It will be interesting if we ever learn the timing of when the tunnels to Egypt from Rafah, or the smuggling began to increase...

In 2012 Hamas leaders moved to Qatar. That was when Morsi of the MB was running Egypt. At the time it was assumed that the MB and groups like it would sweep the region in the wake of the Arab Spring and extremists exploiting the "spring" with support from Doha and Ankara. By 2013 Sisi was in charge in Egypt, and one thing that he wanted to stop was the insurgency in Sinai. It took years to do that. Hamas in Gaza had exploited the chaos in Sinai and also chaos in Libya and elsewhere to benefit. There was a conflict in 2012 and 2014.

Israel's IDF said today that "The bodies of the hostages Yitzhak Gelernter, Shani Louk, and Amit Buskila were rescued overnight during a joint IDF and ISA operation. Based on verified intelligence in our possession, Yitzhak Gelernter, Shani Louk, and Amit Buskila were murdered during the October 7th Massacre at the Mefalsim Intersection, and their bodies were abducted to Gaza." This is a reminder that Hamas has not been charged with crimes against humanity yet and it continued to receive a lot of backing from intl NGOs...and it is ALSO a reminder of how so many voices tried to prevent an IDF operation in Gaza because they wanted to let Hamas keep holding bodies as leverage, just as Hamas did with the bodies of Oron Shaul and Hadar Goldin, which Hamas illegally held for a decade and which Hamas continues to hold.

I believe the goal of Hamas is to leverage Oct. 7 to come to power in the West Bank. Working with Fatah would be one step on that road. It's important to understand that Hamas has a lot more backing abroad today than the PA. Hamas is backed by Ankara, Doha, Tehran and also by Moscow, and probably also Beijing. The PA is being starved of resources. Hamas is making its moves. Israel's leadership has opposed the PA running Gaza because of the concerns about Fatah. This has led to arguments that Hamas shouldn't be replaced by Fatah. However...in the end of the day Israel is being handed a fait accompli...that Hamas is already seeking to move closer to the PA's factions

I’m on the Gaza border today visiting several sites related to the humanitarian aid crossings and covering several stories. One thing I was struck by was the thought that the current debate in Israel over plans for the “day after” are only a tip of the iceberg of the larger question of reconstruction If the war ends there is going to be a battle to “win the peace”….which means the countries that back Hamas will want to do the reconstruction and that means rebuilding the tunnels and bringing in more weapons as they did after 2009.

The US-built floating pier could be operational in coming days according to a briefing today. The pier will be off the coast of Gaza and will enable a new maritime corridor from Cyprus where cargo ships will arrive at the. pier and offload goods, then the items will be put on trucks to be shuttled to shore on smaller ships that offload them to a pier affixed to the shore; then the goods go inland.

A few takeaways from the briefing. United States Agency for International Development Response Director Dan Dieckhaus and Vice Admiral Brad Cooper, Deputy Commander, United States Central Command spoke at the briefing. It was insightful into how this important mission is being characterized.

Israel's Minister of Defense Yoav Gallant puts out an important statement pressing the government to finally come up with a strategy in Gaza after seven months.

"We must dismantle Hamas’ governing capabilities in Gaza. The key to this goal is military action, and the establishment of a governing alternative in Gaza. In the absence of such an alternative, only two negative options remain: Hamas’ rule in Gaza, or Israeli military rule in Gaza." "The meaning of indecision, is choosing one of the negative options - it would erode our military achievements, lessen the pressure on Hamas, and sabotage the chances of achieving a framework for the release of hostages. Already in October, on the night of our military maneuver [into Gaza], the defense establishment presented its war plan to the Cabinet, stating that it will be necessary to destroy Hamas battalions, while simultaneously working to establish a local, non-hostile Palestinian governing alternative."

There's something complex and symbolic about this, that requires a short article looking back at what could have been and how it all ended up.

My view has always been that Gaza was betrayed by the international community. The airport had long ceased to function due to the second intifada, but when Israel left in 2005 there was ample opportunity to make a change for the better. However, what happened was that Hamas was allowed to take over Gaza via a violent coup. Very quickly after that, the international community embraced working with Hamas and NGOs and the UN and others began to partner with them, rather than condemn Hamas and isolate it and get the PA back into Gaza, the int'l community paved the way for its increasing authoritarianism and then its wars.

It appears there is emerging concern within the IDF about the policy of going into neighborhoods like Jabalya and Zaytun again and again without a plan of who will run them after; essentially returning them to Hamas. In operations in Zaytun for instance, several soldiers have been killed in the last days. For instance:

“We are now operating once again in Jabaliya. As long as there’s no diplomatic process to develop a governing body in the Strip that isn’t Hamas, we’ll have to launch campaigns again and again in other places to dismantle Hamas’s infrastructure,” Halevi was quoted by Channel 13 as saying. “It will be a Sisyphean task.”

timesofisrael.com/idf-chief-said…

I see sometimes comparisons between the war in Gaza and the battle of Mosul, comparing the number of terrorists estimated killed and number of civilians. I think these comparisons require an additional layer of analysis. It’s not just about numbers and estimates, it really should be about the end result too.

