It’s all of this

As I have had much reason to say over the last 18 months, it is not either-or. Sometimes, often, it is both. And it is that now.

Netanyahu is what he is. Yes, this will serve him. Yes, this has been in the planning for long months. While the rest of what he does has been done. Including the political maneuvers of the last few days.

And.

Iran is an existential threat to Israel, racing to enrich uranium sufficient for multiple nuclear bombs, which the regime has said repeatedly, including just in the last few days, it will use against Israel, threats to destroy Israel, level the country. As David Makovsky said some years ago while on a tour of US campuses, including the one in which I chaired Jewish Studies, when they say they are going to kill you, believe them.

Hamas, Hezbollah, pose no existential threat to Israel anymore but Iran definitely does.

There was a window to do this. That is not Netanyahu saying that. It is ama”n, military intelligence — and the Mossad — and it is they, and the IAF, not Netanyahu, who planned and are directing this most complicated operation at the timing they deemed optimal. The political maneuvers — and the timing of that family wedding we have heard so much about– were the perfect cover to have the Iranians think, it won’t be now. And so kept the Revolutionary Guard where they were, and Israeli intelligence knew exactly where that was. Was. That is past tense, now.

After Iran’s second ballistic missile attack on Israel, the IAF took out Iranian defense installations, meaning, as long as those were not rebuilt, an attack on the military operational heads of offensive Iranian policy — the Revolutionary Guards — and the nuclear facilities was tenable.

And the first rounds of attack were directed precisely at the leadership of the Revolutionary Guards and it is they, not the Iranian army or air force that have been running offensive planning and operations and are (or, have been), the main threat.

Of course, Iran was rebuilding air defense installations, while it enriched uranium to a level and at a pace that even the IAEA said violated all agreements and was moving swiftly to weapon grade. There is a window to act in such a situation.

So. It is both.

As it is in other situations.

Hamas is a jihadist terror group that must be taken off our borders. And the current military operation in Gaza, as has been the case for a year already, is not the way to do that. As I’ve written repeatedly, echoing numerous Israeli experts, there are smarter, more effective ways to undermine Hamas and replace it. This can only be done in concert with certain regional states, as well as the US, that share mutual interests with us, not least, fear of Iran and Shiite imperialist jihadism, in order to address regional issues, including Gaza, to the rational benefit of all. Including Gazans, who remain in situ under a very different regime that prioritizes their lives and future. Saudi Arabia, Egypt, the UAE, have repeatedly expressed interest in such. Biden pushed hard for such a plan, Sinwar timed the Oct. 7 attack to torpedo those discussions– which had the Iranians, too, quaking.

All the parties, including Israel, have their own interests and those have to be respected and dealt with in any complicated, regional, deal.

And yes, no escaping this for any who may wish that or try to delude us about it—ending Israeli rule over another people and a tangible plan for Palestinian independence and self-rule in a tenable geographic and economic entity that poses no threat to Israel. That huge goal is not achieved at once or perfectly, ever, but there is better and worse and what has gone on and continues to go on absolutely is worse, for all concerned, absolutely including Israel.

It’s called diplomacy– and smart deals.

Complicated, complex, deals, held together not by love of one another or wishful thinking but mutual, compelling, interests.

It is to use the military achievements for strategic ends. Those achievements—not including what is going on as I type, whose full dimensions and impact we don’t yet know– have been tremendous. Hamas is massively degraded, no longer an organized fighting force but a guerilla group, incapable of anything vaguely approaching Oct. 7. Hezbollah is no longer a threat, when we heard and expected (Netanyahu did, this is a quote), that Tel Aviv would be levelled and Haifa, with its oil and other toxic refineries blown up, if we did anything to Hezbollah– and their IRANIAN, gps-guided, short and long range missiles– operated by Iranian specialists as well as Hezbollah forces in Lebanon. And, until we took those out, in Syria. Syria, which now also poses absolutely no threat to us.

It is to use those extraordinary military achievements to build a strategic, better, overall result. It is to stop doing military operations as if they alone are a strategy, when they are and can only be tactical, awaiting a rational strategy, which Netanyahu-Israel has not and is not pursuing.

Is there realistic hope that he will pursue such a regional strategy now? No. He remains who he is and this will boost him and this terrible government tremendously.

Does that mean that this was not the time to do this operation? Or, to never do it? The available information now is, no, that would not be the conclusion to draw. This was the time, and so far as we know now, this was the way to do it.

The real issue of Hamas and Israel’s security needs and the trauma of the victims of Oct. 7 and all of Israeli society has been appropriated by this corrupt regime. They use it with reptilian cynicism– wearing hostage pins as they torpedo deals and endanger the hostages– to stay in power, implement corrupt policies against our fighting forces even as they pursue war in Gaza; refuse to allow a full investigation of Oct. 7 and the necessary conclusions from it; allow fascist, racist, imperialist goals to pollute what was once self-evident, imperative self-defense in Gaza. Unconscionable policies that, if nothing else, endanger our security– though there is plenty else wrong and intolerable about it.

So, we need to keep our heads on straight when things are indeed, very complicated and complex.

What of the hostages in all this? Even if the monsters want to keep those still living, alive– and that is only the case if they can see some gain from doing that– their ability to do so amid massive IDF operations, bombing of buildings, tunnels, in which they hold the hostages– is precarious, at best.

What of Gazans, half of the population are children– needing food, water, medicine, shelter from the sun, dust, from IDF operations and the violence of Hamas, Islamic Jihad, and the mafia militia Netanyahu’s Israel-—the same one that funded Hamas to the tune of $140 million a month for years– is now arming?

No, we are not this government. Yes, we have been in existential danger from Iran. And some indeed, would say, still are from this government.

It’s all of this.