Israel Destroying Hamas amid International Fury and Skepticism - Israel Kasnett (JNS)
    In his State of the Union address Thursday, President Joe Biden spent 90 seconds supporting Israel and blaming Hamas for the atrocities it committed on Oct. 7 as well as for the war that followed. "Israel has a right to go after Hamas," Biden said.
    But then he spent 180 seconds focusing on Palestinians "under bombardment" or experiencing "displacement," and the need for a two-state solution.
    He failed to mention the hundreds of thousands of Israelis under bombardment and the tens of thousands who have been displaced as a result of ongoing Hamas and Hizbullah attacks.
    While Israel is under pressure to ensure humanitarian aid delivery to Palestinians, it is plowing forward in its war against Hamas.
    Jacob Olidort, director of research for the Gemunder Center for Defense & Strategy at JINSA, said that skepticism regarding Israel's military operation to eliminate Hamas "ignores the visceral commitment Israel has, in light of the horrors of Oct. 7, not only to eliminate the terrorists and their infrastructure in Gaza, but also to institute long-overdue deradicalization efforts" with regard to both Hamas and the Palestinian Authority.
    Former Israeli National Security Adviser Meir Ben-Shabbat explained that Israel "cannot compromise on achieving the goals it defined for this war in full, since any failure to do so could expose Israel to an existential threat from its enemies."
    "The results of the war are the only thing that can prevent this. The deterrence that crashed on Oct. 7 will not be restored if it can be argued that Israel failed to achieve its goals."
    As for the day after Israel destroys Hamas, Ben-Shabbat said, "The young people of Gaza, who make up half of the population, were born into the reality of Hamas, were educated on its ideas, absorbed it in schools, mosques, squares and through its media. The young terrorists fighting us today are the same children who spent time in Hamas summer camps."
    Contrary to what some in the West believe, Hamas didn't "kidnap the population" but rather won broad political support and backing from Gaza's Palestinian public, he said.
    He emphasized that Israel must ensure that the demilitarization of Gaza and freedom of action for the IDF there are basic conditions in any future reality.

Hizbullah Remains Undeterred despite Endless Skirmishes with IDF - Lior Ben Ari (Ynet News)
    Hizbullah has been vocal about the damage it claims to inflict on Israel daily, despite the extensive destruction its operations have caused in southern Lebanon.
    Hizbullah publicly acknowledges 241 of its members have fallen, while the IDF suggests the actual casualty figure is more than 300.
    The IDF has relentlessly targeted numerous Hizbullah installations, employing aerial strikes from planes and drones as well as artillery, focusing on command posts, military structures, ammunition depots, rocket launch sites, and surveillance outposts.
    Tens of thousands of residents of southern Lebanon have abandoned their villages amid an increasingly dire economic crisis in a country already on the brink.
    A member of the Lebanese Forces party's Central Council, which opposes Hizbullah, recently stated that 520 houses had been completely destroyed and 3,300 had been damaged.

How the Gaza War Impacts the West Bank Economy - Claire Parker (Washington Post)
    Over the years, Palestinian workers formed the backbone of Israel's construction industry and became a reliable source of cheap labor for its booming agriculture and tourism sectors.
    Workers from Gaza and the West Bank could earn in Israel triple the amount they could make in the Palestinian territories, according to the World Bank.
    But after Oct. 7, when Hamas and other militants killed around 1,200 people in Israel, authorities imposed a near-total ban on Palestinians working in Israel or its communities in the West Bank.
    Work permits of more than 170,000 Palestinian laborers were canceled and tens of thousands more who worked in Israel illegally are now also out of jobs.

IDF Ombudswoman Finds Rise in Reservists Clamoring to Be Allowed to Fight - Emanuel Fabian (Times of Israel)
    Brig.-Gen. (res.) Rachel Tevet-Wiesel, the IDF's chief complaints officer, published the unit's annual report on Monday.
    During the first three months of the Gaza war (October-December), most of the 1,316 complaints received were civilians seeking to return to reserve duty after receiving exemptions and reservists asking to be moved to a combat unit.

IDF Medical Teams on Permanent Alert to Evacuate Wounded IDF Soldiers - Anshel Pfeffer (Jewish Chronicle-UK)
    At an Israeli Air Force base, UH-60 Black Hawk helicopters stood ready to carry flight-crews, doctors, paramedics and fighters of Unit 669, the IAF's search-and-rescue unit.
    The squadron's main role during the war has been to fly teams of Unit 669 into Gaza on evacuation missions of wounded IDF soldiers - swooping in low, often under fire, to makeshift landing-areas and ferrying the wounded back to hospitals in Israel, while the doctors and paramedics have only a few minutes to try to stabilize and treat their patients.
    Lt.-Col. O, a veteran pilot, said, "We've learned a lot in a thousand missions we've carried out in this war in Gaza. We measure ourselves by the time that elapses from the moment a soldier is wounded in Gaza."
    "Our average time over the war is an hour and five minutes until the wounded soldier is in hospital. Most missions now are completed within less than an hour from the wound."