Israel is fighting its war in Gaza to please the US, UN and International Criminal Court (ICC). It should be fighting to win in a knockout.
The Jewish new year, Rosh Hashanah, is just a few weeks away. And Jews do like many others do in December of every year: make resolutions for the new year so as to be better. It is an amazing human trait that God has given to each of us that we wish to be better than we currently are. The guy who falls out of bed, barely gets dressed, eats cereal with enough sugar to stop an elephant and always is late to work resolves that next year, he is out of bed by 5:30, runs 10 km before a shower and healthy breakfast, and is the first one at work. Hope springs eternal.
Some details that have come out recently from Israel include that the six murdered young hostages were brutally killed only hours before the IDF reached their position. Additionally, in the months prior to their deaths, the captives were kept in complete darkness in a tunnel with no air vents. They were given little food, and it was reported that one of the murdered hostages, a young woman who had attended the rave with the others, weighed only 79 pounds when her body was recovered. These are Auschwitz conditions, and it is incumbent on Israel to treat the Hamas psychopaths as the German SS were treated. They must be completely destroyed.
Additionally, it has been reported that three Israelis were murdered by a Jordanian truck driver near the Allenby bridge, one of the few direct land connections between Israel and its forever-ungrateful neighbor, Jordan. Jordanian politicians and the king never stop attacking Israel or threatening to cut off formal relations. Jordan receives water—lots of it—from Israel as well as critical intelligence that helps keep a king in power over a country that is 60 percent Palestinian. I still believe that Ariel Sharon made a blunder when he prevented Yasser Arafat from overthrowing King Hussein. With an official “Palestine” on the map, Israel would have been within her rights to ship Palestinians from the West Bank and Gaza to their new country.
Who was this Jordanian driver? While details have not yet been released, he was one of hundreds of drivers at the crossing. Why are they there? Jordan has so much to offer Israel that there are not enough trucks in the Middle East to bring the stuff over? As the Houthis continue their Iranian-fueled attacks on shipping attempting to approach Israel, shippers have made a work-around. Ships are docking at Saudi Arabia or the UAE, and there is a land bridge that brings goods for Gaza via several countries before it gets to Israel for final distribution. So not only were six hostages brutally murdered in Gaza, but three Israeli civilians working to get Gazans food and other basic needs were murdered for their efforts. This nonsense has got to stop.
Israel needs to make some New Year’s resolutions of her own. The first is to get the hostages out by turning the Gazans on Hamas. When a live hostage is released to the criminally antisemitic Red Cross, Gazans will receive a week’s worth of food, personal hygiene products and tobacco goods. A dead hostage gets them two days worth of stuff. If no hostage is delivered, no humanitarian aid will enter the Strip. And if two weeks go by without a released hostage, water and electricity will stop flowing from Israel. It is always impressive to see really bright people do very stupid things. I am certain that the ones behind the US Afghan departure fiasco were either college-educated and/or high-ranking military officers. And they made a disaster that included 13 dead U.S. service members and billions of dollars worth of equipment abandoned to the Taliban. And no doubt the Israelis who are the only people in human history to feed an enemy during active combat are also a bunch of geniuses. Montgomery did not send food shipments into Caen as he pulverized it out of existence. MacArthur did not take food orders from the Japanese in Manila as he ruthlessly drove them from the city. Israel is terrified of the US, the UN and the ICC blaming Israel—and not Hamas!—for Gazans living like Hersh Goldberg-Polin in darkness and without adequate food. It’s time for Israel to show some strength and say that until we get our people back, you folks can blame Hamas for your empty stomachs.
There is a word in Yiddish, “frum” which means religious devotion. The word is used more generally to describe how religiously observant one is. “Should I go out with him?’ “No, he’s too frum for you. He keeps the Sabbath twice a week.” Israel needs to be a little less “frum” with its fighting ethos. It’s encouraging to see the IDF treat the West Bank like Gaza. In the past, the IDF was limited in its actions there. Now, D9 tractors rip up all of the streets of Jenin while fighters and drones overhead blow up mosques where terrorists are hiding. The kid gloves are off, and that is good news. One does not fight cancer with song and dance. But the fight in Gaza needs to include a reduction in goods being ferried into the Strip. We want our hostages back and you want to live. That’s the equation. Stop bellyaching that Hamas has plenty of food and that they will let the Gazans die. That is an internal Palestinian matter, and if they want their own state, they will have to deal with their own issues by themselves. Hostages come home, you get food and other comforts. If they do not come out, then you will get bupkis (also Yiddish, meaning nothing).
That the world demands of Israel unheard of actions such as reducing civilian casualties in urban fighting is a problem. That Israel agrees to all of the demands is a different problem, one that Israel needs to correct. Experts in warfare say that Israel has set a new standard for reducing civilian deaths in built-up combat areas. Kudos. But success is getting your people home and crushing your opponent. Those two goals—the only ones that have meaning in war—have not been met. The Jewish New Year is coming: it’s time for Israel to resolve to attain a successful victory in Gaza with all Israelis out of that hellhole.
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