Meet JDAM, Israel’s murder weapon of choice

By Andy Ford

The JDAM is the Joint Direct Attack Munition. It is the weapon of choice for the IDF in their demolition of Gaza and Gazan society.

The JDAM is a kit that can be fitted to a normal aircraft-borne bomb. Once launched from an F-16 jet (costs approx $63mn), maybe thousands of feet up and 10 miles from the target, a computer in the JDAM kit adjusts the position of its fins to guide the bomb to its target using live GPS data, with according to Boeing, an accuracy of 1.7 metres.

This means that when the IDF destroy a school, church, mosque, hospital or refugee encampment, it is intentional not accidental. The kit costs around $30,000. In one sense, the JDAM is a triumph of engineering skill and computer wizardry. In another and far more sinister sense, it is a horrible perversion of human science and technology.

The IDF have been using about 6,000 of these weapons every week in Gaza. With the cost of the bombs themselves that would be about $60 mn a week, devoted to death, suffering and destruction. That is about $1.2 bn since October 7^, on the bombs and guidance kits alone.

The insanity of Netanyahu’s evil war

The Israeli government itself estimates that this one-sided war will cost them around $12 bn this year, and the same next year. That means, so far, it has cost about $6 mn to kill each Hamas fighter and $1.5 mn for each home the IDF have destroyed. Imagine what could have been done with that money, if it was used for good: for development, education or healthcare – for Arabs and Israelis – instead of death and destruction. It is an obscenity.

And Netanyahu has spent $12bn to achieve what? A child forced to drink from a puddle just to survive. Lenin once said that capitalism is “horror without end”, and this depraved war is proving him right, yet again.