Ron Jager, a 26-year veteran of the IDF, writes that the surprise Hamas attack by land, sea, and air, which led to the huge number of people, both civilians and soldiers, being murdered by Hamas, will lead to Israel conducting a different kind of war in Gaza. More on his thoughts can be found here: “In Gaza, what was will no longer be,” by Ron Jager, JNS, October 8, 2023:
Fifty years ago, Israel was caught unprepared for the Yom Kippur War. Following a devastating surprise attack by Arab armies to the north and south, the 19-day war saw Israel emerge victorious, with IDF forces closing in on Damascus and Cairo. But the war also left Israel traumatized for a generation.
Over the past 24 hours, Israel has experienced a sense of déjà vu. The mighty IDF was once again caught unprepared, enabling Hamas terrorists to enter Israel freely via land, air and sea. The terrorists indiscriminately murdered civilians in their homes, on the streets of cities and towns, and on kibbutzim. They succeeded in kidnapping dozens of hostages, including women, children and the elderly, taking them back to the Gaza Strip….
It appears that the security and political establishments cannot be trusted to make strategic decisions and, over the years, only brought terror literally to our front door.
This began with the signing of the Oslo Accords 30 years ago and then in 2000 with the sudden retreat from Lebanon. These resulted in the Second Intifada, in which over a thousand Israelis were killed as supposed “victims of peace.” In 2005, Israel withdrew from the Gaza Strip, setting up the eventual Hamas takeover. Then there was the failed 2006 Second Lebanon War.
Many of those who presided over these disastrous policies still serve in high places in the security establishment. Many of their predecessors have been involved in the year-long protests against the government, distracting the IDF from its central tasks of preparation and training. They must be held accountable.
Both sides are accountable — those who support the judicial overhaul and those who so noisily have opposed it — for distracting the government at a time when its entire focus should have been on security in the south. Such a focus might have prevented the Hamas attack from proceeding without Israel noticing it. There would still have been an attack, but the all-important element of surprise would no longer be present, and that would have made all the difference, if the IDF, which had moved troops out of the south to conduct raids on terrorists in Jenin and Nablus and other cities in the West Bank, had instead kept the same number of troops on the border with Gaza, hundreds of Israelis’ lives might have been saved. How many members of Mossad were instead focused on the endless series of protests against the government, or perhaps took place in such protests themselves?
It now appears that the Israeli government and the security establishment have decided to destroy the Hamas regime in Gaza by military means. This means that what was will no longer be. This is what has to happen. There is no backing down. The entire Muslim world is watching to see how we respond. No doubt, there will be a high price in blood for an effective, game-changing response, but we have no other choice.
“What was will no longer be.” Israel, sorrowful and enraged at the same time, will change the rules of the game that it has heretofore observed. No longer will warnings routinely be issued to civilians in or near targeted buildings. Instead, the Israeli government has just issued a blanket warning, telling civilians in Gaza to move out of built-up areas, out of any areas where they know Hamas, its weapons, its bases, its fighters, to be located, and instead to head to the southern border with Israel, and to that part of Gaza that is right on the Mediterranean, where there are unlikely to be any Hamas targets.
Furthermore, the IDF will now want to hit buildings that it only suspects, but cannot be sure, contain offices, or weapons hideouts, or terrorists, belonging to Hamas or Palestinian Islamic Jihad. Certainty is no longer a requirement. The IAF will no longer be held back because it lacks absolute certainty that Hamas has fighters or weapons or offices in the building; nor will the possible presence of some civilians stay Israel’s hand. This is truly going to be, as Prime Minister Netanyahu made clear, a guerre à outrance.
The soldiers of the IDF, having seen so many of their fellow soldiers murdered in cold blood, and a much greater number of Israeli civilians cut down as well in their homes, and on the streets, of southern Israel, will be less inclined than before to take Hamas fighters alive. Unless there is a clear, hands-in-air surrender, they will not try just to wound them, in order to take them prisoner, but will shoot to kill as many Hamas fighters as they can. Every member of the IDF knows what Hamas terrorists did, that first day of murder and mayhem, to Israeli women and girls, to helpless children, to the elderly and disabled, and to IDF soldiers, too, whom they caught unawares and slaughtered. They are determined not to “fight Hamas,” but to “wipe out Hamas.” These are different things.
And after the IDF has spent a few weeks in Gaza in a relentless campaign to destroy every Hamas command-and-control center, every weapons hideout, every rocket launcher, every terror tunnel where Hamas terrorists are hiding, there will inevitably be cries from the EU and UN for Israel to end its incursion into Gaza, and for the IDF to pull back inside Israel because “enough damage has been inflicted and too many civilians have been harmed.” But the IDF won’t budge, as it has in the past; it is going to stay in Gaza for as long as it takes, not to attain a ceasefire — how many of those has Israel agreed to in the past, much to its later regret — but to destroy Hamas once and for all.
VarAway says
AMEN 🙏
SKA says
Give them back a little taste of their own “Kaybar”
maria says
Yes and send them to hell
Do what you must says
The actions by Hamas, such as killing innocent women and children, give the Israelis the moral authority to do whatever they need to do.
Barbara says
There is no guarantee the prisoners are still alive nor are they still in Palestine. They could have already been moved to an unknown country.
This fight is a no hold barred.
KoshsShadow says
And Israel should state clearly that this is the result of giving up land. Since the PA has not met a single commitment,
Area C should be immediately annexed, as well as most of area B.
And I’ll add my plan to stop terrorism – every terror attack, land is PERMANENTLY annexed by Israel. No compensation; the area the PA could ever get shrinks.
