Around and Around on Israel, Hamas, Gaza
I have been loosely affiliated with Indivisible Oregon since May 2018 when I checked out the Resist Trump Tuesday meeting with staff from Senator Jeff Merkley’s Portland office after spotting an announcement about the event while looking for ways to become more active in resistance to the Trump regime. The group continues to meet with staff from Senator Wyden’s and Congressman Blumenauer’s Portland offices on the first Tuesday of each month and with Senator Merkley’s staff on the third Tuesday to share group and individual concerns with our elected representatives. In the early days focus was on the Mueller investigation, the Kavanaugh nomination, gun violence, and immigration policy.
My account from that day indicates that attendance was in the range of thirty-five to forty. Several members of the group introduced themselves to ask if I had attended before and how I found out about it. One little old lady with a Tablet asked if I would like to be on their email list. I said yes, and she signed me up.
Indivisible organized volunteers to get out the vote for the 2018 midterm elections and after that for 2020 by phone banking, canvassing door to door, and collaborating with Vote Forward on letter-writing campaigns. My participation was modest. In the early days I volunteered to do data entry of contact information provided by people who signed up for the email list when they attended various events. I did some letter writing, contributed to the body count on Indivisible Tuesdays, and showed up for demonstrations, marches, and other events, which Indivisible organizers were scrupulous about ensuring were peaceful. Many others did far more than I, tirelessly knocking on doors and making phone calls to encourage people to vote for candidates who share our values, intent on doing whatever they could that might make a difference.
In the weeks and months following October 7, 2023, the Indivisible Tuesday meetings with congressional staff came to be more and more dominated by people wearing keffiyehs and carrying signs to express solidarity with Palestine and demand an immediate, unconditional ceasefire. Their views are deeply felt, their comments emotional, their voices sometimes shrill. I share feelings of outrage, anguish, and helplessness that I heard expressed, but am convinced that the situation is more complex than many seem to think.
At the beginning people who spoke up when it came their turn felt obliged to acknowledge the Hamas attack before launching into lengthy condemnation of Israel’s response and issuing the call for an immediate, unconditional ceasefire. It’s not complicated, one speaker insisted. The criticism of Hamas had something of a pro forma feel to it, and even that soon passed away. Not once in the months since October 7, 2023, did I hear anyone address Hamas’s commitment to establishment of a Palestinian state from the river to the sea and to the use of violence as a means to achieve that goal. This commitment does not justify Israel’s savage response to October 7, but it is part of the problem. The problem of Hamas must be grappled with if we are serious about the human rights of Palestinians, the security of Israel, and where to go from here.
Invective directed at President Biden and others who do not take a sufficiently hard line against Israel has grown more disturbing. Accusations of genocide and complicity in genocide are leveled recklessly. There are rumblings that lay groundwork for opposition to Biden in the November election.
From the outset Biden and Blinken acted on the premise that they can best exert influence on Netanyahu by publicly supporting Israel while pressing for restraint and decency in private. Netanyahu has taken this as a green light to act with impunity. The administration is now more public with criticism and exerting pressure openly but remains too ready to accept Israeli assurances about steps taken to minimize civilian casualties and provide humanitarian aid. In Biden’s defense, the situation is a stark demonstration of the limits on America’s capacity to influence Israel’s actions.
Many of the contingent who sport keffiyehs and carry signs with the slogan “From the River to the Sea” are new to Indivisible. Some identify themselves as Jews outraged by Israel’s actions in Gaza. It is not clear whether they intend to work with Indivisible more broadly on other issues, the most pressing being the defeat of Donald Trump in November, or if they are simply using the group as a vehicle for their cause. Representatives from Indivisible’s leadership try to strike a balanced response that takes into account the horrific attack on October 7, Israel’s right to defend itself, and the merciless assault on Gaza. They have not made much impression on the pro-Palestinian protesters.
My sense is that many who were active in Indivisible prior to October 7 are as critical of Israel as I am, which extends to treatment of Palestinians that has been Israeli policy for decades. They support calls for an immediate, unconditional ceasefire, but may also be uncomfortable with accusations of genocide directed at anyone and everyone who fails to fail in line with protester rhetoric on the issue, the absence of concern about October 7, and indifference to Jews who are as deeply traumatized by what happened on that day as people of Palestinian heritage are by what is happening in Gaza.
As for me, I decided to step away from the group for a time following the meeting with staff from Senator Wyden’s office on April 2, where Biden and Wyden were both accused of genocide or “complicity in genocide.” I have spoken briefly on several occasions since October 7 to urge recognition that Hamas is part of the problem and suggest that the situation really is more complicated than some appear to think. My remarks were heard but I believe not really listened to. They received no pushback. Nor did they generate further discussion or appear to have any impact on those protesting furiously on behalf of what they see as the Palestinian cause.
