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The Only Obstacle to an Israeli Military Victory in Gaza Is Washington
(Tablet) Maj. (ret.) Andrew Fox - Over the past several months, there has been a steady supply of analysis claiming that Israel is not winning. Hamas remains intact. The Israeli government has no plan. The very notion of a military victory is illusory. This tracks precisely with the talking points of the Biden administration which has been trying to bend Israel's operation against Hamas to fit its own failed paradigms. The main focus of IDF ground-holding operations are the tunnels to Egypt along the Philadelphi Corridor in Rafah, while IDF maneuver brigades strike Hamas wherever they coalesce. This is not a counterinsurgency operation. It is a conventional urban war against an irregular but fully formed terror army, with their own underground citadel. Yet many Western analysts are incapable of seeing the conflict through anything but the lens of post-9/11 operations. The refrain is that Israel should be doing what the West tried and failed to do in Iraq and Afghanistan. In other words, Israel needs to make sure it follows our lead and lose. But the IDF's way of war is not the West's way of war. It is not designed to carry out protracted campaigns of attrition. It is a raiding army. Phase A was defense against Hamas's incursion on Oct. 7, airstrikes, and evacuation of Gaza's civilian population from combat zones. Phases B1 and B2 were the Gaza City break-in, Hamas's center of gravity and power base. Phase B3 was the first cease-fire and hostage return. Phases B4 and B5 saw continued operations in Khan Yunis and northern Gaza, focusing on Hamas's central battalions, and undertaking the Rafah operation to seize and clear the Philadelphi Corridor of Hamas tunnels. Phase C will continue to dismantle Hamas's administrative and military capabilities through intelligence-led raids. Phase D will be to stabilize an alternative governance structure and maintain IDF freedom of operation within Gaza. In the second Shifa hospital raid in March - a masterpiece of operational design - the IDF was on the objective within 15 minutes of the start of the mission. It killed 200 members of Hamas and captured 600 more. The IDF applied both pressure and deception to encourage Hamas and Islamic Jihad fighters to go back into the hospital, thinking it was safe. During a visit to Israel last month, the IDF Southern Command showed me designs for the whole Gaza operation. It is truly impressive: Hamas defensive positions were oriented from west to east, and the IDF operational plan outflanked them by coming in from the north, along the coast, and then turning east to hit Hamas from behind. In military terms, Hamas was completely dislocated. Operations are severely hampered by the IDF's remarkable efforts at civilian protection. The IDF has moved hundreds of thousands of people out of harm's way, and it has sacrificed surprise to ensure civilians are protected. Of course Hamas fighters have moved to humanitarian zones along with the civilians. It is unquestionable that the IDF's extraordinary efforts to protect civilians have made the war far more difficult to fight. The constant disruption and interference by a U.S. administration seeking a quick end to the operation have prolonged both the war and the suffering of the people of Gaza. Washington's unrelenting campaign to force a ceasefire is so pernicious because it attempts to ensure Hamas will survive and have a vote in the outcome of the war. The IDF is only midway through a gargantuan task. The job is far from finished, but it is making progress. The only thing that can snatch defeat from the jaws of victory, and ensure the survival of the Iranian-backed Palestinian terrorist group on Israel's border, is Washington. The writer, who served in the British Army from 2005-21, is a research fellow at the Henry Jackson Society and a lecturer at the Royal Military Academy Sandhurst.