I was in Mosul and Gaza so I know something about both. Let’s just say that Hamas had 30,000 fighters and ISIS had 5-10,000 in Mosul maybe. If you go in with a measure of trying to get civilian casualties at 1:1 or something, is that really a good goal, or is the BETTER goal to defeat the enemy and control the area and end the war as fast as possible with minimum civilian deaths?

One of the greatest misconceptions of the war, in my view, is that Hamas has taken heavy losses and is somehow on the ropes.

It is not. Hamas has returned to 90 percent of Gaza, mostly because Israel left every place it "cleared." The evidence for this is that Israel has gone repeatedly back into areas like Zaytun to fight Hamas again...it literally returns immediately after Israel leaves. There is zero evidence that Hamas is under pressure. Hamas feels it is winning. Hamas may have lost thousands of its fighters, including senior commanders. But Hamas has ALWAYS been willing to take losses. It's entire history is full of it losing men, and having them detained and eliminated.

yes the goal is to keep Hamas in power, a goal of the west, and of Russia, Ankara and other countries, since at least 2012 and likely before. I don't know why, but Hamas is a group that a lot of countries want to run Gaza, even though it does tremendous harm and even though it massacred 1,000 people on Oct. 7...it's the most favored group in the entire region. Hamas gets more support than the PA, it gets more high level meetings, and it is a kind of consensus that Hamas should not just run Gaza, but I think quietly a lot of countries want to position it to run the West Bank also. After 2007 when Hamas illegally took over Gaza and set in motion numerous wars...a decision was made to have western allies, who backed Hamas, to also host their leaders...the goal here (as with the Taliban) was to bring them to power. It took more than a decade...but they are on the verge of the goal.

Here's a question. According to the optimistic data on the Gaza war, the IDF has defeated up to 19 of the Hamas "battalions" and eliminated up to 14,000 terrorists and wounded the same number (i.e 28,000) and detained others. So if you add it up...you'd get the picture that Hamas barely has any men left, just a few thousand or so.

But let me ask this...how many men has Hamas recruited in seven months of war. One of the things that the stories about Hamas "battalions" never seems to take into account is the fact that Hamas has access to more men. It has plenty of weapons stockpiled over a decade and a half. It doesn't require men to do much more than use rifles and RPGs nowadays.

The story of the US delaying munitions for Israel is getting a lot of coverage, the BBC call it the "biggest warning yet for Israel."

So here's my question. While countries are growing frustrated with the long war in Gaza, have there been any real repercussions for Hamas since Oct. 7 on the global stage? What I mean is this. Hamas is hosted by two western allies, in Doha and Ankara. There were no repercussions for Hamas leaders in Doha after Oct. 7. While the US and western leaders expressed support for Israel, they didn't move to sanction those leaders more or put them on trial for crimes against humanity.

This story encapsulates what I've always felt about these talks since the beginning. Basically Israel is on one side of the table and Hamas is working via Doha, and Doha is a western ally, so in essence there is a lot that goes on behind the scenes and Israel is always on the losing end of these talks because Hamas is hosted by a "major non-NATO ally" which gives Hamas huge leverage (more than Israel).

THIS is what makes Hamas different than Hezbollah. If Hezbollah had done an Oct. 7 it would be more. isolated because it isn't hosted by western allies. Hamas is indirectly allied with the West and this means it has a huge upper hand in the hostage talks. It's also important to understand how disastrous these talks have been. After the first hostage deal in November, Israel's defense establishment put out a narrative that military pressure would lead to more deals. Hamas violated the first deal and the released hostages told stories about the abuse of the remaining hostages.

I was reading this article about humanitarian aid work and suffering in Gaza and this paragraph struck me.

It notes that before the war many children in Gaza were suffering. And then it admits, correctly, that Hamas started this war. And the war Hamas started has made everything much worse. The article makes me outraged that this war wasn't prevented. How come the TWO WESTERN ALLIES that back and host and support Hamas didn't prevent this? How come the West, via its allies, didn't make sure a war like this didn't happen?

edition.cnn.com/2024/05/05/opi… I think we need to be serious and clear about this fact. Hamas was hosted in Doha, a "major non-NATO ally" of the US and the West. Hamas was hosted there since 2012. Hamas received financial support for Gaza. The West knew this. The West agreed with this and wanted Gaza to function this way.

