ENUGU, Nigeria (VOICE OF NAIJA)- Israel’s army has deployed some AI-enabled military technology in combat for the first time in Gaza. A development that has raised fears about the use of autonomous weapons in modern warfare.
The army spokesperson Daniel Hagari, has hinted at what the new tech is being used for, saying that last month, Israel’s forces were operating “above and underground simultaneously”.
A senior defence official who spoke with the AFP, said that the tech was destroying enemy drones and mapping Hamas’s vast tunnel network in Gaza.
New defence technologies including artificial intelligence-powered gunsights and robotic drones form a bright spot in an otherwise dire period for Israel’s tech industry.
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Although the war in Gaza has wreaked havoc with an estimated eight percent of its workforce called up to fight, the sector accounted for 18 per cent of GDP in 2022.
“In general the war in Gaza presents threats, but also opportunities to test emerging technologies in the field,” said Avi Hasson, chief executive of Startup Nation Central, an Israeli tech incubator.
“Both on the battlefield and in the hospitals there are technologies that have been used in this war that have not been used in the past.”
Mary Wareham, an arms expert at Human Rights Watch, told AFP that the rising civilian death toll shows that much greater oversight is needed over the use of new forms of defence tech.
“Now we’re facing the worst possible situation of death and suffering that we’re seeing today –- some of that is being brought about by the new tech,” she said.
More than 150 countries in December backed a UN resolution identifying “serious challenges and concerns” in new military tech, including “artificial intelligence and autonomy in weapons systems.”