On leaving Israel after a one-day visit on Sunday, Joe Biden said that the US and Israeli militaries are discussing alternatives to the full invasion of Gaza widely expected since the Hamas attack on 7 October.
However since the president’s departure, the determination of Israel’s military appears to have only grown to launch an overwhelming invasion aimed at destroying Hamas in its entirety.
Both the prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu and the defence minister, Yoav Gallant, toured the troops on the Gaza border on Thursday, promising them victory.
“You see Gaza now from a distance, you will soon see it from inside. The command will come,” Gallant said. “We will be precise and forceful, and we will keep going until we fulfill our mission.”
On the flight back to Washington after a day of talks in Israel, Biden was asked about the prospect of a large-scale ground assault by the 300,000-strong Israeli force arrayed along the border.
“We had a long talk about that and what alternatives there are. Our military is talking with their military about what the alternatives are,” the president replied but he declined to give details.
Biden’s comments came a day after a spokesperson for the Israel Defence Forces, Lt Col Richard Hecht, cast doubt for the first time on whether a ground invasion was an inevitability.
“We are preparing for the next stages of war,” Hecht told reporters. “We haven’t said what it will be. Everyone is talking about a ground offensive but maybe it will be something different.”
Since Hamas insurgents broke through the border wire around Gaza and massacred about 1,400 Israelis, most civilians, while taking more than 200 people hostage, the Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, has vowed to “demolish Hamas”. Phalanxes of tanks lined up in southern Israel, apparently poised to strike.
However, the expected assault was put on hold while the US secretary of state, Antony Blinken, toured the region, and Israel received a succession of visitors sent by Washington, including the defence secretary, Lloyd Austin, the head of Central Command, Gen Michael Kurilla, and ultimately Biden himself.
They all brought the same message: to avoid the mistakes the US had made after the 9/11 attacks 22 years ago, rushing in militarily to assuage national rage without thinking of the long-term consequences.
A former senior American commander in the Middle East said: “I suspect that the challenges not just of a major urban operation to destroy Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad are looming large – and the lack of a viable ‘then what,” a viable post-conflict plan, is looming even larger.”
US officials have warned that a mass ground assault could bring reprisals from Hezbollah from the north and the risk of a two-front war – there are already near daily exchanges of fire across the Lebanese border. They say it would create a humanitarian catastrophe for which Israel would be held responsible, and there would be no guarantee it would succeed in destroying Hamas. It could instead create a new generation of Palestinian recruits both in Gaza and the West Bank.
However, leaving Hamas in place in Gaza is not an option either for a government that failed to stop an attack that caused the biggest loss of Jewish life since the Holocaust.
A senior Israeli security official said that his US counterparts had been coming to talk them about the lessons learned from their own military experience, and particularly the mistakes made in Iraq. But this official said: “We believe that our situation is different. Because it’s not Fallujah, or Baghdad or Basra, it’s a kibbutz.300 meters from Khan Younis or from Gaza City, our villages are spitting distance from the Palestinians who invaded them last Saturday.
Since Hamas seized power in Gaza in 2007, Israel had fought three significant conflicts with them before this month’s Hamas attack. Each time the campaign was aimed at keeping the militant group in check – a policy known in military circles as “mowing the grass,” in recognition of the certainty it would grow back. The Israeli military looks on the threat from Hezbollah over the Lebanese border in the same way.
“We gave it a chance but we cannot allow it. You can’t live under the threat of a sword all the time from both fronts. We will have to take care in the northern arena one day. We can’t live like that. But first let’s eliminate this,” the senior Israeli security official said, referring to the threat from Gaza.
Israeli generals hold themselves responsible for the failure to protect Israelis from a slaughter like the one inflicted by Hamas on 7 October. The security establishment feels it has to redeem itself in the eyes of the nation.
“There is no other choice. We won’t be able to show ourselves on the streets as the military without providing security for our people,” the security official said. “The basic agreement between the Israeli government and the Israeli people was broken. Because there is a commitment.”
