Fair Pay Fair Play

Is it possible for a democracy to defend itself against terror while keeping its moral compass intact? This question sits at the heart of Ophir Falk’s Targeted Killings, Law and Counter-Terrorism Effectiveness: Does Fair Play Pay Off?—an extensive exploration of whether following the law and minimizing civilian harm actually improves the success of counterterrorism campaigns. Drawing on the cases of Israel and the United States, Falk examines not just the legality or morality of using lethal force but also its practical outcomes: does adhering to legality make counterterrorism more effective?

Across more than a decade of research, Falk combines legal analysis, statistical modeling, and firsthand interviews with military and government officials. He argues that democracies facing terrorism—particularly those engaged in asymmetrical warfare against non-state actors—gain more than moral high ground when they comply with legal norms. They gain strategic advantage. According to Falk, legitimacy and accountability can act as force multipliers in counterterrorism. When nations abide by legal standards such as distinction, proportionality, and necessity, they not only reduce moral costs but also increase operational success.

The Core Argument: Legality Enhances Effectiveness

Falk’s central claim is deceptively simple: legal compliance and moral restraint make targeted killings more effective. In other words, when democracies minimize unintended deaths, they not only preserve international legitimacy but also reduce retaliation, increase deterrence, and avoid the self-defeating “boomerang effect” in which violence breeds more violence. His research showcases how Israel’s targeted killing policy, when executed precisely and lawfully, significantly reduced suicide bombings in the early 2000s. Conversely, operations with higher civilian casualties led to spikes in retaliatory attacks. Thus, lawfulness becomes a tactical asset, not a constraint.

Why This Question Matters Today

Falk situates this inquiry in the modern era of drone warfare, where lethal operations can cross borders with unprecedented ease and secrecy. Following 9/11, targeted killing became one of the United States’ primary counterterrorism tools. Yet ambiguity remains about the legality of drone strikes and the accuracy of civilian casualty counts. As Falk observes, data discrepancies—from the Long War Journal to the Bureau of Investigative Journalism—undermine both moral clarity and strategic evaluation. Democracies risk losing legitimacy when their own citizens, and the world, cannot trust their numbers or motives. Falk’s analysis aims to give policymakers a grounded framework for decision-making—one that balances law, ethics, and results.

A Two-Nation Mirror: Israel and the United States

Israel offers what Falk calls a “laboratory case” for studying targeted killing. Its 2006 High Court of Justice ruling under Chief Justice Aharon Barak legally defined parameters for such actions: military necessity, distinction between combatants and civilians, proportionality, and the absence of alternative means. These guidelines transformed Israel into a testing ground for balancing law and warfare. The United States, by contrast, has never had its targeted killing policy adjudicated by a high court. Instead, it relies on executive interpretations such as Barack Obama’s Presidential Policy Guidance (2013), which required “near certainty” that no civilians would be harmed before authorizing strikes. Falk contrasts Israel’s transparent legal oversight with America’s opaque justifications, demonstrating how openness influences effectiveness and legitimacy alike.

From Law to Data: Measuring Success

A major innovation of Falk’s work lies in his quantitative research—rare in counterterrorism literature. Using databases from sources like B’Tselem and the Israel Security Agency, he tracked over 200 targeted killings and correlated them with suicide bombing fatalities between 2000 and 2010. His findings: when Israel conducted precision operations without collateral casualties, suicide bombings dropped dramatically in subsequent months. When unintended deaths occurred, the opposite happened—attacks surged within 50–100 days. These results suggest that minimizing civilian harm directly enhances counterterrorism outcomes.

The Larger Moral Formula

Behind the statistics lies a moral philosophy inspired by Just War theory. Falk revisits classical precepts—jus in bello (justice in war), jus ad bellum (justice of going to war), and jus post bellum (justice after war)—to argue that democracies gain durability by embedding ethics into strategy. Quoting Barak’s iconic line, “Democracy fights with one hand tied behind its back,” Falk acknowledges the tension between liberty and security but insists that “lawful restraint strengthens democracy’s spirit.” In his view, legality and morality are not bureaucratic burdens; they are operational assets.

The Contemporary Relevance

The book’s relevance extends beyond Israel or America. From Pakistan to Yemen to the 2020 killing of Iran’s General Qassem Soleimani, targeted killing remains a defining instrument of modern statecraft. Falk uses the Soleimani case to explore whether legal adherence can coexist with political necessity: when a state faces imminent threats, does respecting proportionality and distinction still pay off? His answer: yes, but only if legality and transparency accompany force. Without them, states risk undermining long-term success even as they score short-term victories.

