DAILY TRIFECTA: It's Not A War, It's A Suicide Pact
And there's no exit clause for Gaza's people
TITLE: Netanyahu says ‘victory’ over Hamas is in sight. The data tells a different story
https://edition.cnn.com/interactive/2024/08/middleeast/gaza-israel-hamas-battalions-invs-intl/
EXCERPTS: Nearly half of Hamas’ military battalions in northern and central Gaza have rebuilt some of their fighting capabilities despite more than nine months of Israel’s brutal offensive, according to analyses by the American Enterprise Institute’s Critical Threats Project, the Institute for the Study of War and CNN.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who faces growing international pressure to agree to a ceasefire and hostage release deal in Gaza, has repeatedly said that Israeli forces are nearing their stated goal of eliminating Hamas and destroying its military capabilities. Addressing a joint meeting of Congress on July 24, he said: “Victory is in sight.”
But forensic analyses of Hamas’ military operations since it led attacks against Israel on October 7, which draw on Israeli and Hamas military statements, footage from the ground and interviews with experts and eyewitnesses, cast doubt on his claims.
Israel has dealt a heavy blow to the militant group: senior Hamas figures have been killed and the ongoing offensive has reduced what once was a professional fighting force into a guerrilla army.
Hamas’ political leader, Ismail Haniyeh, was assassinated last week in Tehran in an attack Iran has blamed on Israel. Israel has not claimed responsibility, but said a day later that Hamas’ top military commander, Mohammad Deif, was killed in a July 13 airstrike in Gaza — a report Hamas has neither confirmed nor denied.
And yet, the research, which covers Hamas’ activities up until July, shows that the group appears to have made effective use of dwindling resources on the ground. Several units have made a comeback in key areas cleared by the Israeli military after pitched battles and intensive bombardment, according to the new analyses, salvaging the remnants of their battalions in a desperate bid to replenish their ranks.
“The Israelis would say that they cleared a place, but they haven’t fully cleared these areas, they haven’t defeated these fighters at all,” said Brian Carter, Middle East portfolio manager for Critical Threats Project (CTP), who led the joint research with the Institute for the Study of War (ISW) into patterns of Hamas and Israeli military activity.
“(Hamas) are ready to fight and want to fight.”
In a statement to CNN, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) rejected the findings. "The majority of Hamas brigades have been dismantled, and most battalions are at a low level of readiness, meaning they cannot function as a military framework," it said.
In response to a request for comment on the report, the Israeli Prime Minister’s Office (PMO) said that all 24 Hamas battalions had been degraded. “Twenty-two of them have been dismantled and no longer function in a military structure, and the IDF is working to dismantle the remaining two,” the PMO said in a statement.
“If the Hamas battalions were largely destroyed, Israeli forces wouldn’t still be fighting,” said retired US Army Col. Peter Mansoor, who helped oversee the deployment of an additional 30,000 US troops to Iraq in 2007 – a counterinsurgency strategy known as “the surge.”
“The fact that they’re still in Gaza, still trying to rout out elements of the Hamas battalions shows me that Prime Minister Netanyahu is wrong,” he added. “The ability of Hamas to reconstitute its fighting forces is undiminished.”
“Everywhere Hamas rears its head, we will enter,” said one high-ranking Israeli army officer, who CNN is not naming because he was not authorized to speak. “Can this ping pong stay forever? No. Our society is not built for this. And neither is the international community.”
The officer compared the campaign in Gaza to “a marathon runner who doesn’t know where the stadium is. You run and you don’t know if you’re headed in the right direction.”
TITLE: ‘We’ve lost everything, for what?’: Gazan anger at Hamas grows as war drags on
https://www.972mag.com/gazans-criticize-hamas-war-october-7/
EXCERPT: What has become clear over the past 10 months is that the Palestinian leadership — both Fatah and Hamas — has abandoned the people without any forethought or a coherent plan. While Gazans face relentless Israeli bombardment with no safe place to turn to, Hamas evades its responsibility to protect the population and Fatah is nowhere to be found.
As the war has dragged on, displays of public opposition to or criticism of Hamas have grown among Palestinians in Gaza. Many accuse Hamas of failing to anticipate the ferocity of Israel’s response to the October 7 attacks, and hold the group partially accountable for the dire consequences they are now facing.
For Palestinian journalist Ahmed Hadi (whose name has been changed for his safety, along with everyone interviewed in this article), October 7 was “a crazy decision for us as Gazans.” The attack, he argued, and particularly “the killing and capturing of Israelis, some of whom were civilians and not soldiers, unfortunately had a counterproductive effect on us. It granted Israel global sympathy and provided it with a justification to launch a brutal war on Gaza.”
Hamas, Hadi asserted, “didn’t take into account the impact that Israel’s reaction would have on Palestinian civilians. It entered the war without securing food, water, or the necessities of life. One month into the war, we were already beginning to starve and get sick.”
