Conflict in Gaza: what does Israel want now?

It is three months now since the Gaza conflict erupted. The slaughter continues. We have had several developments over the past few days. One, the Israel Defence Forces (IDF) has announced a withdrawal of some of its forces stationed in Gaza. Two, the number two person in the Hamas leadership was assasinated in Beirut- nobody doubts that is the work of Israel. Three, an Israeli strike killed a senior Iranian commander in Syria. Four, the US has announced the withdrawal of its aircraft carrier, USS Gerald Ford, from the Mediterranean.

What do we make of all this? Well, the Israelis clearly want to scale down their operations in Gaza. They recognise that the complete elimination of Hamas, their stated goal, cannot be realised in quick time. They wish to move on to more focused operations that target the Hamas leadership instead of the all-out war we have seen thus far.

That much is clear enough. The two assasinations are a provocation. The killing of a Hamas leader in Beirut flouts the warning of Hezbollah chief Nasrallah that assasinations by Israel on Lebanese soil are a red line Israel should not cross. The assasination in Syria shows the red rag to the Iranian bull, the principal backer of Hezbollah. Israel knows it must expect a strong reaction and yet goes ahead- clearly, a strong reaction is what it wants. A strong reaction would mean that the managed conflict between Israel and Hezbollah would move to a higher level and draw in Iran, inevitably drawing in the US as well.

There are both strategic and political calculations involved in moving towards such a confronation. Israel views Hezbollah as a far bigger threat than Hamas and Iran an even bigger threat. An estimated 75,000 Israelis have been moved out of the border with Lebanon and relocated elsewhere. They refuse to go back until the Hezbollah threat on the border is removed. At the very least, Israel would like Hezbollah to move to the north of the Litani river with a buffer zone that is protected by, say an UN force. Israel cites an old UN resolution in support of that demand.

Hezbollah has never accepted that interpretation of the UN resolution and it is no mood to oblige. The Americans are using diplomatic channels to pressure Lebanon and Hezbollah into accepting Israel's demand. Israel has said that if diplomacy fails, it will have to do the job of evicting Hezbollah itself.

That would mean a serious escalation of the conflict in Gaza. But that is precisely what the present leadership in Israel seems to want- a confrontation with Iran that addresses this threat once and for all,of course, with the help of the US. 

There is a cold political calculation underlying all this. Israel's PM Benajmin Netanyahu knows that any end to the war will mean an enquiry into the lapses that resulted in the October 7 attack by Hamas and a demand for his ousted. Once ousted, he faces corruption charges and the prospect of jail. A prolongation of the war helps the PM avoid that unpleasantness. 

Alastair Crooke,  a former British diplomat with vast experience in the region, has been making some of these points for quite some time now. He argues that the Gaza quagmire for Israel is not what its leadership had expected- they had thought the mighty IDF would vanquish Hamas in next to no time. Crooke writes, "One man -- a retired Maj. General Brik, a highly respected military officer -- warned PM Netanyahu personally that a quagmire trap in Gaza was a true risk. The military establishment did not like hearing his warning.  Now it is clear; Major General Brik was right. He said a few days ago that ‘the number of Hamas casualties on the ground is much lower than what the IDF reports.’ 

Crooke quotes another retired general as saying 'I cannot see any signs of collapse of the military abilities of Hamas – nor in their political strength with in Gaza'." He goes on to suggest that Israel's getting involved in a prolonged war may have to do something beyond the Iran threat and PM Netanyahu's calculations. 

What has happened in Israel over the years is a pronounced shift towards the right and a progessive embrace of the idea of a Greater Israel. Crooke quotes an Israeli historian, Martin Zimmerman, on what has resulted from that idea:

"Jewish nationhood in the Land of Israel went through a process of nationalism, racialism and ethnocentrism. It created a situation of being unable to reach a modus vivendi with the neighbouring world.......And that is the problem: Once you have embarked on the path, it's difficult to leave it without undergoing another catastrophe."

What is unfolding in the Middle East now thus has the makings of a Greek tragedy, one that could plunge the world into turmoil through this year. Only one power on earth can prevent it from happening, the US. That helps us to connect the fourth dot mentioned at the outset, the departure of the US strike carrier group from the Mediterranean. The carrier group was sent in to reassure Israel after the Hamas attack of October 7. Can we hope that the removal of the carrier group is meant to convey to Israel: we are with you but don't push us too far? 

Gaza's plight: is there hope at all?

