By Brett Daniel Shehadey
Special Contributor for In Homeland Security
The communication between Israel and Hamas, using airstrikes and rockets, may be over, for the time being.
This morning, a 72-hour humanitarian cease-fire has been put into place and peace with longer-term peace talks mediated by Egypt and agreed to by both sides. Israel withdraws troops from Gaza.
Hamas seemed eager for a truce; especially since the conditions of the Egypt-backed proposal were reported as almost identical to the previous offer of a truce they rejected early on in the conflict. At the time, I believe they used the words like, ‘It was not worth the paper it was written on,” and things like, ‘We’ll fight forever,’ and so on.
Not anymore. Hamas sings a different tune as they face the reality of a broken Gaza—a reality they helped come to life by kidnappings, rocket fire and using “human shields.”
The true Israeli objectives appear to have been met: destroy priority Hamas leadership, tunnels, arms and deal crippling blow to infrastructure.
The conflict is not really over. Instead, Israel successfully demonstrated that it is over because Israel says it is over. The last few salvos of rockets and airstrikes were the final word.
“We will continue to maintain defensive positions from the air, the coast and the ground outside the Gaza Strip,” said Lt. Colonel Peter Lerner, of the Israeli military. “It all depends on what happens.”
Operation Protective Edge was orchestrated as an ‘opportunity operation.’ The threat of active rocket fire from Hamas maneuvered into a massive anti-Hamas campaign. But they were never stopped, which was the official stated priority.
In total, Hamas is reported to have launched more than 3,300 rockets that targeted civilians, not including an apparent attempt to kidnap or kill Israelis through underground access tunnels. Israel also incurred the barrage of constant sirens, alerts and shelter seeking. Thankfully, Hamas proved nearly incapable of causing casualties to targeted civilians thanks to the Iron Dome and the advanced intelligence and warning of the Israel security establishment [and the U.S. government]. Total casualties for Israel were set at 64 soldiers (almost all resulting from the ground offensive into enemy territory) and two civilians.
But the great cost was displacing what the U.N. reported as almost half a million Palestinians in the Gaza Strip who are in need of emergency supplies. The total casualties are often reported as: 1,100-1,900 killed, mostly women and children. But this too is greatly disputed. After all, If Israel killed 900 enemy combatants (as they officially state), than the 70-80 percent of Palestinian reportedly killed in the conflict as civilians could not be true.
There were a few controversial highlights like the strike on the school, for example. At the same time, so much destruction, damage and a mass exodus of hundreds of thousands of people (whatever the real number) really calls in to question the overuse of force as a weak practice of Israeli political weaponry.
Israel never did complete the ultimate objective of returning “quiet” in Israel. In other words, they did not “silence” their enemy. Israel’s inability to stop the rocket fire allowed Hamas to maintain the appearance of the struggling Muslim victim throughout the Islamic world and garner stronger solidarity against Israel in a re-focus, away from the Islamic State and Syria and Iraq.
Whatever operational victories Israel gained, and they were not small, are however ultimately minuscule to the negative, compounding, attention and political opposition they did receive and will receive for months, years and decades to come.
Nevertheless, by ending the Operation sooner rather than later, in spite of the main stated objective not being met, Israel avoids cause for a mass immigration of emboldened international jihadists, while still remaining flexible with an option to re-engage Hamas in Gaza if necessary.
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