28/01/2024
Six Steps Israel Must Take to Win the War
Netanyahu needs to scale back war aims and compromise on core issues.
By Daniel Byman, a senior fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies and professor at Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service, and Seth G. Jones, senior vice president, Harold Brown Chair, and director of the International Security Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies.
Under U.S. pressure, Israel claims to be reducing the intensity of military operations in the Gaza Strip, withdrawing some units and disbanding several reserve units. Yet the fighting is far from over. Indeed, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu warned that Israel needs “many more months” to defeat Hamas.
Netanyahu, however, has not articulated a vision for what comes next, beyond offering vague principles needed to end the war and criticizing U.S. proposals to put the Palestinian Authority (PA) in charge of Gaza. Other Israeli ministers, notably including Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, have put forward more detailed proposals, but they leave many questions unanswered.
How can Israel ensure its security, maintain U.S. support, end the humanitarian nightmare in Gaza, and avoid being caught in a forever war there? Based on a December fact-finding trip that we took to Israel, we assess that Israel needs to thread the needle carefully, disrupting Hamas without jeopardizing its own broader position or adding to the already-massive number of Palestinian civilian deaths.
This requires a mix of offensive, defensive, and humanitarian steps, and even if successful, it would only be a partial victory: enough to ensure Israeli security, but also requiring constant vigilance.
Step One: Declare Victory and Reduce (but Not End) Military Operations
The Israeli military is trying to destroy Hamas as an armed force and eliminate its military infrastructure of tunnels, ammunition caches, and other strong points. The Israeli military, intelligence, and diplomatic officials who we talked to told us they believed this effort required six to nine more months.
At some point, however, such efforts will reach a level of diminishing returns. Israel will not be able to kill every Hamas fighter, and whether it destroys 50 percent of the force or 75 percent, the marginal benefit is limited: Either way, Hamas would be hurt badly while retaining some military capacity.
The cost of continuing this full-scale campaign, however, is immense. Israel is killing large numbers of Palestinian civilians in Gaza, destroying significant infrastructure, and, in the process, incurring international and increasingly U.S. condemnation. In addition, widespread destruction and casualties will likely increase radicalization in Gaza and the West Bank, as well as facilitate recruitment by Hamas, the Palestinian Islamic Jihad, and perhaps new organizations that emerge from the rubble.
Israel has called up large numbers of its military forces, and this is costing its economy dearly: The war has already become the most expensive in the country’s history.
Instead, Israel should shift to more limited and targeted operations. This would reduce the number of Hamas military members killed, but it would decrease the number of civilians killed and the cost to Israel, making the war more diplomatically and financially sustainable.
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Step Two: A Targeted Campaign
Even as full-scale military operations decline, Israel should continue to target Hamas leaders, both in and outside Gaza. The emphasis should be on Hamas’s military wing in order to prevent a recurrence of an Oct. 7-type attack. This campaign will not end a group like Hamas, which has deep ties to Palestinian society and a large leadership base. However, constant attacks will disrupt the leadership, creating confusion among Hamas’s ranks and forcing leaders to limit communication to avoid detection, which in turn makes it harder for them to lead a functioning group.
Although this campaign should be extensive, there need to be limits. In particular, Israel should consider the diplomatic consequences of targeting Hamas political leaders in Qatar and Turkey, at least for the moment. Qatar is deeply involved in negotiating the release of Israeli and other hostages, and it will likely play an important role in future reconstruction, governance, and security in Gaza. Assassinating Hamas operatives there would likely jeopardize this.
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Step Three: Stronger Defenses
Israeli defenses failed on Oct. 7, as Hamas used drones, bulldozers, and other means to blind Israeli sensors and punch through the security barrier along the Israel-Gaza border. This failure does not mean that Israel should avoid defenses in the future. Rather, Israeli leaders should recognize that defenses are part of a broader system and strengthen them.
A layered defense is necessary. This would involve multiple barriers, with kill zones near them: Hamas forces must not again be allowed to get near the barrier with impunity. The Gaza-Israel border could increasingly look like the demilitarized zone along the North Korea-South Korea border, with more barbed wire, walls, watchtowers, trenches, sensors, cameras, and possibly mines. Israel should also consider allowing more Israeli communities near the borders with Lebanon and the Gaza Strip to organize self-defense units with more firepower, though this would create risks of theft and inadvertent killings.
Better security along the Egyptian-Gaza border, an area called the Philadelphi corridor, is vital. Hamas used tunnel networks to smuggle weapons into Gaza, with corruption or incapacity on the Egyptian side abetting the process. Israel must work with the United States or other advanced militaries, which in turn would work with Egypt, to improve border security.
A particular failure on Oct. 7 was the slow Israeli military response to the incursion. The IDF had too few soldiers near Gaza, and they were out of position and unprepared for a rapid response. Israel will need to station more troops near Gaza in case Hamas again breaches the barrier, including a beefed-up quick reaction force that can deploy rapidly if a cross-border attack appears imminent. A visible presence is necessary both to deter Hamas and to reassure Israelis living near Gaza that they can safely return to their homes.
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Step Four: Permit More Humanitarian Aid
Israel is allowing humanitarian aid to go into Gaza from Egypt via the Rafah crossing, and it has opened the Kerem Shalom crossing from Israel, which is designed to handle larger shipments.
