Strategy of Failure
Listening to the media, the politicians and even the public, one would think that most of us just want to get back to where we were before October 7th: Safely in our homes, no incoming rockets with all our hostages back, the enemy on the other side of a big tall fence-wall, our army sitting strongly along the fence and keeping a close eye on developments in enemy territory as far away as we can negotiate for, on the other side of the fence. But alas, this will not happen. We’ve overplayed our cards. Hamas has broken the jar that has gone to the well once too many. We are now stuck in a hole, one we have dug for ourselves diligently for over a decade, if not more and we are still digging. We have to explain to ourselves how we have come to a point where Israel has turned into the most dangerous place in the world for Jews and is making the world less safe for all other Jews, wherever they are.
Our politicians and the army have failed us in the worst possible way and they have to take resonsibility for their failures leading up to this disaster. Yet we as a people have failed as well – we have been sitting silently while an occupation is going on next door in the West Bank, unhindered, ignored for all intents and purposes, certainly not discussed and definitely underreported. The Gaza Strip has been under siege, blockaded and to this or that extent turned into a ghetto for almost two decades and we knew, from previous experience, that this situation is anything but stable, can never be stable. And that’s without talking about the humanitarian aspects. We have had two intifadas and countless “lawn mowing” operations in the Gaza Strip with thousands of Palestinian casualties so even though our esteemed all knowing Prime Minister was sure that Hamas was deterred and preferred calm even though plenty of indications showed otherwise, we should have known that we had it coming. And come it did, in the worst posssible way.
We already have lost the strategic game – just like the 1973 Yom Kippur War ended years of futile Egyptian efforts to negotiate a complete Israeli withdrawal from the Sinai peninsula which Israel had taken and occupied in the 1967 War, the Oct.7 attack from Gaza has likely ended years of adamant Israeli refusal to negotiate a resolution to the conflict with the Palestinians. In the wake of the 1973 war, despite having won a tactical victory, Israel was forced to negotiate the full return of the Sinai peninsula, a concession it never considered making before the war and one that brought about the 1979 peace agreement with Egypt which is still holding strong, until today.
In the wake of Oct. 7 and the war in Gaza, after we declare victory regardless of the situation on the ground, Israel will have to negotiate seriously with the Palestinians, preferably including elements of Hamas, something it has refused to do before the Hamas attack. It can, of course choose not to do so and the present government remains totally in “Khartoum mode” (after the 1967 Arab League’s decision taken in Khartoum not to recognize Israel, not to negotiate with Israel and not no make peace with us) but doing so will delegitimize it even more, internationally for sure but also at home. It may also bring the West Bank to boil over.
Even the angriest Israelis, and the national mood towards the Palestinians has turned very ugly, realize deep down inside that the Israeli-Palestinian status-quo cannot continue. There has to be something other than the mindless and endless arming and military posturing which in the end, as we have seen, does not provide the security we were counting on. Sadly enough, this government isn’t even seriously discussing the day after in Gaza, not to talk about the day after in the West Bank.
The people of Israel must bring down this government before it can cause irrepairable damage and delegitimize Israel even more. Unfortunately none of the moderates in the government, nor the opposition elements vying for public support are contemplating serious political compromise with the Palestinians even if they may occasionally give lip service to an unlikely to be implemented two-state solution. This is sad testimony to the present inability of Zionism to come up with a new paradigm, one that could include Palestinians and Israelis in a shared society where they share sovereignty as well. It appears that Zionism has run its course and cannot provide the answers needed while a new leadership to come up with alternatives and implement them has yet to arrive. It better hurry.