Ceasefire in Israel-Hamas War
A ceasefire ending this round of the Hamas-Israel fighting went into effect at 9 p.m. local time, November 21, 2012. There were reports — still unconfirmed — of more rockets being fired from Gaza at Israel after the ceasefire was to be implemented. Hamas immediately claimed victory. So did Netanyahu, and here is his statement.
The brief agreement provides that both sides will stop all hostilities. For Israel, that included the targeted killings of terrorists and Hamas leaders. For the Palestinian side, the phrase “all Palestinian factions” was used. That means the Hamas regime is responsible for any attacks by Islamic Jihad, al-Qaeda affiliates, and other small Salafist groups. According to the text, at least, Hamas cannot hide behind allowing or encouraging such groups to attack and then disclaiming responsibility.
Another provision is that Israel will reopen the crossings and let people (a small number of Gazans seeking medical attention in Israel) and supplies return to normal levels.
Egypt — not the United States, which isn’t mentioned in the agreement — is the sponsor of the ceasefire. According to some reports which seem accurate, the ceasefire was agreed to through Egypt but delayed until Secretary of State Hillary Clinton arrived. By allowing Clinton to claim credit for the agreement, Israel may get something in return, including most obviously a greater U.S. commitment to make the agreement work.
There is an interesting hint on this kind of secret agreement contained in Netanyahu’s statement:
Israel obviously cannot sit idly while our enemy reinforces itself with weapons of terror. Therefore we decided, President Obama and myself, that the United States and Israel would work together to fight the smuggling of weapons to the terror organizations – weapons, virtually all of which come from Iran.
Here is a very significant point that’s being missed in all of the coverage and discussions regarding the ceasefire. Netanyahu’s remark suggests there will be a new anti-smuggling effort involving U.S. intelligence, cooperation with other countries, and pressure on Egypt to make it harder to get weapons — especially missiles — into the Gaza Strip. It is clear that long-range missiles are the hardest thing to bring in and the easiest weaponry for Egypt to stop at the border.
By doing so, Egypt also clinches its gaining more U.S. aid, though that probably would have happened anyway.
On Hamas’s side, the decision to reach a ceasefire was motivated by the damage the organization was suffering and fear of a massive Israeli ground attack. Perhaps most important, however, was that Hamas found it was not receiving strong support from Egypt and other states, especially because Cairo is now ruled by a Muslim Brotherhood government. Hamas is an independent branch of the Muslim Brotherhood movement. Apparently, Hamas did not consult with Egypt before escalating attacks against Israel, the factor that set off large-scale Israeli retaliation. In turn, Egypt, along with Qatar, the Hamas regime’s main Arab funder, pressured the regime to stop the fighting.
The timing for a crisis could not be worse for the new Egyptian regime. It has not yet tamed its army, finished writing its constitution, or established the legitimacy of the parliament it dominates. At the precise time the war started, the Egyptian government was completing negotiations that can be expected to bring it almost $10 billion in aid from the European Union, International Monetary Fund, and United States. Whatever Egypt does in the future, it does not want trouble from Israel at present. Israel had also earlier reassured the Cairo regime that it would support an amendment in their thirty-year-old peace treaty that would allow Egypt to station more troops in the eastern Sinai. The number wouldn’t be enough to threaten Israel but enough to help control the Salafist groups there that have targeted Israel several times in cross-border raids. That is, if Egypt wants to stop them from doing so. At any rate, Egypt faces attacks on itself from some of these groups as well.
Israel’s motives included ending attacks on its civilian population which caused few fatalities but had a tremendously disrupting psychological and economic effect. The truth is that Israel’s population, while overwhelmingly supporting the war, evinced more fear about the attacks than in earlier conflicts. The ability of Hamas to fire missiles toward Tel Aviv and Jerusalem — though this was partly a bluff since these missiles were almost emptied of explosives to get a longer range — set off concerns, especially in Tel Aviv. The Iron Dome system worked very well in shooting down a high percentage of the rockets outside the far south.
But Israel’s most realistic interests — though not its preferences — were reached by agreeing to a ceasefire now. There was international, and especially U.S., pressure to avoid a ground attack which meant that the limit of its military gains using only air power had been already attained. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu wants to develop the best possible relationship with newly reelected President Barack Obama, with whom he will probably be dealing with — assuming Netanyahu’s reelection on January 22 — for the next four years.
