Deep in the Camp of Pariahs, Israelis Continue to Pay a Tremendous Price for a War With No End in Sight - Israel News - Haaretz.com
In May 2004, exactly 20 years ago this week, the Israel Defense Forces began its initial preparation for implementing the disengagement plan announced by then-Prime Minister Ariel Sharon about three months earlier.
A difficult series of incidents, in which 13 IDF soldiers were killed within a few days, spurred the change in Israeli public opinion in favor of withdrawal from the Gaza Strip, although it took place only more than a year later. In an operation in the Zeitoun neighborhood in southern Gaza, six Givati Brigade soldiers were killed when their armored personnel carrier hit an explosive device.
A day later five Engineering Corps soldiers, from a new tunnels unit team that was formed in the Gaza Division, were killed in a similar explosion of an outdated APC in the Philadelphi Corridor, opposite Rafah. Two other Givati soldiers were killed that same week when their force was protecting searches at Philadelphi for the bodies of the dead.
The funeral of Master Sgt. (Res.) Kalkidan Mehari, who was killed in combat in Gaza.Credit: Tomer Appelbaum
According to eyewitnesses, the two vehicles, which hit particularly large explosive devices, simply evaporated. In order to bring back at least some remains for a Jewish burial, the army sent hundreds of soldiers to scour the ground at Philadelphi, at the scene of the second accident. An especially memorable picture was publicized, in which fighters are seen kneeling on the sandy ground in a search for remains. The picture was etched in public memory for many years to come, emphasizing the tragedy and hopelessness of the endless conflict with the Palestinians in Gaza. Sharon leveraged this sentiment into support for his plan for a unilateral exit, without a treaty.
The four soldiers from the Nahal Brigade who were killed last Friday by an explosive device in the same Zeitoun weren't born yet when the two APC accidents took place. Each of the four was 19 years old at the time of his death, meaning they were born in the months following the incidents. The social media publicized a screen saver of the WhatsApp correspondence of one of the dead, Sgt. Daniel Levy of Kiryat Motzkin, a few days before his death.
Levy, a fan of the Hapoel Tel Aviv soccer club, which was still fighting against being dropped from the Premier League, was looking for a ticket to a team game, but he wasn't sure he would be able to attend. "I still don't know what's happening with me," he wrote. "If I don't answer you by Friday afternoon, then you'll know that I'm in Gaza, bro."
Soldiers doing compulsory service, many of them combat soldiers, are part of the hard core of fans of Israeli soccer and basketball teams. There's no club in the premier leagues in which fans don't hold onto such correspondence with soldiers who have since been killed. There are no bleachers without an independent memorial ceremony, every week, for the fallen – in Gaza, in the north, at the Nova music festival, in the Gaza border communities.
A photo in memorian of 19-year-old Sgt. Daniel Levy, who died in combat in Gaza, in Bloomfield Stadium on Saturday.Credit: Shaul Greenfield
Along with Daniel Levy, three fighters from the 931st Battalion were killed: his close friend since childhood, Sgt. Yosef Dassa of Kiryat Bialik, Sgt. Ermiyas Mekuriyaw of Be'er Sheva and Sgt. Itay Livny of Ramat Hasharon. The next day another soldier from the brigade, Sgt. Ariel Tsym, a 20-year-old from Modi'in, was killed in an exchange of fire in the area.
Thirteen years ago I followed a company of new recruits from the same brigade for a year, in order to write a book about the IDF and Israeli society. It was a relatively quiet period, in Israeli terms, and the fighters were prepared and trained for a war that their commanders doubted would ever arrive.
But towards the end of their service, in 2014, Operation Protective Edge began and the Nahal soldiers found themselves in the Gaza Strip, blowing up Hamas assault tunnels near the Israeli border. One of the company soldiers, Staff Sgt. Avi Greenzweig of Petah Tikva, was killed in a battle in the town of Beit Hanoun when he ran to rescue the wounded; Greenzweig and other soldiers from the company received medals for their courage in that battle.
