Victor Rosenthal: How to End the New War of Attrition
Welcome to that familiar location, the one between a rock and a hard place.
Since the day after the invasion and massacre on 7 October, Hezbollah has been waging a successful war of attrition against Israel. More than 80,000 Israelis have been displaced from their homes on the northern border, and more than 50 have been killed by rockets and antitank weapons. Border towns and kibbutzim have become wastelands. Homes and other structures have been destroyed, and fields burned.
Israel has responded in a carefully measured, tit-for-tat fashion which, as anyone familiar with the Middle East knows, sends a message of weakness and an invitation for further depredation. There are three apparent reasons for this:
- The IDF does not want to fight a two-front war.
- Hezbollah has between 130,000 to 200,000 rockets, missiles, and drones that it can launch at Israel, some of them with precision guidance systems that can strike within a few meters of a target. The home front is expected to suffer thousands of deaths and massive destruction of property and infrastructure.
- The American administration has told Israel that if it attacks Hezbollah preemptively, it will not support us (presumably with weapons deliveries or at the UN).
On 28 July, a Hezbollah rocket with a 50 kg warhead struck a soccer field and playground in Majdal Shams in the Golan Heights. 12 children and teenagers were killed and numerous others injured, some critically. There was an alert, but it came only a few seconds before the explosion, and the children did not have time to reach a nearby concrete shelter. One child was missing for a day, before it was determined that his body had been blown to bits.
Majdal Shams is the “capital” of the Golan Druze. The Druze mostly live in Lebanon, Syria, the Golan, and the Galilee region of Israel. They have a unique religion and a tradition of loyalty to the states in which they live. They also have a military tradition, and Israeli Druze serve in the IDF and Border Patrol. They are considered among the best fighters and officers and have paid a high price in blood in Israel’s wars.
The entire region is watching to see how Israel will react to the murder of 12 children. Such an atrocity demands a disproportionate response. If the reaction is typical of the recent past, our enemies will know that the understanding that murdering Israeli civilians is normal behavior is still in effect. The Druze will know that Israel does not care about them or value their contributions to the state. After all, we hit the Houthis’ oil industry and port after they killed one Jew in Tel Aviv.
The Americans have already informed us that yes, we are allowed to retaliate, but no, it cannot be disproportionate. And we may not touch Beirut, where Hezbollah boss Hassan Nasrallah is holed up.
When we were invaded on 7 October, the Biden Administration expressed its horror at the massacre of 1200 Israelis and expressed its support. But in the following days it tried to delay or prevent a ground invasion of Gaza. Once the ground war started, it supported Egypt’s demand that not one Gazan would be allowed to cross the border; but at the same time it complained about civilian casualties in the Strip. Then it tried to prevent us from entering Rafiah and taking control of the border between Gaza and Egypt to cut off Hamas’ weapons supply. Even after we demonstrated that it was possible to move civilians out of the way, it continued to throttle our supply of ammunition, to “protect” them. The administration also delayed the delivery of “smart” munitions which enable precise strikes at military targets! All during the war it has pressed for a hostage deal on terms that would leave Hamas in control of Gaza. And it has encouraged the “bring them home at any price” movement in Israel, as well as the forces opposing PM Netanyahu, who wants to keep fighting. Following the philosophy of never allowing a crisis to go to waste, the Biden administration wishes to turn the “day after” the war into a “two-state solution” that would put most of Israel into jeopardy from 7 October-style invasions.
Many seem to have forgotten that on 13 April of this year, Iran launched a direct attack on Israel, launching more than 300 ballistic missiles, cruise missiles, and drones against us. Israel – with some help from the US and others – succeeded in shooting most of them down (at an estimated cost of $1 billion). But had a large number of them reached their targets, the destruction and death would have been beyond estimation. It was an attempt to destroy the fabric of our nation and demanded a suitable response. Instead, we bombed an Iranian air defense radar installation. We were told this would “send a message” to Iran. It did, but not the intended one. It informed them that it was acceptable to shoot at Jews, and they should keep trying. After all, what do they have to lose?
The Majdal Shams attack cannot be allowed to go unavenged. We cannot afford to allow our deterrence to erode further. The wolves are circling. Yesterday, the little pisher of Turkey, Tayip Recip Erdoğan, threatened that he too could invade Israel. Why not? Everyone is doing it. But still more important: we cannot betray our Druze citizens (and those in the Golan who still hold Syrian citizenship but more and more are becoming Israelis). We owe them, and we need them.
There is little chance that we can make the Americans agree. I would like to think it is because they don’t understand the Middle East, and it’s partly that, but it’s also because the Democratic administration is still following the pro-Iranian policy established by Barack Obama. Nevertheless, we have no alternative but to do it anyway.
But what about the danger from Hezbollah’s arsenal? Many analysts think that Israel could not survive the full force of the blow it could inflict. Of course, the state of Lebanon would also be bombed into the stone age, but the Iranian puppeteers are perfectly happy in sacrificing the hosts of their proxies if it will achieve their goal.
We are in a bad spot, but there is one strategy that might succeed: that is to strike a massive blow at the Iranian regime and Iran’s infrastructure, to cut off the head of the snake, so to speak. If this could be done quickly and effectively, Hezbollah would be left high and dry and could be persuaded to avoid the mutual devastation that would result from all-out war with Israel.
Would it work? How would we do it? I am not a military expert. But I do know that we cannot continue along the road we are following today, because it leads only to destruction.