Equally important was that Israeli leaders — and public opinion generally agrees — know that a temporary ceasefire is the best outcome that can be obtained. A very large portion of Hamas’s weapons, especially longer-range missiles, has been destroyed and it will take Hamas time to rebuild. While people can come up with ideal solutions in their heads, the problem is that Israel does not want to return to rule the Gaza Strip (which would involve armed battles almost daily) and does not have international support for overthrowing Hamas.
In a reasonable world, the international community would support, even join in, bringing down the current regime and replacing it with the Palestinian Authority. After all, Hamas staged an armed coup and chased out its Fatah rivals, killing many of them brutally. It then openly declared its intentions to commit genocide against Israel and Jews generally; staged a constant series of terror attacks; forced out the small Christian population; let al-Qaeda-affiliated groups operate; and systematically taught children to grow up to be terrorists and suicide bombers.
Instead, however, the international community is determined to protect the survival of the Hamas regime, and the Palestinian Authority would not take back rule over the Gaza Strip, either by its own efforts to overthrow Hamas or at the hands of a victorious Israeli army. If the war continued, some more Hamas leaders would be killed and munitions would be destroyed. But that additional benefit would be limited. At the same time, more civilians would be killed on both sides and the relatively positive international support and mild media criticism — by the usual standards, of course — would dissipate.
Of course, everyone knows that this ceasefire won’t last. The key to anything more durable is if the Egyptian government decides that it wants to avoid another war because of its own interests. In other words, despite its hard line toward Israel, would the Brotherhood regime decide that it wanted to consolidate its rule over Egypt — totally transform the army; Islamize the society; and suppress Christians, women and secularist — before taking on Israel? Can it create a repressive regime and fight a jihad simultaneously or does it need to take on these tasks one at a time? By helping to broker the ceasefire, the Egyptian regime has also won points with the Obama administration that should bring it benefits in future.
Thus is the twisted situation characterizing contemporary Middle East politics and U.S. policy.





This time around Rubin’s article confuses me. An article or two back Rubin announced that Israel was learning that it cannot depend upon America (of Obama) and, hence, was going to act on its own. This is how I remember the gist of Rubin’s analysis. In this current article I have the impression that Rubin is trying to make the best out of the fact that Obama (and Europeans) can and did block Israel’s full pulverizing of Hamas. In other words, Israel does not control fully its “own”. What seems evident is that Israel haw bought time, has, so to speak, kicked the can down the road–and at a time when victory was at hand. By “victory” I mean something like in WW II where the Allies simply ended the infrastructure and command of the German military under Hitler. Today in German documentaries, the rather brutal and deadly beating that the German army and the German civilians experienced in defeat is interpreted as the Allied “LIBERATION” of Germany. Could not have Israel “liberated” the Gaza Palestinians from a minature copy of Nazi Germany. From afar it looks, at least for propaganda purposes, that Hamas has played David against the Goliath Israel which has inflicted so much damage on civilians in Gaza. Very recently a leading German newspaper announced that Israel needs “a strong Hamas” to keep the peace. In such a recommendation I see a tactical victory on the part of the Hamas military. I cannot imagine the NY Times of 1944 proclaiming the need of the Nazi party in order to keep the peace. I hope I am wrong, but Rubin’s article has struck me more like an apology than a victory dance.
Yes, you are absolutely right that Rubin’s article lacks its usual clarity and is full of obfuscations. Because of his ties to GLORIA and the Israeli establishment,Rubin is unwilling to criticize Netanyahu and the rest of the government for their failed leadership demonstrated by accepting a deeply unpopular cease-fire that essentially places Israel in a worst position than before the military campaign. (Contrary to what Rubin says polls show that the vast majority of Israelis are opposed to the cease-fire.) Perhaps the biggest contradiction in the article is where Rubin writes that since the Egyptians were not ready for the war they wanted to put pressure on Hamas to accept a cease-fire, but in the future they may be ready to challenge Israel. If this is so it was a major strategic mistake for Israel to accept a cease-fire now to give the Egyptians (and not only the Hamas) time to better prepared next time. In any case, Rubin’s failure to acknowledge that with this war Hamas has improved its international standing, shown it can withstand the fury of the IDF, threatened both Tel Aviv and Jerusalem, and demonstrated that it is the true leader of the Israeli resistance most probably is due to his biting his tongue into submission.
