And The Troops Go Marching In
I think an error that some (on all sides) are making in discussing Israel’s strategy in Gaza is assuming that they have a coherent, consistent and realistic idea of what they’re doing. The circumstances surroudning the initial strikes (the upcoming elections) indicates that our assumption should be that Israel isn’t exactly looking at this in the most clear eyed fashion. Further evidence came in the form of shifting and totally unreasonable goals and rationales for the mission. From inane talk of “breaking the will of the Palestinians, of Hamas” to the even more absurd talk of trying to “destroy complelty Hamas” we knew that either Israeli officials didn’t know what was going on or people were totally off their rockers. Of course, you couldn’t break the will of a people who have been isolated from the world for two years, or of a government which thrives on its people’s suffering at the hands of Israel. And, if the real goal was to protect Sderot from rocket fire, was an air invasion really going to work. As far as we know, Hamas can’t exactly be “deterred” and they are well aware that Israel can, at any time, kill a bunch of their leadership. If the goal was really stopping the rockets, then only a ground invasion would suffice.
And, now, we have a ground invasion to go along with much more modest goals for the mission. It’s gone from breaking the will and completely destroying to striking “ a direct and hard blow against the Hamas while increasing the deterrent strength of the IDF, in order to bring about an improved and more stable security situation for residents of Southern Israel over the long term.” At this point, like Andrew, I have to ask whether it’s really justified – or smart – to launch a legitimate ground war in pursuit of long term security (not immediately ceasing the rocket fire) with Hamas inevitably claiming a propaganda victory (unless Israel plans to occupy Gaza…)
It just doesn’t seem like anyone is thinking very clearly about the long-term or political consequences of all this.
