Israel’s government has picked up the IDF’s brilliant tactical win in Gaza and tossed it in the trash. Hamas has been hit hard. It learned that, unlike Hizbullah, its armed forces were neither well trained enough nor well armed enough to stand up to the assault of a real army from land, sea and air. Its Iranian masters are no doubt laying plans right now to rectify the problem. Hamas will be more careful about launching its next assault on Israel. But Hamas’s main contribution to the threats that surround Israel was the prospect of a southern front, the danger that when a new war comes in the north, Israel will have to leave significant forces in the south to deal with a possible Hamas assault. That threat is sure to be reconstituted in short order. The main objective of the First Hamas War was to ensure that there never is a second one. That entails cutting Hamas off permanently from its Iranian weapons suppliers, so that its armed forces and its regime die on the vine. Israel’s failure to obtain this objective began when its leaders directed the IDF’s military effort at the northern end of the Gaza strip and not in the south, which is where the weapons are smuggled in. The only way to attain the war’s objective is to plant the IDF squarely across the smuggling routes and hold them. Precisely because they fear to do what is necessary, Israel’s current leadership surrendered this option in advance. Instead, Foreign Minister Livni is hard at work erecting a wall of paper to safeguard Israel’s security, reminiscent of abortive UN Resolution 1701 adopted at the end of the 2nd Lebanon War to end arms smuggling to Hizbullah. Israel will now sign agreements with the United States, Britain, Italy, France and Turkey to end the arms smuggling into Gaza. This is an exercise in futility. It’s not as if any of these nations actually sell arms to Hamas. Their contribution to ending arms smuggling in the future can only be minimal. Egypt, too, will make all sorts of commitments to end the smuggling. We cannot see any reason to expect more from these new commitments than from those Egypt has made, and broken, in the past. War is, first and foremost, a continuation of politics. Victories on the field of battle mean nothing unless political leaders have the courage and the intelligence to turn military victory into permanent political achievements. For the second time now, Israel’s current political leadership has demonstrated that it lacks both the moral courage and the political intelligence to do so. To hope that these failed leaders will no longer govern us after February 10 is beside the point. The point is the tragedy of the next anti-Hamas operation in Gaza, with its attendant civilian and military casualties. If this war had been done right, the next one would be unnecessary. Discuss this topic in the Israel Politics and Elections forum