What the heck? What’s GLORIA?
Are you aware what the army consists of (civilians!) and the difficulty in keeping them in the field for a long time? When we will have to do this again, anyway? We did this successfully in the first Labanese war (which now everyone cries over) but I doubt that would work in Gaza.
I don’t say the ceasefire was good, but I can easily see both sides. It helps when the reservists are your co-workers.
As an Israeli, Prof Rubin’s analysis makes sense to me and I have no connections with GLORIA, the Israeli establishment and plenty of criticisms of
Netanyahu. Time will tell, but I think we made some gains with the destruction of FAJRs and the successes of Iron Dome. It would be good if we could just go in and get rid of the Hamas, but its not so simple. I also think
a longer campaign would have been a distraction from dealing with the main threat – the Iranian nuke.
Re. “Could not have Israel “liberated” the Gaza Palestinians from a minature copy of Nazi Germany.”
I think they could not and should not even try.
could not:
1. Majority of arabs supports hamas,
2. International peaceniks supports hamas,
3. The US continue its policies (for whatever they worth) of “winning hearts and minds”,
4. EU supports whatever gives them access to ME oil,
5. Iran supports whoever makes trouble.
should not:
1. “liberation” requirs long term real occupation with accompanying cost,
2. The goal of liberating Europe from Nazis was to have viable Europe as a trading partner and a counterweight to SU.
Why Israel would want viable Gaza? particularly at a huge expense?
Spot on, sir. I would like to add that from a military pov, this whole labeling of Hamas as only a terrorist group has not been very succesful. I know a lot of you hate it, but maybe the time has come for talking.
Perhaps this limited win by Israel (with some pluses also to Hamas and Egyptian government) is the best for which Israel could hope and that may not be a bad outcome.
An Israeli takeover of Gaza would give Israel one million Arabs to worry about again (per grr’s comment). Instead, Israel continues to disrupt the ineffectual local Arab siege and can re-focus on the Iran threat. Meanwhile, Arab and Iranian society continues to disintegrate and Israeli society continues to flourish.
If Israel can end the Iranian WMD threat then the long term odds favor Israel.
Leonard W – With all due respect, I would say this is not a situation which calls for an attempted repeat of Patton’s operation of 1944/45.
All three comments to my comment are appreciated. Apparently the idea of “liberating” the Palestinians has been a cause of concern. I am writing from Germany and German is my second mother language. Last night I viewed (until I could not take it anymore) two sweet looking female commentators (not tough and tumble men) sympathetically talking (not analysing in a Rubin sense) the situation. Yes, a few Israeli casualities were mentioned, ones that pale numerically in the light of the supposed Gaza-ian casualities, including children. In hoping and wishing for peace, the sweet sounding ladies empathized with the victims and the role of Hamas was lost from the analysis and from German consciousness. Any German after 1945 could have (and many did) bemoan the massive destruction inflicted by Allied bombing and forget the role of the “Dictator” (as Chaplin so ironically called him), the Nazi Party and German military (= small version of Hamas and Arabs in Gaza). My impression is that Hamas has won the sympathy battle. Please do think back to Günther Grass’s diatribe against Israel as the problem, not the Iranians. I will not continue with my impressions. I need informed analysts such a Rubin to go beyond the mere impression.
Now to the notion of “liberation”. If nothing else, an invasion into Gaza could have been presented as an action of “liberation” from Hamas. In other words, a propaganda tool! With control of the land mass, Israel could more easily search out Hamas militants, maybe, just maybe made it possible for Fatah to make a comeback, and knocked out the educational propaganda that young Palestianians receive in Gaza. Am I just dreaming here? It is irrelevant, whether dream or not, as the “truce” has been made.
And of course Fatah will then murder anyone it doesn’t like. The world will not care, but we should realize what will happen.
IF IRON DOME CAN HIT A MISSILE IN MID-FLIGHT, COULDN’T IT ALSO TAKE OUT THE LAUNCH SITE?
In this brief war, Tehran learned Israel’s response to missiles: Precision air strikes. Hamas will, therefore, rebuild with missiles as well as MANPADS and SAMs, possibly from Libya, but in any event brought into Gaza through Sinai. Morsi will not stop the flow of weapons.
It would’ve been nice to see missiles take out the missile launchers. It’s possible the next war will start w/a commercial airliner taken down.