“At times democracy fights with one hand tied behind her back. Despite that, democracy has the upper hand.” — Chief Justice Aharon Barak

Through this lens, Falk’s book becomes more than a legal treatise. It’s a manual for morally resilient security policy. By blending quantitative evidence, judicial reasoning, and ethical reflection, he attempts to resolve a paradox central to modern warfare: Can democracies defend their citizens without betraying their principles? Falk concludes that not only can they—but that abiding by those principles may be their most effective weapon of all.

Falk argues that legal compliance is not a constraint on counterterrorism but a source of strength. In Israel’s experience, clarity around legality—especially the 2006 High Court ruling—helped define when and how targeted killings could be used against active threats. This ruling embedded four core pillars: military necessity, distinction, proportionality, and the absence of alternatives. These principles didn’t restrict Israel’s operations; they sharpened them, ensuring each strike maintained legitimacy and precision.

Military Necessity and Judicious Force

When intelligence revealed an imminent suicide bombing, the IDF’s calculus turned on military necessity: would killing one planner prevent mass death? If capture was unfeasible, targeted killing met the necessity criterion. Falk notes that under both Israeli and U.S. doctrines, necessity depends on real threats, not potential ones. This discipline ensured that lethal measures aligned with imminent danger, differentiating preemptive defense from preventive aggression (a distinction also emphasized in Michael Gross’s Moral Dilemmas of Modern War).

Distinction and Legitimacy

The principle of distinction—attacks must target combatants, not civilians—became both a moral and tactical necessity. Civilians perceived as collateral amplified outrage and prompted retaliations. Falk’s data reveal that after incidents like the 2002 bombing that killed Hamas leader Salah Shehadeh but also 14 civilians, suicide bombings multiplied. Conversely, precision strikes that eliminated figures like Sheikh Ahmed Yassin without harming bystanders drastically reduced attacks. The lesson: legitimacy in targeting translates directly to operational success.

Proportionality and the Human Cost

Falk shows that proportionality evaluations—balancing anticipated military gain against civilian loss—cannot be abstract. When commanders view even one unintended death as strategically harmful, proportionality acquires concrete meaning. Israel’s internal investigations, such as the post-Shehadeh inquiry, reaffirmed that lawful restraint improves not only global reputation but local outcomes. In Falk’s model, legality translates into lower civilian tolls, which in turn improve deterrence, intelligence cooperation, and diplomatic support—all strategic dividends of fair play.

One of Falk’s major contributions is turning an emotional and political issue into an empirical question. He constructs a data-driven model linking Israel’s 213 targeted killing events between 2000 and 2010 with the frequency and severity of suicide bombings. Using a 50-day time window to account for recruitment and operational lag, he found a clear pattern: operations without civilian casualties correlated with steep declines in attacks, while those involving unintended deaths saw increases within the next 100 days.

Decoding the Data

In Gaza—the epicenter of Israel’s drone-based operations—targeted killings of ideological leaders like Yassin and Rantisi marked turning points. After these strikes, suicide bombings rapidly decreased. In the West Bank, where ground raids often incurred collateral damage, retaliatory bombings surged. Falk’s statistical models, developed with Israeli data scientist Amir Hefetz, quantify this asymmetry: a single unintended death could boost subsequent suicide attacks by up to 30% in the following period.

Beyond Israel: The Data Deficit in the U.S.

When Falk attempted to replicate this rigor with American operations, he confronted a “data obstacle.” U.S. drone programs remain shrouded in secrecy, and civilian casualty figures vary wildly between official and independent sources: from the Long War Journal’s estimate of 142 deaths to Pakistan Body Count’s claim of over 2,300. Without transparency, effectiveness cannot be accurately gauged. Falk concludes that democracies cannot measure success if they conceal or distort their own data—a warning that echoes through modern security policy.

The heart of Falk’s thesis lies in a counterintuitive insight: killing fewer civilians leads to killing fewer terrorists in the long run—because there are fewer terrorists created in response. Every unintended death risks transforming neutral bystanders into potential recruits. Interviews with Israeli commanders reinforce this logic: they report that when collateral damage occurred, militant propaganda campaigns gained momentum; when precision was perfect, local cooperation improved.