The narrative is now going to go all-out to stop an operation in Rafah…because Hamas needs to control the border so it can control humanitarian aid and work with its partners around the region and around the world who quietly backed it for years. When you see the voices exaggerating about Rafah, you’ll know who is behind the goal of keeping Hamas in power in Gaza Hamas didn’t come to power by accident, this is one of the most well funded, powerful terrorist groups in the world…even as an “armed group” or “militant”…it far exceeds anything else and it gets clout like hosted and backed by two western allies. No other group gets this backing and absolute power.

I don’t think that’s accurate. I don’t recall her condemning Oct 7 or taking a strong action against what happened. Did Amman do anything on Oct 7 or the days after for the victims? Ankara didn’t condemn Oct 7. Doha didn’t. Moscow didn’t. Beijing didn’t. In fact most of the world DID NOT condemn the Hamas massacre. Most of the world DID NOT take strong actions or strong positions. A lot of countries backed Hamas.

She says this but it deserves push back.

I don’t remember her visiting the victims of Oct 7…or basically doing anything.

The fact is that if Ankara-Doha-Moscow and other countries had wanted to prevent Oct 7 they could have. Instead they backed Hamas and enabled it to happen and Amman’s track record in this is not great. Amman warned Israel before the 1973 war. Why didn’t it pick up chatter before Oct 7 and pass on warnings? We hear this a lot, “everyone condemned Oct 7…Israel had the world’s sympathy”….but this must always be confronted with “what did you say on Oct 7?” Usually the person making this claim didn’t condemn it or excused it. And then you need to ask them for examples of condemnation or action by US allies that back Hamas such as Doha and Ankara and also other powerful countries such as Russia and China. Just start going through the list because most countries did not condemn Hamas.

Not only is Hamas "fighting capacity" not destroyed, every day that goes by the group is growing again. It now controls most of Gaza again and there is almost no military pressure on it as Israel's campaign has stalled and most IDF units withdrawn from Gaza. Hamas has obtained a de facto ceasefire in Gaza without a hostage deal and a de facto withdrawal by the IDF without a deal, so it got most of what it wanted already. Hamas may be exaggerating its capabilities, but it is openly bragging about coordinating attacks on the Netzarim corridor with other terrorist groups in Gaza such as PIJ, which shows what it is thinking. It is already thinking about entrenching itself around the corridor and waging a war of attrition

It’s fascinating how Hamas holds court across the region and holds the whole region hostage and major powers and every country has to go to beg them for months. They sit and are not condemned but rather empowered since Oct 7 and rewarded and treated like a country. It’s obvious the message here is that groups should be like Hamas rather than that countries should distance themselves from this massacre. Hamas is openly rewarded not just by its backers and hosts such as Turkey and Qatar and Iran but also by the U.S. and Russia and moderate states. It’s truly extraordinary. Before Oct 7 none of these countries were waiting on Hamas every word. Now they do. They don’t condemn it for holding hostages and destroying Gaza. They REWARD it. This is WHY Oct 7 happened. Hamas knew it would be rewarded because it was likely told this before it carried out the attack. We have to understand Oct 7 was likely planned abroad or at least its general framework was agreed to. The agreement was that on Oct 8 Turkey will demand a ceasefire and Doha will go to work to get Hamas a good deal for hostages and use its influence in the U.S. and Israel to achieve this, likely meaning hostages are left in Gaza for months or years for slow deals that extend a ceasefire forever

There's something about that cartoon of the scorpion and the frog...like somehow Hamas massacred 1,000 people and his olding 133 hostage...to get rid of Hamas you need to bring the PA to run Gaza, but Israel's ruling coalition doesn't want the PA to run Gaza because it views the PA as a larger long-term threat...so it can't come up with a day after plan...and meanwhile the PA keeps trying to isolate Israel, thus resulting in Israel bashing the PA...leaving Hamas to return to Gaza...

Why is it like the scorpion and the frog. Because it's in the "character" of the conflict to be this way. I'm not making a value judgement here on the PA or Israel's actions (Hamas in my view is a genocidal organization that should be destroyed completely)...I'm just saying that it's in the "nature" of the PA and Israel to do this and it prevents positive outcomes...much as the scorpion and frog couldn't work together and instead end up drowning eachother... Am I saying that the infighting between Israel and the PA will result in them doing a proverbial drowning to eachother...yes I think in the long run unless they can escape this problem...then Hamas will end up running the West Bank and will bring more war to Israel.

One of the greatest disasters for the Middle East has been the international community's decision to cement in power extremist militia groups and turn them into "states" basically in the region. This happened with Hamas, Hezbollah, the Houthis and other groups. It's important to note that this is not how the international community dalt with similar groups in other countries such as Boko Haram or Al Shabab or the FARC, it's basically only in the Middle East where the UN and international groups and also major powers, swoop in to make sure that Hamas controls Gaza, and keep Hezbollah strengthened in Lebanon and create deals for the Houthis to keep them in power.