Here and there I still come across former members of that company, today reservists, at the various fronts. One of the platoon commanders, Naor Boublil, remained in the standing army. On the morning of October 7, after the commander of the Southern Brigade in the Gaza Strip, Col. Asaf Hamami, was killed in the attack and his deputy was wounded, Boublil was summoned to replace the deputy brigade commander; since then he has fought continuously. Now he's on the outskirts of Rafah, as the commander of the patrol battalion of the Nahal Brigade, another replacement that was advanced after the death of the previous brigade commander, Yehonatan (Barnash) Tzur, who was also killed in the battles on the Gaza border in the first day of the war.
Israel continues to pay a tremendous price in the lives of civilians and soldiers, the dead and the hostages, for continuing the war against Hamas. On the Lebanese border, where the situation is relatively static and the IDF is on the defensive, Hezbollah occasionally succeeds in causing casualties. Last week three soldiers were killed by drone attacks; at the end of last week there were huge fires in Kiryat Shmona and its environs, after a particularly heavy rocket barrage.
That's how a war of attrition looks, one of the longest Israel has ever known, without any foreseeable conclusion. It's already almost superfluous to mention Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's promises of total victory. The real situation is clear to any thinking person.
Preperations for the torch-lighting ceremony which marks the end of Memorial Day and the beginning of Independence Day, last week.Credit: IDF Spokespersons' Unit
We can continue to see the war as part of struggle of the generations, although Netanyahu's desire to manage it for a long time and refrain from any diplomatic agreement on the day after is clear. On the other hand, there's no reason to accept the preaching of the self-appointed political hacks who explain to us that on Independence Day this year we must be happy, as the song goes.
This is the saddest and most difficult year in Israel's history. We're allowed to mourn and we should demand a change. Netanyahu, who reads the public opinion surveys, is lowering his profile at the official ceremonies this year for fear of public humiliation. But for almost a decade already he had been preoccupied with appropriating these ceremonies for his personal benefit, as is evident this year, too, in the deviousness of Transportation Minister Miri Regev, whom he appointed to be in charge of the Independence Day ceremonies.
Father of hostage Hersh Goldberg-Polin in a demonstration in Jerusalem, on Saturday.Credit: Naama Grynbaum
Dead end
Negotiations over a hostage deal are again deadlocked after another round of talks in Cairo collapsed. There remains a chance that Israel will send another delegation to the talks in the next few days, but expectations are not high.
First, Hamas' leader in Gaza, Yahya Sinwar, sees the predicament that Israel is in with the United States and the melting away of the Israel Defense Forces' achievements in the fighting, and is toughening his demands.
Second, Netanyahu will find it difficult to show flexibility in future talks in the face of the opposition of his partners on the extreme right. At the security cabinet meeting last week, the far-right ministers demanded a vote prohibiting the resumption of talks. Their position was rejected, but Netanyahu's room for maneuver seems small, despite the hopes and despair of the families of the captives.
In the meantime, Netanyahu has put his trust in the Rafah operation. In practice, it remains smaller and more limited than how he presents it to the public. So far, the IDF is operating only on the eastern edges of Rafah, the eastern third of the Philadelphi Corridor on the border with Egypt, and the Rafah crossing. The danger, as always, is that the continued fighting will drag the army into pushing its forward positions further in order to defend its line.
At the same time, brigade-level raids have been renewed on Zeitoun and Jabalya refugee camp, areas in the northern Gaza Strip that the IDF had cleared a few months ago. Dozens of Hamas fighters who had returned to retake control of the area after the Israeli withdrawal have been killed in these battles. The army had planned from the start to stage periodic raids on the assumption that it would not be able to expel the organization unless it held onto the areas permanently, or an alternative to Hamas took over.
Now things are presented as supposedly good news in order to fend off criticism and the questions being asked by the public. Yet something serious could happen here: In the absence of an alternative, and without a conscious policy decision, Israel could gradually establish a military government in the Strip. This would be another year-long disaster, greatly complicating the situation, saddling it with huge costs and demanding increased attention at the cost of other strategic problems, such as the confrontation with Iran.
