Financial Times: Israel needs a Gaza strategy more than war

By Efraim Halevy  ( The writer is former head of Mossad, the Israeli intelligence agency)

THE FINANCIAL TIMES   NOVEMBER  18  2012

Almost a week after “Operation Pillar of Defence”, morale is running high in Israel. The public is justifiably proud of the performance of the air force, which has flown more than 1,000 sorties. The air strikes have decapitated much of Hamas’s command level, including the death of Ahmed Jabari, the leader of the Islamist group’s military wing.

Ehud Barak, the Israeli defence minister, singled out the destruction of Iranian-made Fajr-5 missiles as particularly worthy of praise in his first media briefing. The second stage of the operation, now in advanced preparation, entailed cabinet approval to call up about 75,000 reserve soldiers on Friday night. Husbands and fathers hastily left the sabbath night dining tables to join their units.

The public has been given the highest marks for reacting promptly and calmly when warning sirens have announced an impending rocket attack. Iron Dome anti-missile batteries have destroyed many hundreds of rockets in mid-air. Mr Barak has been quoted as saying that “there is no reason to ask for a ceasefire until Hamas comes begging for it on its knees”.

The aims of the operation have been publicly stated: to halt the rocket attacks on Israel entirely; to restore Israel’s deterrence; and to secure a long-term commitment from Hamas that it would respect a ceasefire. But little to nothing has been revealed on how the Israeli leadership hope to secure this result.

When asked publicly if the aim was to uproot Hamas in the Gaza Strip, Avigdor Lieberman, the foreign minister, said this would have to await the “next government”. This allusion to the impending general election scheduled for January 22 was the first shot in a subsequent string of comments focusing on growing support for postponing the poll. The next day Mr Lieberman said that there was no justification for a ground offensive unless Israel was determined to see it through to the very end. Was this one more deception or a bold statement of intent?

A ground operation is often fraught with uncertainties and the experiences of unfinished business in both the Lebanese war of 2006 and the operation in Gaza in 2009 are fresh in peoples’ minds. In the past 48 hours serious voices, such as those of Dan Halutz, the former chief of staff, and Amos Yadlin, the former military intelligence chief, have stressed the need for a quick exit strategy once Israel declares victory.

Herein lies the rub. Hamas, badly beaten but uncowed, is defiant in setting its own terms for a ceasefire: an Israeli commitment to halt targeted assassinations; an end to the blockade on Gaza; and free passage between Gaza and Egypt. These demands are unacceptable to Israel.

All eyes therefore are on Mohamed Morsi, the American-educated Egyptian president. His sympathies lie with Hamas, which is a sister movement of the Muslim Brotherhood, but he is duty bound to preserve his country’s interests, which preclude the free entry of terrorist operatives into Sinai – which is already a hotbed of violent anti-Egyptian activity. On Saturday Turkey’s Recep Tayyip Erdogan, Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa al-Thani, Qatar’s emir, and Khaled Meshal, the Hamas leader, arrived in Cairo in the wake of President Barack Obama’s call on Mr Morsi to take the lead in defusing the tension. Even Saudi Arabia has deferred to Cairo.

There are those in Israel who believe this could be the supreme test of Egypt under Mr Morsi to seize the moment and save the entire region from sliding into chaos.

The situation in the Palestinian Authority is precarious. Mahmoud Abbas and his Fatah movement are pathetically irrelevant. Their foreign minister will be visiting Gaza as a member of an Arab League mission,  a demeaning status indeed. Widespread unrest in Jordan in response to a steep rise in the price of energy products could develop into a national insurrection endangering the monarchy. Such an event would be a big setback for Israel, both politically and security-wise. The weaker Hamas emerges in the Gaza Strip, the stronger the Palestinian Islamic Jihad, the principle Iranian proxy, will become. Elsewhere Iran, the main threat to Israel, has suffered serious setbacks in recent months, primarily in Syria, its strategic ally in the region.

Thus much more is at stake in the current flare up. If it spreads and a ground offensive inevitably produces photo opportunities of dead and wounded, the “street” in all the Arab capitals could erupt and unleash wild consequences, forcing Mr Morsi and others to step back and let the chips fly and land wherever. Regimes and governments can collapse overnight in a second version of the Arab spring. No one can predict the outcome.

Israel must not allow Hamas to feign victory through pictures of rockets flying over Tel Aviv and Jerusalem. Yet it is imperative that Israel contributes to an Egyptian-crafted and American-supported formula for the region. If it doesn’t, it might have to grapple alone with the fallout from the latest escalation in violence. Indeed, Israel will have to do what no government has done before: determine a comprehensive strategy on the future of Gaza and its 2m inhabitants.