Why cannot the defense system hit the launch sites? I doubt that it is technically possible. But, even assuming that it were so, it would mean in many cases hitting a house in which a Palestinian family lives. We have been informed that often enough Hamas launches missles from sites in homes or schools, etc. To hit the sites would be what the Hamas needs to win the propaganda war or, better, the war through propaganda. Given the sympathy-for-civilians reporting of CNN and other media, each success against a home-site lauching would be a defeat. Israel just had the opportunity to militarily swamp Hamas on the ground and did not use it or, most likely, was blocked from using it. Reult: Hamas is still there with sympathy points in the world press and the time of reckoning will come again.
Mike, the launch sites are taken out from the air, through missiles fired from planes or drones.
Because launch sites are taken out by planes, it leaves them vulnerable to surface-to-air missiles (SAMs) which, I predict, Hamas will have in the next conflict.
Some 20,000-30,000 MANPADS (shoulder-fired missiles) are missing from Qadaffi’s arsenal and could wind up in Gaza. These type of weapons destroyed the Russian planes in Afghanistan and, basically, caused Russia to exit Afghanistan.
The precision guided munitions Israel uses to hit launch sites have a much longer range than MANPADs.
Though frankly I think Israel should use artillery. Much cheaper. Not as accurate. So it goes.
Josh – Yes. MANPADS have a limited ranged. But considering that Russia supplied Libya w/anti-aircraft weapons, can we say with certainty that these Russian weapons — whatever they are, going from Libya through Sinai to Gaza — cannot take out an Israeli plane?
BTW: I agree w/you that if artillery can do the trick, why risk a plane and a pilot. In fact, I’ll go even further: It’s the Israeli aircraft — which seems so much more powerful than poor-little Hamas — that creates the impression of Palestinians as under dogs. This angers the world. So don’t use the damn planes. Use missiles. Tit for tat. Who can argue with that?
According to the data released, the Russan stuff primarily consisted of Strela-3 (Nato reporting name: Gremlin) MANPADS and ZSU-series anti-air autocannon. Both are reasonably accurate, but short-ranged, and more negatively, have a low engagement ceiling. I don’t think HAMAS will bring in many ZSUs – most of those are large and obvious targets.
No the Kipat barzel (Iron Dome) cannot hit the launching sites. The radar unit needs to pick up the missile already in flight, project (calculate) its flight path, whether or not it is headed for an open area or built up area, decide if to intercept, shoot the interceptor to meet the oncoming missile at the right point and destroy it. All this is a matter of seconds takes a huge amount of computing power. But the key is that the missile must already be on its course to project where to hit it.
As far as the shoulder fired anti aircraft rockets, these worked well against russian helicopters in the 80′s. The IAF is much more sophisticated and ready for this.
“The radar unit needs to pick up the missile already in flight, project (calculate) its flight path…”
Rick – It seems to me that if Iron Dome can calculate where a missile is going to, it can be re-calibrated to determine where it came from. Attacking w/a precision missile seems safer to me than attacking by aircraft. BTW: Just read this article by Reza Khalili [http://www.wnd.com/2012/11/iran-were-taking-out-israels-warplanes/?cat_orig=world] “Iran is now claiming that it has armed Hamas with antiaircraft missiles and that the militants have hit and damaged several sophisticated Israeli warplanes.” Aaron Klein thinks that Hamas’ claim that it took down a drone is correct.
Back-tracking a missile (even an unguided rocket) is not as easy as a ballistic shell. This is because the thrust characteristics of the rocket change in flight, as the fuel state of the missile changes, and possibly after the fuel runs out and the projectile goes pure ballistic. You can only backtrack a missile to an area, not a specific point – and unless you’re willing to flatten city blocks (and take the bad press that goes with it) that isn’t good enough.
Kevin – You certainly know your stuff. Thank you.
Mike
There is so much smoke being puffed in our faces, but this much is for sure – http://adinakutnicki.com/2012/11/21/brief-war-update-as-an-addendum-to-ceasedeath-fire-or-not-commentary-by-adina-kutnicki/
And the above is(partly)why we are where we are; in a more horrific situation than before!!
If one can believe the news (a big if) Southern Israel is mad as hell, and the soldiers aren’t too happy either. And the Likud primaries are Sunday.
The right (note – the Likud is not “right-wing”) may gain in the election in January at Likud’s expense.