Benjamin Netanyahu, next to President Herzog and MK Amir Ohana at a Holocaust memorial ceremony, last week.Credit: Olivier Fitoussi
Over the weekend, senior officers indicated that if Netanyahu had not insisted on refusing any discussions with the Americans on alternatives to Hamas rule, there might not have been a need for the repeated raids. The right was furious: The cabinet, they recalled, had ordered the IDF to eliminate Hamas rule. If the army is not up to the task, then it is time to fire Chief of Staff Herzl Halevi.
As is usually the case, the contention was at best an exaggeration. After all, it was already reported in December that Netanyahu's stubborn refusal to discuss the day after was endangering the IDF's achievements.
Question marks concerning Netanyahu's policies are currently affecting support for the continued moves of the IDF. Parents of the soldiers now participating in the Rafah operation and the raids on Zeitoun and Jabalya are showing growing concern. In addition to regular units, these operations have also required a limited call-up of reserve units. Parents have begun organizing petition drives against continuing the war and are demanding a hostage deal soon, even if the chances of reaching one are not certain.
For the time being, there are no reports of soldiers publicly refusing to serve. The prolongation of the war, amid growing doubts about the policy and the considerations that guide it, may bring us there, alongside the phenomenon of "gray [undeclared] refusal to serve."
The IDF's slow progress in Rafah is connected with U.S. opposition. President Joe Biden only stopped a single delivery of a few thousand bombs to the Israel Air Force, but in doing so sent a clear message against a wide-ranging Israeli assault on the city. Netanyahu expressed shock about the U.S. decision, but it was obvious already quite some time ago; the prime minister had deliberately turned a blind eye.
On the ground, meanwhile, he is acting cautiously. The trouble is that it is difficult to predict how he will behave from now on. The old Netanyahu would not have dared to directly confront a U.S. president in a way that risked the delivery of essential arms in a war that could still escalate into an all-out confrontation with Hezbollah.
But how the 2024 model Netanyahu will act is hard to guess. In the past he confronted President Barack Obama, but this time he has gone one step further in terms of hostility and consequences.
Channel 12 News reported over the weekend that the prime minister was reprimanded by National Unity Party ministers who demanded that he set a deadline for the return of the residents along the northern border to their homes.
"Don't make an issue of it," Netanyahu responded. The security cabinet ministers have been surprised to hear Netanyahu recently give emotional speeches in which he embraced role models from the past (Ze'ev Jabotinsky and his father, Prof. Benzion Netanyahu) and promised to continue to fight Hamas tooth and nail, if necessary.
The crisis with the U.S. is more serious than it has been portrayed, and does not just involve Biden's efforts to win reelection and curry favor with voters from the progressive wing of the Democratic Party. The administration is groping its way in the Middle East in the wake of Iran's blatant act of defiance in the unprecedented April 14 missile and drone attack on Israel and its efforts to reach an agreement with Saudi Arabia.
In the background lurks a dual danger from the international courts in The Hague – not only the possibility that they will issue arrest warrants against senior Israeli officials, but also an order for Israel to stop the fighting.
This constitutes danger whose importance is hard to minimize. It may be that as early as this week South Africa will submit another request for the cessation of hostilities to the International Court of Justice in The Hague, and that it will later also be brought to the United Nations Security Council for a debate on the imposition of international sanctions. Thus, a situation may be created in which Israel is forced to end the fighting without succeeding in reaching a hostage deal.
Benny Gantz at a press conference, last week.Credit: Oren Ben Hakoon
The Rafah operation complicates the situation. Israel had succeeded in slowing the moves against it after it increased the amount of humanitarian aid entering Gaza to as many as 350 trucks a day. But after the idiotic incident in which soldiers waved Israeli flags at the Rafah crossing, the Egyptians began to delay the entry of trucks into the Strip. The decrease in humanitarian aid may lead to increased criticism of Israel and accelerate court proceedings; on Sunday, Egypt joined the South African petition to the ICJ.
