The "New York Times" (New York Times) said that senior Israeli officials in the government and the army regretted the destruction of the evacuation tower in the Gaza Strip during the recent war - which housed the offices of media institutions, including Al-Jazeera - because of the international condemnation it sparked.
The American newspaper quoted 3 Israeli officials as saying that before their decision to destroy the tower, the army officers knew that it housed the offices of the Al-Jazeera network, the American Associated Press and other media, and that some of them feared that it was not a correct idea.
Israel claimed that the tower contained important electronic equipment belonging to the Islamic Resistance Movement (Hamas), which the movement and the Gaza authorities denied.
In the wake of international anger and condemnation of bombing the tower and leveling it with the ground, a number of senior Israeli government and army officials have come to describe what happened as a mistake, saying that Israel needs the media to remain open to it in order to take its version of events, and that destroying the tower makes this difficult.
An Israeli official told the newspaper that although the raid had a justification - according to his opinion - the skeptics were right after it became clear that the damage caused to Israel as a result of international disapproval was greater than any benefit to the destruction of Hamas equipment, he said.
Last Saturday (May 15), the occupation warplanes bombed the Al-Galaa Tower, and it consisted of 60 apartments that included, in addition to the media offices, a number of lawyers and doctors' offices, some of which were inhabited by several families.
For its part, the Washington Post said - quoting a source it described as the beginning - that the destruction of the tower represented a pivotal turning point in the American position towards the fighting between the Palestinian resistance factions and the occupation army.