Beyond its failure to prepare for Israel’s response, Gazans also criticize the Hamas leadership for its lack of a clear post-war vision for the Strip’s future. “We want one of the Palestinian leaders to tell us where we are going,” Dana Khalid, a 19-year-old university student displaced in a tent in Az-Zawayda, near the central city of Deir el-Balah, told +972. “Is there still a future for us? What does [Hamas’ leader in Gaza, Yahya] Sinwar want to achieve? Where is he?”
“Why did October 7 happen?” asked Mohammed Adnan, a 27-year-old Palestinian whose carpentry shop was destroyed in February when Israeli forces entered the Zeitoun neighborhood of Gaza City. “Of course there is no justification for what Israel is doing, and we are all against Israel. We all support the decision [to fight] for liberation and freedom, but it must be a well-thought-out decision.
“When I express my opinion, people consider me a traitor who doesn’t care about the sacrifices of my people,” Adnan, who is now living in the Al-Rimal neighborhood of Gaza City, continued. “I am part of the people who suffer; I am among the many hungry ones left in the north. I have the right to speak. Or should we die silently?
“If the result of the war is full Palestinian freedom, I don’t care about my life or my home. But if it’s less than that, then the decision to go to war is absurd.”
These sentiments are reflected in a recent poll by the Institute for Social and Economic Progress, an independent Palestinian research organization. According to the study, less than 5 percent of Palestinians in Gaza want Hamas to rule in a post-war transition government, and a majority expects the Fatah-controlled Palestinian Authority to take over the Strip. Nearly 85 percent of Gazans oppose Sinwar, and only slightly fewer opposed Hamas’ political leader, Ismail Haniyeh, who was assassinated by Israel last week in Tehran.
In the face of this growing unpopularity, Hamas has attempted to silence those who criticize it, with reports of attacks and beatings that have only further fueled public discontent. On July 8, a group of masked men claiming to be from Hamas’ security forces attacked Amin Abed, a Palestinian activist and known critic of Hamas, who has been outspoken in his rejection of the October 7 attacks.
Abed told the media that he was taken from his home to a partially destroyed building, where he was beaten. The group’s leader instructed Abed’s attackers to break his fingers to prevent him from continuing to write publicly against Hamas. While Fatah condemned the “blatant assault” against Abed, Hamas has yet to respond to these allegations.
Hamas and its supporters have long claimed that the group has the backing of the Palestinian population to fight Israel. But this is a distortion of reality and an evasion of their moral and national responsibilities to their people.
As Adnan, the carpenter, told +972: “Everyone has left us alone; everyone wants us to appear as heroes who don’t tire or hunger. But no one knows that I am hungry, that I crave clean water.” True resilience involves protecting people from death, preventing the collapse of internal order and institutions, and not leaving the battlefield to the criminal Israeli army.
Adel Sultan, a 62-year-old from the Sheikh Radwan neighborhood of Gaza City, voiced his frustration with the Palestinian leadership, calling on them to agree to a ceasefire with Benjamin Netanyahu’s Israeli government as a matter of urgency. “Those who started it should end it. Where are our leaders? Let them sit with the occupation government and end the war before it ends us, as Netanyahu wants.”
“I am exhausted. I have nothing left to hold on to, no home to return to,” he told +972, with tears in his eyes. “Every night, I nearly go mad. Why is this happening? What was the outcome of Hamas’ actions on October 7? Why were we left alone? Where are the Arab and Muslim nations? Is it logical to leave our lives to an evacuation notice? Where do we go, and to whom do we turn? Can no one stop this madness?”
TITLE: Silenced bells: Gaza’s cry amidst devastation
https://baptistnews.com/article/silenced-bells-gazas-cry-amidst-devastation/
EXCERPT: As a Palestinian Christian deeply troubled by the plight of my people, I feel compelled to share the silent cries reverberating through the rubble, piercing our hearts and imploring us to breathe life back into their shattered existence.
The scenes of destruction etch themselves into our souls with haunting clarity. Once-thriving homes, towering structures, thrumming factories, vibrant businesses and bustling retail centers now lie in ruins. The vast majority of the 2.2 million inhabitants are displaced, starved and cast aside by a world that seems to have turned a blind eye.
The very foundations of education, once pillars of enlightenment and progress, now stand as harrowing reminders of a silenced future. Vital infrastructure that sustains life — water, electricity, communication networks — lie in disarray, depriving people of their fundamental needs and plunging them deeper into the abyss of despair.
The loss of fertile lands and decimated crops, which form the backbone of Gaza’s economy, has exacerbated their pain, while critical healthcare needs remain unanswered. Innocent children, their tender souls scarred by the horrors they have witnessed, cry out for immediate solace and healing.
Churches with their bell towers — once symbols of solace, joy, prayer and community — now stand damaged, lonely, sad and mourning, adding to the profound sense of loss and devastation.
In this shattered landscape, the most vulnerable bear the heaviest burdens. Widowed women, orphaned children and fishermen stripped of their livelihoods are left to navigate an uncertain future, their hopes flickering like fragile flames in an unforgiving wind. Their pleas for care, support and even the faintest glimmer of hope resonate deeply within us.
We must recognize the profound human toll behind the rubble and extend our unwavering compassion to alleviate their anguish.