Soccer Dad

Insufficient other means

When I saw the title of a recent article in the NY Times, Israelis Don’t Want Gaza to Be Their Next Lebanon, I was thinking, sure, no one wants a terror organization to build an arsenal and threaten his territory. This must be about the political pressure to strike at Hamas and not allow it the freedom to build its threat against southern Israel.

Well, this was the NY Times, so I guess I shouldn't have been surprised, it was not the focus of the article.

The Israeli government is feeling constrained by its own weakness and damaged credibility. If it goes into Gaza too hard, it will be criticized for trying to overcompensate for its failures last summer against Hezbollah. If it acts with too much restraint and caution, it will be criticized for being intimidated by its failures last summer against Hezbollah.

“We don’t want to invade Gaza in a big way,” a senior official said. “But stalemate is impossible. We hope that a political process will prevail because we don’t want to be dragged into what Hamas wants us to be dragged into. But events will dictate. If a Qassam rocket lands on an Israeli kindergarten, all bets are off.”

. . .

But trying to calibrate the amount of military pressure that might persuade Hamas and the Palestinians to stop the rocket fire and recreate a working cease-fire over Gaza is not an easy calculation.

Military pressure? That's precisely the problem. Instead of trying to win the war and eliminate the threat, Israel's really approaching war as "a continuation of politics by other means. Instead of trying to defeat the enemy Israel's trying to discourage the enemy and remain popular doing it.

The idea that killing the leaders of Hamas is a "harsher measure" shows a distinctly political approach to war. The leaders of Hamas (even the so-called "political wing") are the enemy. They deserve no immunity. They are organizers. Eliminating them, will help reduce the threat. (The same argument can be made for Fatah too. But I'm not even pretending that anyone considers Fatah "militant" anymore.)

Erlanger even pointed to the limitations of this approach in Lebanon: Graveyard of Israeli politicians

It was Barak who suddenly pulled out of Lebanon in 2000 to concentrate - in vain - on efforts to make peace first with Syria and then with the Palestinians. But his was a unilateral act, and neither he nor his successors reinforced it with the retaliation he had promised Hezbollah if it violated the border.

Well yes, if you stop harassing your enemy and allow him to rebuild you are asking for trouble. (With Erlanger the fact that the withdrawal from Lebanon - and Gaza for that matter - was unilateral is part of the problem. As if the bilateral Oslo Accords and subsequent retreats made Fatah lay down arms.) One would hope that Israel has learned this painful fact from last summer's wars.

UPDATE: The problem underlying Erlanger's report and Israel's political leadership is that there seems to be a hesitation whether Israel ought to be defending itself. And it's a pervasive impression. Consider a recent editorial in the Baltimore Sun, Fighting in Lebanon

The government of Prime Minister Fouad Siniora is asserting itself - as it must to protect this fledgling democracy.

...

The fighting outside the refugee camp underscores why the policy must change. The Siniora government, already embroiled in a political fight with elected representatives of Hezbollah, can't afford a second prolonged conflict. It must defeat the insurgents before the violence spreads.

For the Baltimore it is self evident that Lebanon must defend itself, apparently regardless of cost. But as I noted recently in a letter to the editor that same presumption (that it has the right to defend itself) does not apply to Israel.

Israel, hamas, gaza, lebanon.