How will Israel's assault on Gaza pan out? Will it lead to the ethnic cleansing of vast portions of Gaza, a repetition of what happened when Israel came to be founded? Or will the world rouse itself to put an end to the suffering of a helpless people?

Here's  a somewhat bleak view penned by a former UN official:

To date, only Bolivia has severed diplomatic relations with Israel to protest against the ongoing war crimes perpetrated against the Palestinians. Unless Egypt, Jordan, UAE and Morocco sever their diplomatic relations with Tel Aviv as their people demand; unless countries such as Turkey, South Africa and Brazil, which have denounced Israel’s war crimes, align their diplomacy with their own pronouncements; unless these countries emulate Bolivia’s principled diplomatic move and put pressure on their Western partners; unless Saudi Arabia, UAE, Iran, Qatar, Azerbaijan and other large exporters of oil and natural gas use their economic leverage on Israel’s blinded backers, Gaza and its population will be destroyed, inch by inch, soul by soul. And no one would be able to say: “We didn’t know.”

The view from a South African who was witness to the end of the apartheid is more hopeful:

They will do well to learn from white South Africans who, after 300 years of minority rule, realised it was an impossible political project to continue to defend so violently, and still maintain any semblance of a moral high ground.There is a tipping point when even for the defenders of such a project, the faint question rings louder and louder in the collective conscience: how far is too far? There can be no going back to the promises of security based on what was before. There can be no going forward in peace if it means more and more blood of children and civilians haunting successive generations who will have to take responsibility for the actions unfolding before our eyes today.

The most astonishing thing about the ongong carnage is much of Western Europe (UK, France, Germany) is firmly with Israel with dissenting voices being heard from the smaller countries such as Belgium and Spain. 

Israel's war on Gaza: assorted links

 An article in Aljazeera has an interesting take on some of the top people in Israel's government starting with PM Benjamin Netanyahu:

Kimhi, who teaches at Tel Aviv University, has studied Netanyahu’s mind for almost a quarter of a century. In 1999, the same year that Netanyahu’s first term as premier would end, Kimhi’s behavioural analysis of the leader found a concerning pattern of behaviour. Some of his conclusions: Netanyahu was narcissistic, entitled and paranoid, and he reacted poorly under stress.

Kimhi revisited Netanyahu as a subject in 2017 but found not much had changed. As people age, Kimhi said, their behaviours tend to become more extreme. For Netanyahu, his paranoia and narcissism have grown. He trusts no one, except maybe his immediate family, and prioritises his “personal future” over all else, Kimhi’s research found.

         ....National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir has been convicted of incitement to racism, destroying property, and joining a “terror” organisation when he was 16 years old. Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich leads the hardline Religious Zionist Party that not only rejects Palestinian statehood but denies the existence of the Palestinian people and has condemned LGBTQ activists. Interior and Health Minister Aryeh Deri is an ultraorthodox rabbi who was sentenced to three years in jail for taking bribes.

 A senior official at the UN has resigned his post in protest against what he calls Israel's 'genocide' in Gaza:

The director of the New York office of the UN high commissioner for human rights has left his post, protesting that the UN is “failing” in its duty to prevent what he categorizes as genocide of Palestinian civilians in Gaza under Israeli bombardment and citing the US, UK and much of Europe as “wholly complicit in the horrific assault”.

Craig Mokhiber wrote on 28 October to the UN high commissioner in Geneva, Volker Turk, saying: “This will be my last communication to you” in his role in New York.

Mokhiber, who was stepping down having reached retirement age, wrote: “Once again we are seeing a genocide unfolding before our eyes and the organization we serve appears powerless to stop it.”

 Heartening to see there are still a few people in high positions with conscience left in them.

And finally, South American countries have chosen to express their outrage over what is going in in various ways. Bolivia has cut off diplomatic relations, others have recalled their envoys. In the Arab world, only Jordan has reacted in such a fashion, choosing to recall its envoy:

Bolivia said on Tuesday it had broken diplomatic ties with Israel because of its attacks on the Gaza Strip, while neighbors Colombia and Chile recalled their ambassadors to the Middle Eastern country for consultations.

The three South American nations lambasted Israel's attacks on Gaza and condemned the deaths of Palestinian citizens.

Bolivia "decided to break diplomatic relations with the Israeli state in repudiation and condemnation of the aggressive and disproportionate Israeli military offensive taking place in the Gaza Strip," Deputy Foreign Minister Freddy Mamani said at a press conference.

....."What we have now is the insanity of Israel's prime minister, who wants to wipe out the Gaza Strip," said Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva on Friday.