Our strength is also our weakness.
That is what I have been thinking about the last week ever since the deal to release some of the hostages – for now, the women and children – became serious. On the one hand, Israelis are strong since they put the fate of the few – the hostages – ahead of the ultimate mission which is to eliminate Hamas. On the other hand, it is impossible to ignore that deals of this kind are Israel’s vulnerable and weak point, something our enemies can (and will) continue to exploit.
This deal is an argument between the Israeli mind and the Israeli heart. The Israeli mind looks at the deal with grave concern. Israel is stopping its military for at least four days which could easily turn into 10. Hamas will have the upper hand and will use the time to regroup, redeploy, and rearm.
For the last three weeks, the IDF has been moving through Gaza with a massive force, succeeding in achieving its goals of cutting off southern Gaza from the north and isolating Hamas forces in two areas in the south – Khan Yunis and Rafah.
It is not easy to stop a massive military force and once stopped, it is not easy to get it restarted with the same energy and momentum. In addition, with a lull in the fighting, Hamas forces will be able to move around Gaza freely and prepare for a future Israeli offensive. This will mean that if and when the operation restarts, IDF soldiers can expect tougher resistance.
That is the mind though. The heart, on the other hand, has no doubt that Israel needs to do everything possible to get the hostages back. The failures that enabled Hamas to attack Israel on October 7 are a stain on the prime minister and his government, on the generals in the IDF, and on the top operatives in the Shin Bet. Just as they are responsible for the failures that led to this, they are also responsible for bringing home the nearly 240 people they let down.
Most hostages are civilians
This is especially the case when considering that most of the hostages are civilians and not soldiers. They were people spending the morning of October 7 at home or at the Supernova music festival.
What happened on that dark day was the violation and breaking of the social contract between the state and its people and if the state does not fix it then who will be able to trust it ever again? This has a direct impact, not just on the country’s delicate social fabric, but also on national security. If people do not trust the state, then who will be willing to serve in the military or put their lives in danger for someone else?
That is the heart.
And while the cabinet made the right decision to approve the deal, there are serious concerns about what is ahead, especially regarding the possibility that the next few days could lead to a complete end of the war.
THERE IS little doubt that this is exactly what Hamas is hoping for: It wants Israel to stop its offensive and therefore, set up this deal so it will release a trickle of 10 hostages a day with the potential for Israel to receive more when the first five days are over. We can now assume that Hamas will most definitely offer more hostages so it can gain a few more days of quiet.
There is also little doubt that the United States will be working behind the scenes – with the Egyptians, the Qataris, the Europeans, and the Saudis – to create an end mechanism to the war that will stop Israel from expanding the operation into southern Gaza. The Biden administration has been under immense pressure from within the Democratic Party to achieve a ceasefire and now, when there finally is one, will it not try to get Israel to extend it indefinitely?
What can this look like? It is hard to tell, but if, for example, Biden asks Netanyahu for a few more days that might see the release of all the hostages as well as the removal of Hamas from power – imagine Hamas leaders leave Gaza and go to Qatar – what will Netanyahu do? Will he accept such an offer or defy the president and insist that the IDF needs to proceed? And what will the Israeli people say if there is an offer to get all the hostages back at the cost of stopping the operation?
While it is true that Israel has had some significant achievements and has caused Hamas significant damage, the Hamas leadership in Gaza is still intact with three Hamas brigades and thousands of fighters.
That is why, when considering the primary objective of degrading Hamas’s capabilities so it can never threaten Israel again and removing it from power, there is still a lot more work that needs to be done, and that requires Israeli troops entering Khan Yunis and Rafah in southern Gaza.
The defense establishment is unanimous in the opinion that the operation needs to continue even after these few days of a pause in the fighting and soldiers – including those operating on the ground right now in Gaza – have been doing what they can to privately and publicly make sure that Netanyahu and his ministers know that.
The main reason the war should not end after these few days of a pause, is because if it does, it will be an Israeli surrender to the previous failed policy of containment. It will be a capitulation to the same forces that got Israel to believe that through small operations and defensive measures – like missile defense systems and bomb shelters – Israel can protect itself from a monstrous enemy just over the border.
Israel learned on October 7 that this is not possible, and that the only way to prevent another attack is to go into Gaza and eliminate Hamas to the greatest extent possible. We owe it to the hostages to do almost everything to get them home, but we also owe the nine million citizens of this country to ensure that what happened almost 50 days ago will never happen again.
The writer is a senior fellow at the Jewish People Policy Institute and the immediate past editor-in-chief of The Jerusalem Post.