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Israel's War Against Hamas

(UnHerd) Prof. Edward Luttwak - Hamas knows from previous experience that the closer the range, the greater the qualitative gap between their men and first-line Israeli infantry. Even in Hamas' hyper-successful surprise raids, that took full advantage of Israel's over-confident reliance on high-tech observation towers and absurdly few troops, they lost more than a thousand to civilian home guards and a handful of soldiers. Both the Israeli Army and the Israel Security Agency have units of skilled individual fighters who speak perfect Palestinian-accented Arabic and who can look the part. With all the confusion caused by the bombing, they have been able to walk into Gaza to blend in and look for Hamas leaders. So far, the names and photos of 28 Hamas commanders and political chiefs successfully found and killed have been published - and the mini-campaign is continuing. Hizbullah leader Hassan Nasrallah and his Iranian paymasters keep calling for Israel's destruction, but thus far, Hizbullah hasn't unleashed its rocket barrage. He may be deterred from action by the vulnerability of his Shia supporters in southern Lebanon to Israel's artillery and airpower. During the Israel-Hizbullah war in 2006, Shia southern Beirut was left in ruins along with Hizbullah headquarters and barracks - and dozens of Shia villages. Israel's bombing capacity has tripled since 2006. There is also the large question of asking Shia to sacrifice their homes for ultra-Sunni Hamas that views them as heretics deserving of death. The writer is a contractual strategic consultant for the U.S. government.
2023-10-29 00:00:00
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