Transmaster says
Ron Jager has nailed it. This time it is going to be open hunting season for Hamas members. I am sure the IDF has lists of name, and crimes and like Judge Dredd they will be judge jury and executioner.
Transmaster says
The reference to Olive trees being the sign of ownership of land in this area, and Dendrochronology to date the trees age. That no olive tree in the West Bank is over 90 years old, Very interesting.
Derek says
It’s anti-Israel propaganda.
FYI says
What hamas has done are crimes against Humanity:they deliberately targeted innocent civilians,like the ones at that music festival ,which they must have known were innocent and posed no threat to anybody.
So there is no excuse.
They have also worsened the situation for the palestinians themselves.I am sorry for innocent folk caught up in a war ..but hamas deserve a just retribution for doing such a wicked and evil and typically islamic thing in all its savagery.
Wellington says
+1
Westman says
Let’s hope that guerre à outrance will not only eliminate Hamas but also, at some point, set Iran back about 50 years and totally end any possibility to build a nuclear bomb.
Ignoring Iran will result in a worse situation than ignoring Hamas. Both Hamas and Iran have assumed they can always take violence and interference to some limit short of their own destruction. That appears to have been a miscalculation.
The US warships will be in place within a day. Maybe Iran will play fast-boat footsie.
FYI says
+1
Linde B. says
To FYI- I, like you and all the commenters here, want to see Israel destroy those 2 satanic groups: Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad. And I pray that Israel is successful in that endeavor. +🙏+
Regarding your sentence about innocent Jews being killed at the music festival, I know music is Haram or “forbidden” in Islam, so
those Islamic attackers were looking for any excuse to kill as many people as they could. I am
grateful that God stopped those devilish creeps 😈 from hurting more Jewish people.,
FYI says
Just like the Manchester bombing in 2017.
Just because muslims live in their joyless music-less misery they think they are free to attack us infidels.
Linde B. says
To FYI- So very true.
The musical intelligence is one intelligence that many humans have, and the musical intelligence is also connected to the mathematical intelligence (which many humans also have) because all music has a rhythm or beat which involves
numbers and timing. Seems that Islam totally ignores the many human intelligences all people have, especially emotional intelligence.
in my opinion, Islam is the religion of Satan the devil. 😈
Shidoi Gaijin says
Wipe them out.
Every single able-bodied man that can hold a rifle or send a coded message should be rendered stone-cold dead and facing their Creator. Anything less is an injustice to both Israeli citizenry and human decency.
Their time is long past merely overdue.
Seen this movie before says
The world responded to the barbarism of Al Qaeda.
The world responded to the savagery of Islamic State.
Now the world needs to respond to the evil of Hamas.
jdow says
If you are facing a genocidal foe that will not stop to the last person standing, is it genocide in turn to do what you must to live?
{o.o}
Derek says
Yes, the islamic terrorists have warranted their own destruction. End those evil cultists. Pray for Israel & the IDF.
All. Out. War.
mj bonner says
many angry, emotional remarks cast in the heat of battle, yet which ones are doing any fighting?
only the dead know battle, everyone else remembers it.
if you seek retribution, make sure to coordinate with like minded people in your sphere.
Major Tom says
“God hates hands that shed innocent blood….” May the IDF be the instrument of God’s vengeance and may the victory be absolute…….
Scotsman48 says
I hope the Israeli Military rolls into Gaza under the cover of darkness after they cut off ALL Electrical Power Grids, stop Fuel and Food from entering and shoot everything that walks dead in their tracks, destroy every building, many that Israel built years ago, all schools, hospitals, government, apartment blocks, Mansions and Palaces with the families of these Hamas scumbags inside with their families and let the building collapse on top of them as they eat Dinner.
Return the entire area to the Desert it has always been and claim it as The State of Israel.
islam teaches revenge as an important tenet in their Fascist Religious Cult so teach them what revenge looks like as that is the ONLY thing they understand, not appeasement, not a wee signed piece of paper, but a full on reaction to their cowardly violent actions against old women and children.
islamism is the new nazism.
Shalom.
Joe Kool says
AMEN!
Linde B. says
To Scotsman48- I agree with you 100%, but I would add Mahmoud Abbas, the millionaire head of Hamas. He needs to go.
KuhnKat says
Never forget the leftard Judicial System in Israel is PART OF THE PROBLEM THAT ALLOWED THE ATTACK!!!
Jumpmaster173rd says
While I agree that Hama needs to be wiped out…..it is never going to happen. You can kill all the Hamas leaders (maybe/hopefully) and kill a lot of the foot soldiers…..you might set them back somewhat….but there will always be survivors…they will reconstitute…remember you cannot kill an ideology…..
libertyORdeath says
“But the IDF won’t budge, as it has in the past; it is going to stay in Gaza for as long as it takes, not to attain a ceasefire — how many of those has Israel agreed to in the past, much to its later regret — but to destroy Hamas once and for all.”
I’m much less confident about the supposed end of Arab-controlled Gaza. We’ve been here before. If the leftists in Israel can fight for Arabs to serve in the Knesset, they can definitely save Gaza.
Not to mention the massive international pressure being put on Israel to go relatively easy on the terrorists.
I’m just hoping the average Westerner can see the multitude of anti-globalist lessons that Hamas has taught us. From national security and immigration to the second amendment, there’s a lot to learn here.
I do know that if the Israelis don’t retake Gaza completely there will be future attacks. The cycle continues. Haven’t we seen enough death and barbarity yet?