Channels

Photo: AFP
IDF chief Gantz. 'Created the impression that resumed rocket fire would be interpreted as a failure'
Photo: AFP
Ron Ben-Yishai

What Israel needs right now is patience

Analysis: Israel must make it clear to Hamas that it will not benefit from ongoing rocket fire, while IDF builds new sophisticated offensive plan against terror organizations and their leaders.

IDF Chief of Staff Benny Gantz and Southern Command chief Sami Turgeman were wrong to urge the Gaza vicinity residents to return to their homes last week.

 

 

It was a cognitive and practical mistake which was also shared by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Moshe Ya'alon, who did not explicitly call on the residents to return, but created the impression that the military battle was over and that its objectives had been achieved once the 72-hour ceasefire took effect.

 

For Netanyahu it was also a political error, which allowed all his opponents in the right to attack him with all their might and present demands for another invasion of the Strip in order to occupy it.

 

The cognitive mistake in calling on the Gaza vicinity's residents to return to their homes was creating the impression among Hamas that resuming the rocket fire would be interpreted as a failure among the Israelis. Once the sirens sounded, that's what happened.

 

It was a practical mistake because the threat had yet to be removed. The forces the IDF left around the communities adjacent to the border fence are not enough to protect the returning residents from the mortar shells, which is currently the most fatal weapon from Gaza.

 

The possibility that the rocket fire would be resumed in the middle of the negotiations in Cairo was presented as a 50-50 chance in the explicit estimates of the Military Intelligence Directorate and Shin Bet. It's surprising that the people who run Operation Protective Edge so skillfully failed in their estimates. When there is a doubt about such issues, there is no doubt.

 

Informing the enemy in advance

This wasn't the only cognitive mistake made during the battle. The fact that the assessment of military casualties was leaked after being presented to the cabinet, and the fact that the tunnels were presented as the only objective of the ground operation, were wrong too, as they boosted Hamas' self-confidence.

 

The resumed rocket fire was likely the result of a feeling among Hamas that Israel would not go deep into Gaza because it is afraid of losses. Even if one has no intention of taking such a move and paying a high price, one shouldn't inform the enemy about it in advance, making the enemy realize that its leaders – who are hiding deep down in Gaza City – are in no danger.

 

All these mistakes and others don't mean that the IDF failed in Operation Protective Edge. Most of the objectives were reached, and deterrence was likely restored as well.

 

The resumed rocket fire points to one thing only – that Hamas and the Islamic Jihad are now desperate. The terror organizations are in urgent need of significant achievements which will justify the war they initiated and its terrible results for the Strip's residents. Most of them, by the way, are now running for their lives again and are not free to present tough questions to the government.

 

Despite the aggressive statements and the rocket fire, Hamas and the Islamic Jihad are very interested in the negotiations in Cairo. They just want to say, "We are not on our knees yet."

 

Hamas isn't firing the rockets and mortars itself. The southern residents don't care who is behind which mortar shell, but it means something versus the Egyptians: Not to stop playing by the rules.

 

A troubling cliché

In such a situation, the Israeli public is required to exercise restraint and patience. Haste makes waste.

 

It's true that we should not get dragged into a long war of attrition which will empty southern Israel of a considerable part of its residents (and turn into a political catastrophe for the current government), but a few days of patience may make it clear to Hamas that the rocket fire will cause more damage to its position in the negotiations than improve it.

 

Senior state officials clarify that if the IDF detects the slightest possibility that we are being dragged into a war of attrition, it will not hesitate to enter the Strip in order to complete the disarming of Hamas and the Islamic Jihad of their military abilities. The ongoing rocket fire will also deepen their isolation in the international arena.

 

Israel should also stop using the hollow statement that "negotiations are not held under fire." Everyone knows, both the Palestinians and Israel's citizens, that the telephone lines between Cairo and Jerusalem are working very well, incessantly, and that there is not a single senior political or military Israeli official who will hang up on Egyptian intelligence chief Mohamed al-Tuhami when he calls to discuss a suggested compromise.

 

So when a statement is meaningless, it turns into a cliché or, worse, a binding mantra which one cannot get rid of and which disrupts the businesslike and flexible handling of the crisis.

 

In any event, we are not talking to Hamas but to the Egyptians and to Mahmoud Abbas' Palestinians, and so it's advisable to put the slogans aside. The main question is what should be done now.

 

Many proposals have been made in the past two days – what we should give Hamas, what we shouldn't give, one kind of port or another, a similar military operation or a different operation which will bring Hamas to its knees. But the truth is that we have yet to reach the stage in which alternative plans are discussed.

 

In the current stage, the goal shared by all sides is to reach a stable ceasefire which will not be limited in time, and to bring large amounts of humanitarian aid into the Strip in order to meet the basic needs of some 250,000 people with no roof over their heads and no clean drinking and bathing water.

 

Hamas needs this humanitarian aid more than anyone, but the organization is presenting exaggerated, strategic demands, betting that the global public opinion not accept the situation in the Strip and will allow aid to be brought in, and then the Egyptians will give in as well. Hamas is gambling again, holding the civilian population hostage.

 

Demilitarization in return for aid

Now, if Israel exercises patience, Hamas will likely get off its high horse and halt the rocket fire. Then we will be able to move on to the second stage in which Israel will present a positive rather than negative stance, which will provide it with major advantages in the global and Arab public opinion: Demilitarizing the Strip of weapons and heavy military infrastructures under efficient international supervision in return for a large aid package to rebuild the Strip.

 

Such a package could also include a naval exit from Gaza, for example through the Port of El-Arish or a temporary floating dock off the shores of Gaza (yes, there is such a thing and it even works pretty well), which will be connected to Cyprus under European supervision.

 

The idea of demilitarizing the Strip of weapons and heavy infrastructures includes removing the rockets and launching pads, destroying launchers and removing 160- and 120-milimter mortar shells from the Strip.

 

At the same time, the manufacturing means will be supervised and the excavation of tunnels and reinforcements will be thwarted. The IDF will be permitted to ensure that the offensive tunnels are not being dug in the agricultural area separating between the eastern margins of the constructed area in the Strip and the border fence. Hamas will be allowed to keep small arms for self-defense purposes and for its policing forces.

 

The demilitarization in return for a major aid package, a sort of "mini Marshall Plan," will be suitable for the second stage. In the meantime, what Israel needs is patience, in order to make it clear to Hamas that it will not benefit from the ongoing rocket fire, while the IDF – and mainly the Military Intelligence Directorate – builds a new offensive plan against the terror organizations and their leaders, a sophisticated plan which will make it possible to defeat them, as long as the proper efforts and means are invested in it.

 


פרסום ראשון: 08.11.14, 01:12
 new comment
Warning:
This will delete your current comment