Embracing a Strategy of Self-Defeat

Without presuming to sit in judgment of the families of the hostages, whose pain and heartache are unimaginable, we can and must evaluate the effectiveness of the Hostage Family Forum’s public relations campaign over the last ten months. Let’s begin with what we can agree upon: We all want the hostages back home, and without delay. Our disagreement is on strategy. That is, how best to achieve the goal. Permit me to say that torching Tel Aviv’s highways and other forms of collective venting are counterproductive—no, ruinous.

The misdirection of the public pressure campaign, and its confusion of the “good guys” for the “bad guys”—i.e., blaming one’s own government, rather than Hamas—serves the ends of no one but Sinwar, accomplishing far more than he could do without the protestors’ assistance. The documentary evidence that the protests are aligned with Sinwar’s aims comes from a note recovered from one of his subterranean lairs, as revealed in January 2024: “Do everything possible to increase psychological pressure on Gallant,” it says in Arabic, and, “Keep spreading the message that Netanyahu is responsible for what has happened.” And so, like clockwork, Hamas has followed the playbook. So too, the predictable chorus of critics, always willing and eager to blame Netanyahu, after the tragic recovery of the bodies of six more hostages this past weekend.

Domestically, the protests have produced little other than a series of “own goals”:  damage to infrastructure, a diversion of security and emergency resources, and a deepening of national fissures. In contrast, these “goals” have put points on Hamas’ scoreboard: they have raised the price for Israel of any future potential hostage exchange; encouraged Hamas to believe that additional cold-blooded murders of hostages will bring further pressure on Prime Minister Netanyahu; and now, thanks to Israel’s National Labor Union, the Histadrut, which initiated a general strike after news of the murder of the hostages, heaped additional economic injury on an already fragile economy. Although legal intervention ended the Histadrut’s breathtaking action, its effects are nonetheless indisputable: aiding and abetting the enemy in a time of war. To the Histadrut and other likeminded protestors: Mr. Sinwar thanks you for shooting yourselves in the foot; he is low on ammunition.

To be clear, not all families of the murdered and kidnapped share the protestors’ tactics, and some have appropriately spoken out against them. I’m thinking of Ayelet Samerano, the mother of murdered Yonatan Samerano, who wrote this to Histadrut Chairman Arnon Bar-David: “I understand that you are calling for the shutdown of the Israeli economy and I am asking if doing so, in the dire situation we are in, is what will bring the hostages back to us? Is this what will make Sinwar want to release them?” She continued: “While we are looking for the ultimate solution, you have chosen to shut down the economy and say to Sinwar, ‘You succeeded, keep on murdering.’ The murder of the hostages has brought the crowds out to the streets and disabled the State of Israel. So here you go, within a short time the whole country will collapse and you can thank Mr. Bar-David, among many others.’”

So too, Elkana Liebman, a Histadrut member himself, and the brother of the murdered Elyakim Liebman, wrote to Bar-David: “you are only raising the ransom price and harming the hostages, harming the soldiers and harming all the citizens of the State of Israel.” Quite true. What Ms. Samerano and Mr. Liebman are noting, in other words, is an “unforced error,” which is to say an entirely avoidable and self-inflicted mistake benefiting one’s opponent. The tragedy here, of course, is that this is not a baseball game we are talking about. At stake are the lives of hostages, the morale of brave combat soldiers, and the safety and security of an entire nation.

Yet the impatient throngs still call incessantly and insistently for an agreement of any kind and on practically any terms (“Now! Now!”). Is it just me, or do the mobs remind you too of an unrestrained three-year-old kicking and screaming on the floor of an ice cream store? The display is all the more remarkable given there is no evidence a viable deal is even on the table, or that, if there was one, what the costs to Israel and its security from such a deal might entail. But such long-term implications trouble the protestors not a wit. They want a deal, any deal, and they want it now. And because there is no limit to their hatred and mistrust of Netanyahu, they conveniently overlook the abundant public evidence—from the words of the Biden Administration itself—that, on several occasions (at least in March 2024, May 2024, June 2024 and August 2024) an Israeli agreement to a deal has been spurned by Hamas. But of course, why should Sinwar accept an agreement at all when so large a portion of Israel’s public is already in self-destruct mode?  Time is clearly on Sinwar’s side.