Perhaps it is wrong to step away instead of showing up to express a dissenting view. That might be appreciated by some, but there is no reason to think that dissent would register with those most ardently “pro-Palestinian,” another term that could do with more thoughtful examination. I fear that sooner or later frustration would lead to me to say something I would wish afterward that I had not said. This is where it stands for now.
The Bulwark was founded in 2019 by Sarah Longwell, Charlie Sykes, and Bill Kristol “to provide analysis and reporting in defense of America’s liberal democracy.” The founders and early contributors who drew me to the website were a bunch of earnest, cranky, opinionated, Never Trump, mostly former Republicans with whom I found myself in agreement on some points and able to respectfully disagree on others. I have cited Bulwark contributors frequently in this space.
The Bulwark consensus is fiercely pro-Israel. Acknowledgement of the deaths of innocent Palestinians and Israeli “mistakes (like the inadvertent killing of civilians) and errors in judgment (like restricting aid)” (Last, Hamas, Israel) is made in passing before getting to the point that Hamas is to blame for everything because Israel is defending itself against what Jonathan V. Last labels a death cult and anyway this is what happens in war. Last and Will Selber advocate, in Selber’s words, “total war to destroy Hamas’s offensive capabilities and end its rule in Gaza” (What to Expect).
In the coming weeks, we are likely to get more humanitarian crises and dead innocents. Israel will face more condemnation from the West and worse relations with the rest of the Middle East, but even these terrible costs must be paid. (Last)
Last posits three imperatives for Israel going forward: the complete elimination of Hamas, the return to normalization talks with Saudi Arabia, and rebuilding Gaza “because its long-term security requires a functioning independent state on the strip…Israel’s best chance for reaching an equilibrium point is a prosperous, democratic Palestinian state.” Elsewhere in the column he specifies necessity for “the creation of a sovereign Palestinian state in Gaza and the West Bank.” It does not appear to occur to him to consider whether the complete elimination of Hamas is possible or how occupants of illegal Israeli settlements in East Jerusalem and the West Bank might react to any suggestion that their options are to live in a Palestinian state or return to Israel.
Last insists that in all of this he is speaking on the level of strategy, the elimination of Hamas, not tactics, “not ‘Netanyahu should have done X better.’” At the same time he appears ready to accept any tactic that Israel adopts to achieve the strategic goal to eliminate Hamas.
The Economist is a weekly British magazine with a conservative, pro-business editorial slant and excellent news coverage. I read it regularly some years back when I subscribed briefly through an introductory offer. After a time I let the subscription lapse in the interest of keeping subscriptions at a manageable level (at present, The New York Review of Books, The Atlantic, and Harper’s).
An Economist article published on April 11 (The IDF is accused of military and moral failures in Gaza) provides a detailed critique of Israel’s handling of the war that is in no way soft on Hamas and terrorism or naïve about the position in which Israel finds itself. A stark subtitle summarizes the theme: “Its generals botched the strategy, and discipline among troops has broken down.” Policy analysts in Israel and retired military officers are cited in support of this conclusion.
The article opens with this blunt assessment:
Israel had the sympathy and broad support of much of the West when it sent its army to war with Hamas. Half a year later, much of Gaza lies in ruins. Over 33,000 Palestinians have been killed, according to the Gazan health ministry. The uprooted civilian population faces famine. Israel has lost the battle for global public opinion. Even its closest allies, including America, are considering whether to limit arms shipments.
The Israeli Defense Forces (IDF), “the most cherished institution in Israeli society…is now accused of two catastrophic failures. First, that it has not achieved its military objectives in Gaza. Second, that it has acted immorally and broken the laws of war.”
Primary blame for the failure in strategy is laid on Israel’s politicians, especially Netanyahu, “who have refused to countenance any alternative Palestinian force taking control of Gaza. But responsibility also rests with the generals and their understanding of how success there should be measured.”
Criticism of the decision to start the war with a massive assault on Gaza City is growing. After October 7th, the IDF’s senior commanders were “motivated by deep feelings of guilt and humiliation”, says Reuven Gal, a fellow at the Samuel Neaman Institute, a policy research centre in Israel, and retired colonel. He was a young infantry officer in the Six Day War and went on to become the army’s chief psychologist. “Instead of stopping this time to think and plan, [the army] went in fast and hard, to restore lost pride.”
Retired Major-General Noam Tibon
believes his former colleagues were “under the illusion that going first into Gaza City would break Hamas psychologically, by taking their symbols of government”. But, he argues, “all the talk of dismantling their brigades and battalions is rubbish. They remain a fundamentalist movement which doesn’t need commanders to fight until death.”