That America could force this Hudna (the West calls it ceasefire, Humas calls it Hudna)on Israel even though it is clearly against Israel’s interest demonstrates conclusively that Israel is no longer an autonomous country. It is now firmly established as residuary to the USA and under Obama’s loving control.
Ceasefire is absolutely in Israel’s interest. To “defeat” Hamas means to take responsibility for Gaza and for Palestinians who define themselves by their hatred toward Israel and Jews. Israel does not want to take care of all those people. So, maximum it can achieve in current situation is some quiet. And it is achieved.
Yvonne – I’m hoping that in this ceasefire, Israel is taking the long view: Hamas is the ‘little enemy’, Iran is the ‘big enemy’. So that Israel is keeping its options open for action against Iran.
This looks to me as if the USA has forced a stalemate on Israel and prevented a defeat of the aggressor, Hamas. It looks as if the USA has helped buy time for Hamas instead of forcing them through a decisive defeat into a serious treaty with Israel.
Hamas can not have a “comprehensive treaty” with Israel, because the whole purpose and reason for its existence is armed struggle against Israel. If they stop fighting Israel, world will loose all interest in them. But Hamas can not support itself, they can not exist on their own. Comprehensive treaty with Israel will be death sentence for Hamas and for Palestinians, as we know them. So, Hamas can not be forced to sign such a treaty, the same way you can not force Israel to fold everything and leave.
Okay, Israel accepted a cease fire, BUT ounce reelected Bibi will play hardball no matters what Obama has to say.
The present US Admin is pushing Israel to the brink of desperation. Israel is loosing the US support, and in the future will very reluctantly obliged to seek it from Europe. Obama just gave Israel a poisonous candy – support for self defense in words, and de facto accept a cease fire now! Unfortunately we’ll pay it dearly.
Ceasefire? Truce?
As in buying off Hamas – what happens to the money or materiell that buys them? A true UN “Triumph”, i.e. SOP/sop. Virtually daily attacks on the ground or via missiles of little interest to major media/politicians/”leaders” in the West when Israeli babies, people, are the victims.
Recent public history – what do we know except provided by established information institutions adept in reporting to their agenda of the moment – as pattern of truce, peace, ceasefire?
Payments in perpetuity – which groups of people are the actual paymasters – to Hamas or other “freedom loving” groups. Payment always escalating “to keep the peace”. The word/words usual to describe are never used by the “disinterested” media/politicians. Other peoples’ money, lives and peace once again?
OR that other ploy “to keep the peace”, one side only honours the “truce” the “ceasefire”, the Oslo “accord”. SOP in the even handed assessment in the West by the creators and recorders of these ceasefires, truces, accords?
Special thanks to Christine LaGarde and the IMF on Nov. 20. May Dec. 19 pass without problem – the date for actual disbursement of IMF loan funds to Egypt.
ok, it is interesting to wonder how Morsi felt getting “advised” by two secularist Christian women, LaGarde on Nov 20, and HClinton on Nov 21.
WHAT CEASEFRE?
The missles are still coming into Israel from Gaza, for Heaven’s sake! At least 20 today.
Maybe because it’s night in the US, but every American outlet is missing this. GAZANS ARE STILL SOOTING MISSLES AT ISRAEL. It may not be Hamas, but it never was only Hamas, and it doesn’t matter because they run the place.
OK, it appears that the rockets were in the three hours between the cease fire and midnight. I guess Hamas had to fire after the cease fire to claim victory.
But I’m not holding my breath.
Wait a minute! I said this as a joke. “We can’t sign until Haliary gets here.” You mean we really waited for Clinton to come? And how many people died in the meantime?
On the other hand, I suppose it gave us a chance to get more targets.
I’m with Barry on this one. I think Obama is moderating his simple minded (ie academic) postcolonialism. Heck by 2016 he might even have realized what he is dealing with. Kidding aside, Israel needs time for the West to awake from it’s postcolonial siesta and it is the Islamists who will eventually awaken them, not Israel. Benghazi didn’t get Obama turfed out as I think it should have, but he seems to be pursuing his path of appeasement with a bit more realism. Perhaps Israel and the rest of us will survive him yet. This time, I think Israel has wrong footed both Hamas and Egypt and done some serious damage at low cost. If they had gone into Gaza and torn the place up like in Cast Lead they would have just further fed the West’s post colonial delusion while gaining little more time.
