by Emmanuel Shiloh, Editor of B'Sheva Newspaper, translated by Hillel Fendel.
Pressure from Cabinet ministers Smotrich and Strook are the best chance Netanyahu has to be saved from his traditional hesitation so that he can actually strive for victory in Gaza.
The slogan "He who dares, wins" is well known in our country as the leading motto of the IDF's elite Sayeret Matkal unit. But actually, it’s not an original Israeli brainchild, but rather a translation of the maxim of the famed WW2 British commando unit, the Special Air Service (SAS).
The traits of daring and brazenness are certainly important components of victory, although British history itself proves that he who dares does not always win. In fact, two of Britain's most dangerous historic enemies were actually quite daring, yet were ultimately defeated by Britain and her allies. Sometimes, the over-brazen end up taking miscalculated risks, or setting impossible strategic goals, leading to defeat.
In politics, too, it's not always the daring who emerges victorious. Take Naftali Bennett, for instance. A former Sayeret Matkal fighter, he set himself grandiose goals – and as a result, was forced to depart the political scene twice in the past year. (It's true that he is currently doing well in the polls, so we won't pass final judgement on him just yet.)
More to the point is Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu, who I believe was the first Sayeret Matkal member to enter politics. Unfortunately, his path as a statesman and politician has not quite been characterized by boldness, but rather by hesitation and caution.
Netanyahu rarely takes risks. He prefers to take measured steps and avoid sharp turns; when he reaches a crossroads that involves both risks and opportunities, he usually chooses neither. This tendency has often saved him from fateful mistakes and is part of the secret of his political survival, but has also led to bad mistakes. As a prime example, we remember his decision not to return to politics in 2001, losing the easy chance to regain leadership of the Likud party when Ariel Sharon seized the premiership almost by default.
Often, he waits so long to decide that reality finally comes along and leaves him no choice. We saw this very recently in the war against Hizbullah. Netanyahu adopted a hesitant, defensive policy for nearly a year, while leaving tens of thousands of Galilee residents in an intolerable state of exile from their homes for fear of Hizbullah rockets. Apparently, the only thing that got him to move was the once-in-a-lifetime chance to carry out the famous Beepers operation. It had become clear that Hizbullah could discover the booby-trapped Beepers at any minute, and Netanyahu finally understood that he had no choice but to decide, then or never. To his credit, he bucked the opinions of some of the top security officials and decided to give the OK. No one in Hizbullah knew what hit them when thousands of beepers exploded in their hands. This then led to the offensive against Hizbullah that all but wiped out their leadership and many - not all - of their offensive capabilities.
Most problematically, Netanyahu's hesitancy and procrastination are quite evident these days on the Gaza front. All the ingredients for a strong offensive are here: a much calmer northern front, a loyal defense minister, a new IDF chief of staff and Southern Command head, and a supportive and accommodating U.S. administration that is supplying us with arms and not pressuring us to deliver "humanitarian aid" to the enemy. Hamas is beaten down and the population is in despair.
Yet instead of taking advantage of all this in order to initiate an all-out attack that will enable us to take over all of Gaza and finally win this war decisively, Netanyahu is once again treading water. Even the recent offensive in the Morag Route area was not for the purpose of destroying the enemy, but only to pressure him to agree to another round of hostage releases in which we free hundreds of terrorists and renew the supplies to Hamas. As of now, after beginning to consider a partial release of hostages, Hamas predictably reconsidered, in the hope that Israel would fold.
In fact, the abominable Hamas murderers have several good reasons for thinking that this would happen, including:
• The political and public pressure regarding the recruitment of hareidim, which threatens to dismantle the coalition government;
• threats of refusal to serve in the IDF;
• the Netanyahu trial, which takes up so much of the prime minister’s critical time that it constitutes a national security threat;
• the courts' and the left-wing's refusal to accept the government's firing of Shabak chief Ronen Bar, leading to tremendous political and social unrest;
• and above all, the incessant pressure by the Kaplanist groups demanding the hostages' release "at any price," based on the same talking points parroted by Hamas.
Why does Netanyahu continue to act so hesitantly now? His detractors – a nice way of saying his enemies – say it's because he doesn't want the war to end, because that's what's keeping him in office. His supporters say he wants to continue to search for every possible chance to secure the release of hostages, as long as it does not mean ending the war with Hamas still in power.
But it's possible that the reason is much more mundane: He simply has trouble, as usual, being decisive. He prefers to take little steps rather than to make a dramatic and daring decision to end the war with a massive offensive. Though this option sounds frightening, it does not have to cost us as many sacrifices as in previous rounds. With the help of air power, we succeeded in overcoming Hizbullah with relatively few sacrifices – and we can do the same in Gaza. Netanyahu has no choice but to understand that the time is now; we can no longer afford the economic costs, nor the costs to family life of the reservists, nor the drop in motivation in the IDF, that his delay is causing us.
Another worrisome sign is that the top military brass actually submitted a proposal to the Cabinet this past week regarding the renewal of "humanitarian aid" to Gaza. It's as if we haven't learned a thing! The plan means that the IDF fights Hamas with one hand, and strengthens the enemy and supplies it with the other! How could such a plan be considered without even offering a solution to the problem of Hamas taking over and using the supplies for its own needs and coffers?
Religious Zionism party chief Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich, who also has authorities in the Defense Ministry, sharply opposed this destructive plan. His unwavering commitment to victory in the war, together with his colleague Minister Orit Strook, stands out above all their fellow ministers. But actually they were not alone this time. Many ministers expressed opposition to the plan, and the Cabinet sent the senior IDF officials to do their homework and present an alternative in which supplies are not distributed by Hamas.
One can only hope that the new Chief of Staff, Zamir, will finally realize – as we thought he did already – that victory will be achieved only via a complete conquest of the Gaza Strip, the establishment of an Israeli military government, and the destruction of Hamas as either an armed or governing organization.