The stalemate on the hostage issue, like the general paralysis in Israeli policy, is fueling calls from the outside for National Unity to withdraw from the coalition. Benny Gantz, who has been delaying an exit for a long time, apparently understands that the party is approaching a dead end.
Over the weekend Gantz hinted that he was headed for a showdown with Netanyahu over the latter's plan to soon enact his conscription-evasion law. In doing so, Gantz is coming closer to the position of Gadi Eisenkot, who has focused his criticism on the conduct of the war and the lack of progress on the hostage issue.
After repeated postponements, an escalation between Likud and National Unity should begin sometime after Independence Day. The bill, whose purpose is to create a blanket exemption from conscription for the ultra-Orthodox for many years to come, will be the straw that finally breaks the camel's back. It's happening slowly and too late, but the party is exiting the coalition.
Erasing October 7
Retired General Mark Milley served until about a year ago as the chairman of the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff. It was a difficult, charged term of office, at the beginning of which he often clashed with then-President Donald Trump, in attempts to protect the American military and democratic government from repeated attacks.
Last week, at a conference in Washington, Milley was asked what he thought of the war in Gaza. Israel, he answered, was attacked on October 7 and has the right to defend itself.
"Twelve-hundred people were slaughtered, not just killed in the conduct of war – they were slaughtered, beheaded, butchered, raped in front of their husbands. … And if you do the math and take 1,200 and apply that to the United States, that would be the equivalent of 50,000 to 100,000 dead in a morning. Can you imagine what we would do?" Milley asked.
"War is a horrible thing. I had a lot of years in combat, been shot at, blown up, the whole nine yards – it's a horrible, brutal, vicious thing. And, unfortunately, because the character of war is going to be in dense urban areas, the very conduct of war is going to have very high collateral damage. There is almost no way around it. But if there's any morality at all, you need to get into it, achieve your political objectives, get it done, get it done fast, and get it over with," he said.
The complexity that can be explained by an American general with more than 40 years of modern warfare behind him will never be appreciated by the judges and participants of a European singing competition, even if they were sat down and explained it. But the anti-Israeli sentiment is much broader than the protests at Eurovision, even if the Israelis are now celebrating how well Eden Golan did in the voting. The international attitude towards Israel has changed for the worse – deeply and for the long term.
Pro-Palestinian protesters in Malmo, Sweden, on Saturday.Credit: Martin Meissner/AP
While they were counting the votes in Malmo, the legendary guitarist Eric Clapton was performing in Liverpool in front of 10,000 drunk and self-satisfied Brits. Age 79, every tour of his already seems like his last. Among the songs he performed was "Prayer of a Child," which he wrote last November against the background of the Gaza war.
The video that appeared in the background on giant screens reflected an identification only with the Palestinian pain, without the slightest mention of Israeli suffering or the overall context of the war, which began with Hamas' murderous terrorist attack on civilians. If anyone still had any doubts, they were put to rest when the cameras focused on one of the guitars Clapton was playing, which was clearly painted as a Palestinian flag.
The song and the tribute to the Palestinians evoked shouts of excitement from some in the audience. Some left in protest. Most viewers remained indifferent.
Clapton has a long record of being both a great artist and something of a jerk. He has expressed harsh anti-Black sentiments, flirted with the far right in Britain and then expressed remorse. Like his colleague Roger Waters, who is infinitely worse than him, he has not said a word about the war crimes that have been taking place for years in Sudan, Yemen, Syria and Ukraine. But for those who came to watch it, all the way from Israel, the experience was likened to a little punch in the stomach.
You can escape for a moment from reality in Israel, but you can't really hide. We are now in the heart of a real shit-storm, deep inside the camp of pariahs. And Israel is in the same league as Russia, which, unlike us, was not brutally attacked but launched an attack on Ukraine without provocation against it.
This is a double standard at its worst. In the West, and certainly in Arab countries, many began to minimize, excuse and even deny the October 7 massacre from the moment it happened. But it also takes a special kind of diplomatic talent to waste extensive political credit in such a quick and deadly way. The Israeli government did this with great success.