I agree. What has Hamas really gained from the latest hostilities? They got Ministers from other Muslim states that were already pro-Hamas to visit Gaza and show support. And for one of those countries–Turkey, a NATO member–that show of support may reduce their influence among western nations.
One thing that Turkey will proably get from Germany is the appearance of German soldiers in Turkey with Patriot Rockets in order to defend Turkey from …? Syria? Erdogan never fails in his visits here in Germany to insult German attempts to assimilate immigrant Turks into their society. Indeed, “assimilation” has been designated as a crime against humanity. We all know the value judgments uttered by Erdogan against Israel’s harsh, to be sure, “punishment” of Hamas. No mention of self-defense needs. The result of keeping the Israelis “moderate”, viz., bringing them to negotiate with Hamas via Morsi has had the effect to bolster the image of Israel’s enemies. Morsi is now a “moderate”! All that I can take. What bothers me is that Obama, H. Clinton, Europe, etc. have had success in blocking Israeli military efforts, all in the name of “peace”. Israel should forget action against Iran, i.e., unless it is willing outright to oppose Obama and, for that matter, European public opinion. I do hope that Rubin takes note of the number of replies thus far to his article wherein the feeling is NOT that “Bibi” won the, say, upperhand, rather that he had to, apparently, let a real disarmament of Hamas slip past. For how long? On Fox News a Mr. Schartz, an aid to the mayor of Tel-Aviv, could only express hope that the truce would hold–for awhile. Is the almost timid tone of voice of Mr. Schwartz expressing something hopeful the “best” that the truce has reached for the long term? Alas, I do not possess the expertise of Rubin. I want him to convince me that all is better. As of this article I remain sceptical.
The ceasefire was arranged to protect morsi.after shooting off their mouths,the Egyptians were going to either back up their antiisrael rhetoric and lose all that western aid or do nothing and lose a lot of face. I am not sure what the hell the Israelis or the state dept were thinking shoring up the moors regime.
I am more concerned about the bus bombing. I tactic of throwing the bomb on board rather than the standard self immolation suggestsnthat the murderer was an israeli Arab.this indicates a further radicalization/palestinianization of Israeli arabs! Hamas et al are less of an existential threat Israel than the fifth columnists.
Judge William Young sentencing “shoe bomber” Richard Reid to prison:
We do not negotiate with terrorists. We do not meet with terrorists. We do not sign documents with terrorists. We hunt them down one by one and bring them to justice.
If only we had patriotic, ethical leaders like this judge, running our country.
A worthwhile read alongside this article:
http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Peace/2012/11/22/Understanding-What-Hamas-Means-by-Peace-Truce
By agreeing to this ceasefire “truce”, the Israeli government has insured that its citizens will willingly line up and march into the gas chambers after the next Muslim attack conquers Israel – using Iranian-supplied rockets from the North, while Egypt provides most of the ground troops from the South. This scenario became inevitable once Obama destroyed the secular Egyptian government. Remember this conflict is fueled by “religion”, which by its very nature cannot compromise.
The Muslims get stronger and stronger, while Israel gets relatively weaker and weaker after each Muslim aggression. We are seeing Munich again, and soon it will be too late. The only alternative for Israel is full use of its nuclear arsenal – not only against the Muslims, but against Russia and the Europeans who have supported the destruction of Israel.
The European governments know this, as does Obama, and the only way to insure a constant supply of oil (and “peace in the Mideast”) is to eliminate Israel once and for all.
I wonder how the European and Russian governments intend to prevent the use of nukes by Israel during its final days? I hope the Israeli government wonders about this also, and wonders what part the European and Russian governments will play in it final solution.
Was the “Pillar” the preparation for the strike on Iran or just the Hamas rocket systems and depots destruction? Were these tasks fulfiled without the ground operation? Was the wavering of the ground forces use in the combination with the declared dependence on Obama and Murci the best way of the independent actions against Iran? I`ve found no answers in this post.
I tend to agree with Mr Rubin’s analysis. If I were Mr Netanyahu, my main concern would be Iran not Hamas. Taking care of Iran’s threat always meant facing the triad of Hamas, Hizbullah and Iran itself.
