Israelis favour forever war, just want hostages released first

 

By James M. Dorsey

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To say Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu is a highly controversial figure in Israeli politics is, at best, an understatement.

Yet, his notion of a forever war against Palestinians resonates with a significant segment of Israeli public opinion, despite differences over strategy, tactics, and the prioritisation of the war’s goals.

Analysing the radicalisation of Israeli society, political scientist and human rights activist Menahem Klein said many Israelis across the political spectrum “imagined” that Hamas’ October 7. 2023 attack put “Israeli society‘s very existence at stake…. This brings many Israelis to the conclusion that this is a war of us against them, an existential war, and our existence is in danger.”

Mr. Klein noted that Israel moved on the day of the attack “from feelings that we rule the Middle East, we are the strongest, nobody can harm us, to an attack that Israel never before experienced. No Arab army hurt Israel on such a scale. No Arab army since 1948 occupied parts of sovereign Israel, pushed over 300,000 Israelis away from their homes, occupied Israeli towns, and murdered so many Israelis.”

Mr. Klein asserted that “Israelis live in a moral bunker” because of the attack that killed some 1,200 people, mostly civilians.

That is “what leads Israelis to commit war crimes (and) use genocidal language,” he said.

Even so, a majority of Israelis, in contrast to Mr. Netanyahu, would be willing to end the war for now to secure the release of the approximately 55 remaining Hamas-held hostages, 20 of which are believed to be alive.

Hamas and other Palestinians abducted 251 people during the group’s attack on Israel. Hamas released most of the hostages in prisoner swaps for Palestinians incarcerated by Israel during ceasefires in November 2023 and earlier this year.

Credit: ABC News

However, few in Israel have thought through what a forever war would mean for their country.

Recently, Israeli Palestinian columnist and novelist Odeh Bisharat spelled out what a forever war would entail in a blistering criticism of prominent Israeli military analyst Ron Ben-Yishai.

By implication, Mr. Bisharat argued that Israel would be fighting its war against the Palestinians and potentially its neighbours, including Egypt, with which it signed a peace treaty in 1979, as long as it refuses to acknowledge Palestinian national aspirations and agrees to an equitable resolution of the conflict that addresses Israeli and Palestinian rights.

Israel has insisted it will continue the Gaza war until it has destroyed Hamas, ensured that Gaza will not be a launching pad for attacks on Israel, and can install a post-war Gaza administration that involves neither Hamas nor the West Bank-based internationally recognised Palestine Authority.

US President Donald J. Trump told Mr, Netanyahu in a phone call this week that Israel must permanently end the war., according to media reports.

The reports quoted the president as saying that the 60 day-ceasefire, proposed by US Special Envoy Steve Witkoff with the prime minister’s backing would not suffice.

Ron Ben-Yishai

Mr. Ben-Yishai, like many Israeli pundits, often echoes Mr. Netanyahu’s thinking.

"If Hamas manages to preserve even part of its underground network, then within a few years, an intolerable threat to the south will once again arise in Gaza," Mr. Bisharat quoted Mr. Ben-Yishai as saying.

Mr. Ben-Yishai’s “tidings are horrifying – a war lasting for years until the very last tunnel has been destroyed. But if the last tunnel is in fact destroyed, Gazans will just dig more tunnels. So here we have an ongoing race of horror – one side destroys, the other digs,” Mr. Bisharat said.

Making his argument more pointedly, Mr. Bisharat asked, “Who is more dangerous – Hamas in Gaza or the Egyptian army, which was once Israel's bitter enemy? That army currently has thousands of tanks, hundreds of planes, and tens of thousands of missiles. So, to remove a threat, must we now destroy the Egyptian army? Because, according to Ben-Yishai's logic, if not tomorrow, then the day after, an extremist leader will arise in Egypt and press the button, and great tragedy will ensue.”

Mr. Bisharat argued that the 1979 Egyptian-Israeli peace treaty proved its worth because it regulated the two countries’ relations and served their interests.

