Something has changed …

Peloni:  “Wishful thinking, they say, is not a policy.”  If nothing else was has changed, this relatively obvious statement sounds as a thunderclap between what was believed before and what is understood today…and there can be no retrograde on having learned this lesson as the costs have been, and continue to be, to great to overlook or ignore.

Despite tremendous costs on the individual level, Israelis know they are here to stay in the Middle East.

Sarah N. Stern | Mar 17, 2025

Sitting here in Israel, I ask myself if this is the same Middle East it was before Oct. 7, 2023. Yes, the war that was waged on Israel on seven fronts continues into its 17th month, and at least 59 hostages are still not home with many no longer alive.

However, something else has changed.

Although still a threat, Hezbollah has been severely neutered. The Israeli Air Force sent a squadron of F-151 planes on Sept. 27, dropping more than 80 bombs. The body of Hassan Nasrallah, Hezbollah’s commander-in-chief, was found lying in the rubble the next day. Also eliminated by the Israeli forces were Ali Karaki, commander of Hezbollah’s southern front, and Abbas Niforoushan, deputy commander of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps.

The real display of Israel’s power came a few weeks earlier on Sept. 17-18 as part of the Israeli operation of blowing up thousands of Hezbollah-owned beepers and pagers. This secret maneuver eliminated Ibrahim Aqil, the commander-in-chief of Hezbollah’s unique elite unit, the Radwan Force.

The Israel Defense Forces have entered and removed dozens of meters of underground tunnels in Southern Lebanon—many lying under children’s bedrooms, replete with RPGs, Kalashnikovs, missile launchers, grenades and explosives.

There is still a threat from Hezbollah, but they are now a mere shadow of the fighting force they once were.

Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad remain active in the Gaza Strip. During the last year and a half, despite their enormous losses, Hamas has still recruited between 12,000 and 23,000 new fighters. Before the Hamas-led terrorist attacks in Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas had approximately 30,000 fighters, but the IDF claims that approximately one-third had been eliminated.

That doesn’t mean the fighting in Gaza is even remotely over.

The Fatah Party, otherwise known as the Palestinian Authority, remains a huge problem.

According to Itamar Marcus, founder and president of Palestinian Media Watch, while the United States and many other countries agree that the Hamas terror organization must be removed, there is disagreement as to who should lead after the end of the war. Mahmoud Abbas, with the backing of some European countries, has demanded that the administration be given to the P.A./Fatah, while the security control be given to the Palestinian Authority Security Forces (PASF).

But as Itamar explains, “Not only has the PASF failed to play an active role in its task of fighting terrorism, it plays an active role in Palestinian terrorism against Israelis. Senior officers in the PASF simultaneously have senior roles in the Al-Aqsa Martyrs’ Brigade, an internationally designed terror organization. Moreover, when these P.A. and Fatah terrorists have been killed, they have been honored by the P.A. with military funerals, Both the P.A. and Fatah openly and proudly showcase the terror activities of the PASF members, glorifying their conflicting roles with praise.”

As P.A. leader Mahmoud Abbas has said: “By day, (the P.A.) Security Forces, by night self-sacrificing fighters.”

In a publication by Marcus, “Terrorists in Uniform” he outlines how scores of members of Fatah and the P.A. Security Forces work simultaneously for the Al-Aqsa Martyrs’ Brigade. Indeed, according to the Spokesman for the PASF, “The highest number of martyrs and prisoners is from the Security Forces members.”

We also see weapons smuggled into Judea and Samaria (more commonly known as the “West Bank”) from Iran and through Jordan.

Looking north, an unstable Syria is being led by Abu Mohammad al-Julani (Ahmad al-Sharaa), a man who has recently changed his army fatigues of Al-Qaeda into a suit and a tie. An emerging civil war is starting between the Alawites (an Arab ethno-religious group that lives primarily in the Levant) and the jihadists. Clashes have also erupted between Lebanese tribal groups and the Syrian Armed Forces in the Bakaa Valley. And, of course, are concerns related to the neighboring Kurds.

This weekend, the United States launched massive attacks against the Iranian backed Houthis in Sanaa, the capital of Yemen. The Houthis have being launching attacks against American and Israeli ships in the Red Sea for more than a year, and have, mostly unsuccessfully, launched drones against Israeli cities. They are vowing to continue their attacks.

And the Israelis are bracing for a counterattack on their civilian infrastructure.

Looking to the east, the looming threat of an Iranian nuclear bomb remains. Iran has thousands of gas centrifuges spinning. According to the International Atomic Energy Administration (IAEA), the Islamic Republic already possesses enough highly enriched uranium for six nuclear bombs. On Oct. 26, the Israeli Air Force carried out an airstrike on Iran’s Parchin nuclear facility, destroying sophisticated equipment used to make explosives around their uranium enrichment, rendering it very difficult to replace and rebuild.

What, therefore, has changed?

Sitting around a table with a group of young soldiers and their families, it seems that the illusions of their parents, of Oslo in the 1990s, of the disengagement from the Gaza Strip in 2005 and of real peace with their neighbors have been extinguished. Wishful thinking, they say, is not a policy.

Despite tremendous costs on the individual level, they know that Israel is here to stay.

There is a feeling of resolution among the people. They recognize in their core that this is their land—the only land they have. They say that is worth fighting for—and worth making the ultimate sacrifice for.