One of the legs of the triad has been weakened and degraded. The second leg in the north, Hizbullah is involved in its own problems within Lebanon and in Syria, and it has witnessed the amazing performance of Iron Dome. This means that its main weapon of terror, missiles into Israel is no longer as terrifying. Should Israel act on its Iran problem., Hizbullah will think more than twice if to get involved given the fact that Israel will have all of its power focused against them, since Hamas is licking its wounds, if not dying from them, and Iron Dome can neutralize a great part of its threat. This leaves Iran standing on one leg of the triad…Iran. They can reach Israel with long distance missiles but just like we saw with iron Dome , the Arrow batteries will come into action with the same or better results. Iran may resort to terror or shenanigans in the Gulf, but they know very well what the payback would be from the West.
So in summing up, if i were Iran I would be very concerned about what might happen in the coming months. Remember Bibi keeps his eye on Iran first, foremost and last.
Ceasefire. What claptrap. “There is no solution for the Palestinian question except through Jihad. Initiatives, proposals and international conferences are all a waste of time and vain endeavors.” (article 13, Hamas Charter)
CNN white-washing hamas in full swing
hamas feels emboldened and is asking for more weapons
someone in Israel will regret not having finished the job
what a shame
I have enjoyed the discussions as much as the article… I have to agree with Barry’s analysis of the situation… no victory for either sides is perhaps the best description and we have not given up the option of retaliation for more rocketing… no matter who claims credit (a big step)…
a friend of ours came up with a novel solution to this issue…
set up launching sites on the border and have them respond automatically to any rocket that lands… computerised indiscriminate retaliation…
While I, as many of the commenters on this site, would have liked to see was Israel go into Gaza and hang all the jihadis on the nearest lampposts. But in the world of geo-politics such velleities mean very little — and often are counterproductive.
Fact 1: Obama just won re-election; he does like Jews — and he probably hates Israel. Given this, Israel can only publicly go against him when not doing so would jeopardize the Jewish State.
Fact 2: What Hamas and its pawns did to Israel re shooting rockets at indiscriminate targets was a truly horrible thing; it was not\is not, however, an existential threat to the Jewish State.
Fact 3: The only existential threat to Israel is a nuclear armed Iran. Obama is definitely on Iran’s side when it comes to an Israeli attack on Iran’s nuclear infrastructure.
Fact 4: If, as I expect, Obama plays along with Iran in its trying to run out the clock, Israel will have no choice, Obama or no Obama, to attack Iran.
Fact 5: Having gone along with Obama in making a deal with Hamas, and so bolstering Morsi, whose organization Obama has done all he could to help, Israel has scored some points with his administration and the “international community” (and yes, I know very well that most in this “community” are anti-Semitic hypocrites).
Fact 6: When Israel does attack Iran — and I think it will have little choice in the matter, Israel is going to need every one of these points (again, I know these points are almost meaningless — but they are not totally meaningless) to fight the diplomatic firestorm which such an attack will occasion.
So yes, Professor Rubin could have supported his thesis by adverting to these obvious facts — but chose not to. But this in no way undermines his argument that Israel did the right thing — GIVEN THE CURRENT SITUATION.
Parchellan
Some elements missing in your analysis:
Hamas has now the support of Egypt. Even a passive support (meaning, turning a blind eye to weapons transported across the Sinai to Gaza) is very dangerous because knowledge about it can be denied and will not create a conflict with the US.
Hamas has now the support of dissatisfied factions of Fatah in Jordan. Only the total destruction of Hamas could have eliminated this potential threat. Egypt would have no one to support and Fatah would have been silenced by the resolve of the Israeli government.
And there is the heavily armed Hezbollah in Lebanon which would probably think twice before attacking Israel. Hezbollah is now definitely emboldened.
And so is Turkey. She will have soon Patriot missiles, supposedly directed towards Syria but positioned in a way to cover airspace over Lebanon against IAF attacks.
I hope the Israeli government has anticipated this scenario and is prepared to fight against three sides simultaneously. Yet, I do believe that it would be easier, with Hamas out of the picture, to face a somewhat discouraged Hezbollah than three or four enemies, encouraged by the abort of the Gaza campaign.
Weapons inventory was getting a little low anyway. The IDF cannot afford to keep half a dozen brigades just hanging out anyway.
Once Hamas replenishs it’s rocket supply, they will start up again. 6 months.
and, in 6 months, Hamas, Hezballa, and Iran/Egypt all know the performance and limits of the Iron dome!
Hamas was desperate for a cease fire. Israel should have waited until Hamas approached them.
Egypt was not necessary.