Quantifying the Boomerang

Falk’s statistical analysis of 213 Israeli strikes revealed that cases with unintended deaths were followed by significantly more suicide bombings within 50 to 99 days—the typical preparation cycle for a retaliatory attack. This “boomerang effect,” a term first introduced by counterterrorism scholar Boaz Ganor, shows how moral failure produces tactical backlash. In the Shehadeh case, fourteen unintended deaths were followed by a spike of over 190 Israeli fatalities from suicide bombings in just three months. In contrast, precise operations that killed only the intended target halted cycles of violence entirely.

The Moral Multiplier

By integrating moral legitimacy into strategy, Falk reframes humanitarian restraint as a “force multiplier.” Minimizing unintended deaths not only reduces recruitment potential for terrorist groups but also strengthens domestic and international support for counterterrorism campaigns. Democracies, he argues, erode their defensive capacity when they treat ethics as optional. In an age of immediate media amplification, a single civilian casualty can outweigh entire months of military success.

Israel’s experience, according to Falk, provides a rare transparent view of targeted killing in a democratic context. The state’s open legal discourse and Supreme Court oversight created a framework unmatched globally. The 2006 High Court’s guiding sentence—'democracy fights with one hand tied behind its back'—became an operational ethic. Falk traces how this ruling institutionalized proportionality reviews, pre-strike intelligence verification, and post-strike investigations, exemplified by inquiries such as the Shehadeh Commission. These mechanisms not only preserved Israel’s legitimacy but demonstrated measurable reductions in terrorist violence over time.

Balancing Liberty and Security

By aligning with law, Israel sustained its identity as a liberal democracy while confronting existential threats. Falk contrasts this with authoritarian regimes where civilian casualties are instrumentalized, citing Valentino and Huth’s findings that indiscriminate killings can sometimes end insurgencies but destroy moral credibility. For democracies, he argues, maintaining moral constraint is both a political requirement and a strategic imperative.

In the United States, targeted killings expanded dramatically under Presidents Bush, Obama, and Trump. Each administration claimed precision while resisting transparent accounting. Falk scrutinizes how secrecy undermines both lawfulness and trust. Obama's Presidential Policy Guidance promised 'near certainty' that civilians would not be killed, yet independent trackers like The Bureau of Investigative Journalism consistently reported far higher casualties. This discrepancy, Falk argues, is more than an ethical issue—it's a strategic blind spot. Without truthful data, policymakers cannot calibrate effectiveness or legitimacy.

Perception and Effectiveness

Even when drone strikes eliminate genuine threats, global opinion often pivots on perceived morality rather than outcomes. Pew surveys cited in the book show that while 62% of Americans approve of drone killings, majorities in allied nations oppose them. Falk asks policymakers to consider a paradox: every strike that appears unjust abroad erodes the international cooperation essential for sustainable security. Legality, in his view, functions like currency—its value lies in shared belief, not mere declaration.

Falk explores why democracies bear a heavier weight of lawfulness than non-democratic actors. Because democratic states are accountable to citizens and judged by international norms, perceived fairness becomes integral to policy success. Violating moral or legal norms drains domestic resilience and inflames adversary recruitment. Israel’s consistent judicial review and transparent debate, Falk argues, show that democratic accountability can coexist with operational success. The U.S. experience, often hindered by secrecy, illustrates the opposite risk: success without legitimacy is unsustainable.

On a philosophical level, Falk draws on the Just War tradition to remind readers that justice strengthens—not weakens—security. As Chief Justice Barak put it, rule of law and freedom 'constitute an important component of security stance.' The book ends by urging democratic governments to codify these insights into doctrine: compliance isn’t a liability—it’s the sharpest weapon democracies possess against terror.

In his epilogue, Falk applies his framework to the 2020 U.S. strike on Iranian General Qassem Soleimani. He calls it 'the most significant targeted killing of the twenty-first century' and evaluates it through his established lens. Legally, the operation met the standards of distinction and proportionality—it eliminated combatants without harming civilians. Strategically, its impact remains uncertain. Will it deter Iran’s proxy wars or trigger escalation? Falk sees a potential precedent: the strike signaled that state-sponsored terrorism invites personal accountability, possibly deterring future actors. Yet, as with all targeted killings, its long-term success depends on whether legality and transparency accompany force.

Falk closes with cautious optimism. Just as Israel’s lawful precision eventually reduced suicide bombings, adherence to strict legal standards could enable global powers to apply force responsibly. The question 'Does fair play pay off?'—he concludes—receives a conditional yes: only when fairness itself becomes part of the strategy.