Restoring military supremacy

By David M. Weinberg, ISRAEL HAYOM

[..] Israel’s war against Hamas in Gaza must be viewed in this broader context. Israel is acting not only to end the immediate and acute rocket and tunnel threat to Israel — which alone is more than enough to justify our current military offensive — but acting to restore a measure of overall deterrence against all or enemies; to regain the aura of military supremacy, in their eyes.

Israel must prove that it is not deterred by Islamic terrorist militias that embed themselves in civilian populations and think themselves thereby invulnerable. Israel is showing that it can and will take the fight into their streets and underground hideouts, and uproot and destroy their bases of operations — despite the cost in life to our soldiers and to noncombatants unfortunately trapped (purposefully so, by Hamas) in the crossfire, and despite international condemnation.

If Israel can’t do this, and do so while maintaining a high degree of internal cohesion and social solidarity, then Israel’s long-term security prospects are bleak. Iran and all its regional subsidiaries are watching closely.

Consider, for example, our northern border. We know for sure that Hezbollah has dug its vast missile armories deep into the Lebanese mountainsides, underneath civilian towns. It is also very possible that Hezbollah has dug dozens of terror attack tunnels under the Israel-Lebanon border, reaching deep into the kibbutzim and towns of the Galilee. It is only a question of time until Israel has to take military action to “mow that grass,” to degrade and denude Hezbollah’s terror infrastructure and weaponry.

Wining this war against Hamas, then, is step one in restoring Israel’s security and its broader deterrent abilities. It is part of Israel’s response to the gains made by radical Islamists in Arab civil wars raging across the region. It is part of a re-assertion of the basic building blocks in Israel’s strategic posture. It is critical for Israel in grand strategic perspective.