“More importantly…there's also a universal understanding that countries can live in peace despite the enormous quantities of arms in their possession. If every country were to decide that to ensure its future security, it had to destroy other countries' weaponry, the world would continue drowning in rivers of blood,” Mr. Bisharat noted.

Ukraine is Exhibit A for Mr. Bisharat’s argument.

Credit: The President’s Brief

In addition to a forever war, Mr. Netanyahu risks in Gaza sparking a civil war that could embroil Israeli forces by backing a criminal gang notorious for its looting of the trickle of humanitarian aid trucks Israel allows to enter the Strip.

It would be a war that Hamas would likely win if Israel did not intervene.

Middle East analyst Zvi Bar’el noted that Israeli-backed gangs, like The Popular Forces headed by Yaser Abu Shabab, whose family disowned him and many label a collaborator, “might find (themselves) in violent confrontations with other gangs, organizations, members of the popular committees, large and small families and, of course, with Hamas members. This is usually the stage where a bloody civil war might develop.”

Mr. Bar’el warned further that “Abu Shabab…will need to base his ’legitimacy’ on some national idea, shake off the image of a collaborator, change allegiances, and finally also turn the weapons he received from Israel against it.”

Historian and Le Monde columnist Jean-Pierre Filiu, who witnessed two of Mr. Abu Shabab’s lootings of aid convoys backed by Israeli drones on a visit to Gaza in December and January, and media reports suggested that Mr. Abu Shabab and Hamas were already having a go at each other.

Mr. Filiu said in one of the instances he witnessed, “Hamas…cracked down on the looters – or those it identified as such – leading to a dramatic escalation of inter-Palestinian violence.”

Veteran Middle East correspondent Hamza Hendawi reported that Mr. Abu Shabab’s gang had recently attacked Hamas operatives and their families while Hamas was eliminating gang members and their supporters.

"Hamas is assassinating them in the range of five to seven a day. It's the latest chapter in a history of enmity between Hamas and armed gangs and families opposed to its rule in Gaza,” Mr. Hemdawi quoted a source as saying.

Israel’s backing of gangs belies Mr. Netanyahu’s assertion that Hamas was responsible for the looting, even if it does not exclude the group’s alleged involvement.

This week, Israeli opposition leader Yair Lapid took Mr. Netanyahu to task for publicly acknowledging that Israel was supporting gangs.

In doing so, Mr. Lapid highlighted the degree of support Mr. Netanyahu’s goal of destroying Hamas enjoys, despite much of the Israeli public’s disagreement with his tactics as they affect the hostages.

Mr. Lapid argued that the prime minister should have agreed to a ceasefire and, possibly, an end to the war, which would have led to the release of all the hostages with no intention of honouring it once the captives were free because agreements with terrorists were not binding.

Mr. Lapid asserted that in their heart of hearts, “no one wants” an end to the war because “we want to keep killing Hamas,” but that “sooner or later,” Hamas would create “opportunities” for Israel to renew its assault.

While few would take by his word Mr. Netanyahu, widely perceived as having a troubled relationship with the truth, Mr. Lapid didn’t do Israel any favours by suggesting that Israel’s word in negotiations cannot be taken at face value.

In addition, Mr. Lapid may have committed the same faux pas he accuses Mr. Netanyahu of making.

Casting doubt on Israel’s word risks strengthening Hamas’ insistence on demands Qatari negotiators are trying to convince the group are unrealistic.

Hamas has insisted on a long- rather than a short-term ceasefire and guarantees by the mediators, who include the United States and Egypt alongside Qatar, that Israel will negotiate an end to the war.

“Israel's technological dominance did not spare it the trauma of the October 7, 2023, bloodbath. But even such a shock failed to convince the Israeli military to change its approach in Gaza… The surest way to remove Hamas from the Gaza Strip would have been to support a credible Palestinian alternative – an option categorically rejected by Binyamin Netanyahu,” said Mr. Filiu, the historian.

Dr. James M. Dorsey is an Adjunct Senior Fellow at Nanyang Technological University’s S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies, and the author of the syndicated column and podcast, The Turbulent World with James M. Dorsey.