, by this writer anyway, as the “strategy of using — or misusing — law as a substitute for traditional military means to achieve an operational objective.” There are lots of permutations of lawfare, but each typically attempts to achieve an effect that is virtually indistinguishable from that which would have otherwise required the application of kinetic armed force or other conventional military means.

In its modern context, lawfare can be dated to the 1990-91 Gulf War, in particular to the al-Firdos bunker incident. In that case, a bunker thought to be an Iraqi command and control facility, but actually used as a bomb shelter by the families of high-ranking Iraqi officials, was attacked. The bombing caused hundreds of civilian deaths and injuries and led the Iraqis to accuse US forces of war crimes.

Although there was no actual illegality, the mere allegation of such, accompanied by media photos of the dead, had a real operational effect. As Michael Gordon and Bernard Trainor recorded in "The Generals’ War," the political fallout from the bombing “accomplished what Iraqi air defenses could not: downtown Baghdad was to be attacked sparingly, if at all.”