(Times of Israel) David Horovitz - We can begin to draw some interim conclusions from the Israel-Hamas war. Hamas fired more rockets, further into Israel, than in the two previous rounds of conflict. It has further battered the traumatized south, where a generation has grown up knowing that it might have to dash for shelter any second. And it has brought Tel Aviv and places even further north into the line of fire. And it's still firing. Its leadership has survived intact, hidden safely away in underground bunkers deep in the heart of Gaza. Most of its thousands of death-cult fighters have survived too. Much of their weaponry is intact. However, Israel can claim significant achievements of its own. The Hamas attack tunnels, a central part of the Hamas strategy, have been largely defanged, for the time being. The Iron Dome rocket defense system has performed miracles. Hundreds of rockets, whose impact could have caused immense loss of life and widespread devastation, were blown out of the sky. Israeli troops killed hundreds of Hamas gunmen, proving capable of overcoming the enemy on its home territory, despite its years of planning and preparation, bomb-planting, tunneling and booby-trapping. And Israel's population showed impressive resilience under rocket fire, and unity behind the IDF and the political leadership.
2014-08-05 00:00:00Full ArticleBACK Visit the Daily Alert Archive