After the murderous onslaught by Hamas on 7 October, Israelis rallied around the prospect of a swift invasion of Gaza. Benjamin Netanyahu’s government mobilised tanks and reservists amid widespread agreement that Israel needed to enter the enclave and destroy Hamas.
Three weeks later, however, there is still no invasion and many Israelis seem to no longer want one – at least not immediately.
Nearly half wish to hold off, according to a poll on Friday for the Israeli newspaper Maariv. Asked if the military should immediately escalate to a large-scale ground offensive, 29% said yes, 49% said it would be better to wait and 22% were undecided. This compared with a poll on 19 October in which 65% backed a ground offensive, although that poll did not specify timing.
The government’s decision to pause the invasion of Gaza – where more than 220 hostages are being held and which has been subjected to a bombardment that has killed thousands of Palestinians – has complicated what had once seemed an inevitability.
“It is almost certain that the developments on the matter of the hostages, which is now topping the agenda, have had a great impact on this shift,” said Maariv. The latest poll was conducted on 25 and 26 October with a sample of 522 respondents and a margin of error of 4.3%.
Dahlia Scheindlin, a public opinion expert and policy fellow at the Century Foundation, a thinktank in New York, said the two Maariv polls could not be directly compared but that the latest finding was striking. “That you have half the people saying ‘wait’ is significant.”
Israelis were taking their lead from the government, which has faced pressure from the US to delay an invasion, and assumed it had a good reason to pause, said Scheindlin. “People are angry at the government’s handling of security but there is still a rally-round-the-flag effect and willingness to follow its lead.”
The other reason was a hope to extract more hostages before any offensive – a desire fanned by the emotional return of four captives and rallies by relatives of those who remain captive. “Israelis cannot tolerate the idea that someone is being held who is still alive.”
Shock and revulsion at the killing of more than 1,400 people by Hamas endures, as does a determination to make sure the group can never repeat the atrocity, but some people interviewed on the streets of Jerusalem conceded doubts.
“It’s very important to bring back all the kidnapped people and to fight Hamas until they lose all their power but I don’t know what is the right way to do that,” said Roani Poupko, 24, an arts student.
Samuel, 66, a delivery driver, said: “I just don’t know if we should go in – it depends on the Jewish people stuck there.”
Abraham, a 53-year-old shop manager, said he would endorse whatever the government decided. “They’ll know what to do.”
Scheindlin predicted that most Israelis would support a major land incursion once it began, but she said their support would be fragile due to the government’s unpopularity and the reality of messy urban fighting. “I could imagine support souring faster than normal.”
Prominent commentators have joined former military and political leaders in making stark warnings that Israel’s forces are not ready for a ground invasion and that there is no credible plan for the aftermath even if Hamas is incapacitated.
“I would like to hear more people talking about other options,” Sima Kadmon wrote in the newspaper Yedioth Ahronoth. “Launching a ground incursion now is liable to jeopardize the dozens of children, women, elderly people and soldiers deep in the underground city, and it will guarantee our troops a long slog in the Gazan sand dunes.”
