The war in Gaza may topple Hamas without making Israel safer

The Economist

Mar 24, 2024 08:00 AM IST

It will end up even more deeply mired in the conflict that is the main threat to its security

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“I WISH I could say we have a very detailed plan,” an Israeli army officer admitted to your correspondent in the chaotic days following Hamas’s brutal assault on southern Israel on October 7th. More than 1,100 people had been killed; some 240 had been dragged back to Gaza as hostages. It was clear from the outset of the war in Gaza, now six months old, that Israel’s two main goals—to eliminate Hamas and to free the hostages—were at odds. It was also clear that invading the territory, in which 2.2m people live cheek by jowl and under which Hamas had built a labyrinth of fortified tunnels to help it withstand an attack, was going to be immensely difficult. And there was always the risk that war in Gaza would spiral into a bigger conflict.It is possible to look at this unpromising starting point and conclude that Israel’s invasion of Gaza has not gone badly—and many Israelis take just that view. After all, Hamas’s fighting capacity has been massively reduced, with little in the way of Israeli casualties. Some of the hostages have been released and negotiations continue in an attempt to free the remainder. And all the while, there has been no regional conflagration, nor even much unrest in the West Bank (the more populous of the two Palestinian territories) or among Israelis of Palestinian origin.Pyrrhic progressYet others question whether Israel’s security has improved at all. Hamas’s leader in Gaza and the mastermind of the attacks of October 7th, Yahya Sinwar, remains at large. The devastation Israel has unleashed—around 20,000 civilians have perished, food and medicine are in desperately short supply and more than half the territory’s buildings have been destroyed or damaged—will make it almost impossible to institute a stable, peaceful regime after the war. And Israel’s perceived indifference to civilian suffering is eroding international sympathy and prompting allies to question their support. Could Israel, the sceptics ask, be winning the battle but losing the war?