This is not enough. Only a fraction of the necessary aid is flowing into Gaza, which needs help for wounded civilians as well as massive amounts of food, water, and medicine for the almost 2 million Palestinians in Gaza who have been displaced by the war—more than 85 percent of the population. Fearing that aid will be diverted to Hamas, Israel has moved slowly to design a system to inspect cargo going into Gaza. Inspection points are often understaffed, and necessary supplies are not reaching residents.
In addition to the human toll, the death and misery creates the perception that Israel wants ordinary Palestinians in Gaza to suffer, fostering even more resentment there and further diminishing Israel’s international standing.
Israel must redouble its efforts to let aid flow to Gaza, allowing respected humanitarian organizations more freedom to operate, creating longer pauses in the fighting to allow civilians to access aid, streamlining inspections, and in general being more permissive. Hamas, because of its dominance in Gaza, will inevitably seize some of the food, medicine, fuel, and other supplies, but this is a price that Israel must pay.
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Step Five: Bring the Palestinian Authority into Gaza
Someone must eventually govern Gaza if Hamas is to be kept down, and the best bet (as well as the preferred choice of the Biden administration) is the Palestinian Authority, which currently controls parts of the West Bank. A visible PA role would reduce fears of an Israeli occupation or annexation of Gaza and allow the United States and friendly Arab countries to claim that there is a path forward for greater Palestinian self-government.
The PA is hardly a perfect partner: It is weak and corrupt, and President Mahmoud Abbas is deeply unpopular. Politically, it is anathema to many Israelis. Netanyahu has declared, “I will not allow the entry into Gaza of those who educate for terrorism, support terrorism and finance terrorism.” The minister of national security, the extremist Itamar Ben-Gvir, claimed that the PA “is not an alternative to Hamas, it is an ally of Hamas, and that it is how it should be treated, both now and after the war.”
Israeli policies, however, are responsible for part of the PA’s weakness. Israel encouraged Qatar to fund Hamas in part to divide Palestinians and thus claim that Israel cannot productively negotiate with the PA. The expansion of settlements and the impunity of settlers as they launched pogroms against their Palestinian neighbors further undermined the PA’s credibility among Palestinians.
For the PA to succeed in Gaza, there needs to be a massive program of recruiting, training, and equipping PA security forces, which the Biden administration is just beginning to embrace. Training could occur in neighboring countries, such as Jordan and Egypt.
Greater PA credibility also requires new leaders (which the United States is indirectly referring to as a “revitalized” Palestinian Authority). Abbas is too damaged, both in Israel and among Palestinians and Arab leaders, to expand the role of the PA in Gaza. Technocrats, including those linked to the PA, must play a role providing basic services, reforming the education system (including the textbooks that children read), and building the courts and other institutions. To succeed in Gaza, the PA also needs more credibility, and that requires progress toward independence for Palestinians in the West Bank.
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Step Six: Avoid a Broader War
The Israel-Hamas war has stoked violence on other fronts, including Iraq, Lebanon, and Yemen. Israel has long seen the Lebanese-based militant group Hezbollah, an ally of Hamas and a close partner of Iran, as its most dangerous immediate threat. Hezbollah has thousands of well-trained fighters and a missile arsenal that dwarfs that of Hamas. After Oct. 7, Israel considered launching a preventive war against the group. Instead, Israel and Hezbollah have engaged in a limited war with hundreds of cross-border strikes. Israel has killed more than 130 Hezbollah fighters, including senior leaders.
As understandable as Israel’s fears are, a broader war would be a disaster for all sides. Fortunately, Hezbollah is likely seeking to avoid a broader conflict for now. It has removed some of its fighters from the border, and its attacks seem carefully calibrated to show solidarity with Hamas but not escalate the conflict. Hezbollah knows that its organization and Lebanon as a whole would suffer tremendously in a conflict with Israel, with many Lebanese blaming Hezbollah for any conflict.
Instead, Israel must focus on deterrence. It should strengthen forces on the border, conduct limited strikes in response to Hezbollah attacks, and demonstrate a willingness to increase the use of force if Hezbollah were to escalate operations, making it clear to the group that any war would be a disaster for Hezbollah and for Lebanon. Israel should also strengthen the border with Lebanon and establish a much more formidable demilitarized zone. The destruction in Gaza has made such deterrence easier in some ways, as it highlights the price that Hezbollah and Lebanon would pay for any war.
A Limited Victory
These six steps would require a reset by Netanyahu and his far-right government—a willingness to slightly scale back the aims of the war and compromise on core policy issues. They would also reduce U.S. and international pressure, making Israel’s anti-Hamas efforts far more sustainable.
Hamas might still have a limited presence in Gaza, but it would be far weaker and under constant pressure from Israeli raids and drone strikes. Better defenses would make it far harder for Hamas, Hezbollah, or any group to again menace Israeli citizens along the lines of the Oct. 7 attack. Israel would not be fighting multiple wars, and more humanitarian aid and improved Palestinian leadership in Gaza would diminish international and U.S. criticism.
Over time, the Palestinian Authority, with help from neighboring states and Israeli forces, could replace Hamas in Gaza.
Netanyahu needs to scale back war aims and compromise on core issues.
