As has occurred many times in the last 15 years, Israel is in danger of fighting a war where it “wins” tactically, but achieves very little strategically.
If Israel uses the same playbook as in the past, why should it expect a different result with Hamas?
In wars with Hezbollah and Hamas in 2006, 2008-09, 2012 and 2014, the IDF killed far more “senior commanders” and fighters than were killed on the Israeli side, but in every case the IDF’s overwhelming superior force was insufficient to stop Hezbollah or Hamas from extensively firing rockets across the home front.
One reason was that the cabinet and the IDF never set clear goals in past conflicts other than to vaguely demand a restoration of “deterrence.”
Though the 2006 war was viewed at the time as the least successful, a variety of factors have meant that Hezbollah has been sufficiently deterred from launching another round. And since the Syrian Civil War that kept Hezbollah busy is long over, it is clear that Israel did indeed set a clear deterrence.
This has been far less true with Hamas.
Though the last major war was in 2014, there have been many flare-ups, including shortly before the wave of corona, so if this is a war, then four wars in 12 years cannot be considered a success in imposing a deterrence.
So to be more specific than “deterrence,” what should be Israel’s goal?
In 2014, Israel tried for about a week to make Hamas stop shooting rockets using bombing.
First it bombed the “best” Hamas targets, and when all of those were destroyed, it continued to bomb “command centers” and “intelligence centers.” But after much bombing and the rocket fire not stopping, it became clear that the bombing wouldn’t put an end to the rockets.
The IDF was then dragged into an invasion of Gaza, albeit a very limited incursion of a couple of kilometers. And when even that limited invasion did not stop the rocket fire, the cabinet and the IDF found a new goal to present to the public as a face-saving measure for ending the operation: destroying Hamas’s attack tunnels.
Yet while the attack tunnels were important, blowing them up did not change the basic standoff with Hamas.
The destruction in Gaza did keep Hamas deterred for a few years, but the cabinet never decided on a diplomatic solution and grant Hamas more economic space – such as an offshore port as suggested by some former Israeli security chiefs – or cutting a new peace deal with the Palestinian Authority in the West Bank.
It also never authorized the IDF to strike a harsher blow against Hamas, which would have required a broader invasion and potential losses of 500-1,000 soldiers, versus the actual loss of 67 soldiers in 2014.
The current playbook seems to be more attuned to 2014. The IDF increases its bombing every day, but there is no sign of Hamas capitulating, and the rocket fire continues.
There is more talk of a land invasion, but no talk of what it would accomplish, how deep it would need to go, and what the cost in IDF soldiers’ lives would be necessary to make a difference.
There is also no talk of mixing a bigger invasion with a major diplomatic initiative.
If cabinet and IDF policy are made with no long-term consideration of where things are going between Israel, Gaza and the PA – and if they do not clearly lay out these goals to the public – it is unclear what the fighting and the hiding in bomb shelters will achieve, and this will remain the case regardless of how many successful strikes the IDF carries out.