Complete elimination of Hamas is an illusory objective used by Netanyahu to gin up support for his campaign of devastation. Suppose for the moment, for the sake of argument, we imagine that Hamas can for all practical purposes be eliminated. Next try to imagine the children of Gaza who live through the devastation, the wreckage and ruin of the life they once knew, which in Gaza was not so great to begin with, the deaths of family, loved ones, friends. Is it possible to imagine that they will hold Hamas responsible for all this, as Last and Selber hold Hamas responsible? Far from eliminating Hamas, Israel is cultivating the next generation of recruits for Hamas, Islamic Jihad, or some other group more convinced than ever that violent resistance is the only option they have.
The article takes apart the fiction that Israel tries to minimize civilian casualties. The best that can be said in Israel’s defense is that at the upper levels of its government and military command there is supreme indifference to civilian casualties. Any number of civilian deaths are brushed off if that is what it takes to kill a single Hamas leader. Families are fair game.
The IDF’s second failure is the way in which the army has prosecuted this war, specifically the high levels of destruction and civilian deaths. (The IDF disputes the Hamas-run health ministry’s death toll, saying that many of the dead are militants, but the number of civilians killed is undoubtedly extremely high.) This is down to two main factors: first, operational directives that allow strikes even when the likelihood of killing civilians is significant; and second, a lack of discipline within the IDF in adhering even to those rules.
…
The lack of enforcement of even these looser rules of engagement has been such that accusations that Israel has broken the laws of war are plausible. “The standing orders don’t matter in the field,” says one veteran reserve officer who has mostly been in Gaza since October. “Just about any battalion commander can decide that whoever moves in his sector is a terrorist or that buildings should be destroyed because they could have been used by Hamas.” “The only limit to the number of buildings we blew up was the time we had inside Gaza,” says one sapper in a combat-engineering battalion. “If you find a Kalashnikov or even Hamas literature in an apartment, it’s enough to incriminate the building.”
Finally, there is the humanitarian crisis brought about by wholesale destruction of medical facilities and restrictions on food and medical supplies that are not yet flowing freely.
The IDF’s third failure is its role in Israel’s obstruction—until an angry phone call between President Joe Biden and Mr Netanyahu on April 4th—of aid efforts to Gazans. Officers have mainly blamed the politicians for this. But some acknowledge that even without a political directive, the army, which is arguably an occupying force in Gaza now, should have assumed this responsibility from the planning stage. Instead it acted only when the humanitarian situation became critical.
Major-General Tibon’s fiercest criticism is reserved for Mr Netanyahu: “[He] has been running this war to serve his political interests—keeping his nationalist base happy and preventing his far-right extremist parties from leaving his government.” Serving generals share this view.
Where does any of this get us? What can be done to support Israelis and Palestinians who want to find a way to live decent lives together in peace? The Netanyahu government and Hamas are both impediments to any progress in this regard. The corrupt and unpopular Palestinian Authority is no better. It is hard to imagine any Israeli government anytime soon undertaking to rebuild Gaza, even after Netanyahu is deposed. The usual suspects in Congress can be counted on to oppose funding for any such effort. Even with adequate funding, a hypothetical premise, rebuilding Gaza will be along and arduous undertaking.
As usual I have many, maybe only, questions. Is anyone with expertise in the region working to identify and support groups in Israel, Gaza, and the West Bank who can work together to begin digging out of the mess? Is there any strategy for dealing with Hamas other than pipe dreams about complete elimination? What about the illegal settlements in East Jerusalem and the West Bank? Reports that Jewish extremists are already eying choice plots of land on the Gaza coast?
Meanwhile in this country protesters show their commitment to the Palestinian cause, however they might identify that, by blocking traffic on highways and organizing campaigns to show dissatisfaction with administration policy by voting “uncommitted” in Democratic primaries. From there it is a short step to rationalizing a vote for a third-party candidate in November. The options there are Jr. Kennedy, Jill Stein, and Cornel West. For the record, I would not want to see any of them in the White House.
Biden’s political situation is complicated by the instinctive affinity with and support for Israel felt by many Americans, and not just Republicans. Some are concerned that he goes too far with criticism of Netanyahu and calls for restraint. No matter what he does, he is likely to antagonize voters whose support he will need.
With that it is time to break away before I rattle on interminably.
Keep the faith. Stand with Ukraine. yr obdt svt
References and Related Reading
Doctrine of Hamas, Wilson Center, October 20, 2023
Hamas: A Document of General Principles & Policies, Center for Israel Education, May 2017
The IDF is accused of military and moral failures in Gaza, The Economist, April 11, 2024
Jonathan V. Last, Hamas, Israel, and the Brutal Logic of War, The Bulwark, April 9, 2024
Will Selber, What to Expect from an Israeli Offensive in Rafah, The Bulwark, March 28, 2024