The public outpouring of angst, the general lack of discipline and fortitude to stick with a worthwhile and unavoidable long-term struggle, and the demand for instant gratification, can only fairly be described as, forgive me, childish. At least that’s how a grateful enemy must perceive it. But that perception of emotional fragility, of national immaturity, and of a growing tantrum fest, is costly. It keeps the embers of hope burning deep in the dark hearts of Hamas’ murderous foot soldiers. It is also why Israel’s national security cabinet must be run with cold calculation and on the basis of the national interest serving a country of nine million souls, not by those who are for good reason bereft and emotionally distraught.

What we are witnessing on Israel’s streets are unprecedented displays of self-defeating stupidity. When the signs of protestors demand Israel’s leadership reach an agreement quite literally at “any price” (and I’m not exaggerating) I dare say the game is already lost. Sinwar, who is reputed to regularly watch Israel’s nightly news, wants precisely that—an agreement at a destructively high price for Israel. Why would any Israeli of good conscience possibly want to assist him in achieving that aim? But the protestors are undaunted, and ready to jump into a bargain for the most prized and precious possessions at the biggest of all Middle Eastern bazaars, but with an enemy far more practiced in the arts of negotiation and psychological warfare. By conveying so publicly that they have no floor to their negotiating position, the protestors have declared defeat before the negotiation has even begun. Again, Sinwar thanks you.

Meanwhile, although Prime Minister Netanyahu is reviled by his detractors based on surmise and innuendo, and accused of the basest of motives in the absence of proof, Bibi is courageously holding the line. What an admirable display of Churchillian tenacity from a man surrounded by Chamberlains at home and even more so abroad, and who so personally knows the tragic loss of a loved one to terror. He deserves more from the public he serves.

Despite his continued vilification by his political opponents, I believe that Israelis one day will look back upon this chapter of Netanyahu’s tenure with profound gratitude. His caricaturists love to portray him as self-centered, engaged in this high-stakes poker game only in the interest of self-preservation. I think exactly the opposite is true—that Netanyahu cares deeply about reversing the defeat that occurred on his commanders’ watch, restoring Israeli deterrence, and making Israel impenetrable once again.

That will require never allowing a repeat of the fateful exchange of over 1,000 terrorists (Sinwar, infamously, among them) for a single Gilad Shalit. I’m no Robert Aumann, to be sure, but one need not be a Nobel Prize laureate in game theory to marvel at the insanity of such an arrangement, and to pray it never recurs. Israel simply cannot afford to duplicate anything like that exchange ratio in another prisoner exchange, even if some are irrationally clamoring for one. Thus, even if it is not among the explicit goals of Operation Swords of Iron, Israel must reverse the equation of past lop-sided hostage exchanges, and thereby diminish the incentive for its evil enemies to capture more Israelis, Jews and non-Jews alike. This is no less an existential imperative than Israel’s official stated war aims.

To be sure, caving to the plaintive cries of the political opposition would be an easy way to achieve a quick fix, as would pulling back from the Philadelphi Corridor. It would give respite to Israel’s economy, return reservists to their families and jobs, give stock portfolios a bump, and bring a momentary reprieve from the never-ending onslaught from the UN, the ICJ, the ICC, UNRWA, the EU, and other associations of international hypocrites and antisemites. Everyone would collectively exhale, and then enjoy a fresh breath of Mediterranean sea air long enough for the Tel Avivians to have a peaceful cappuccino again. And for Hamas to rearm.

And then what? How long before the next Qassam rockets fall on Sderot? Or on Tel Aviv? Netanyahu surely knows that band-aid solutions, however much desired by his political enemies to salve the current wounds, risk all the gains made so far, and would put Israel at even greater future peril. Similarly, a public relations strategy Sinwar himself embraces is a strategy for defeat, not for the victory Israel deserves.