One of the biggest problems that Israel faces is that it has no credible partners beyond the United States.
It was reported recently that something went wrong in Gaza. During the ephemeral ceasefire, a program was set up in the middle of the strip. A joint venture of Egyptian and American contractors was tasked with checking vehicles returning from the south of Gaza to the north. During the fighting, much of the population was sent south. Israel wanted to ensure that terrorists would not return to the north during the lull in the fighting. According to recent reports, no less than 20,000 Hamas terrorists moved from south to north during the break in fighting. How could such an outcome occur? My guess is that those approaching the barrier could see where the Egyptians and Americans were working and made sure that they entered the Egyptian lanes. Egypt is a fan of Hamas (though it crushes its own branch of the Muslim Brotherhood) and allowed for virtually all of the weapons that entered into Gaza through the Rafah crossing. Their people couldn't care less if 25-year-old men with Kalashnikovs passed through their positions.
And that is the problem that Israel faces. There is no credible body that can take the place of Israelis for any type of security or food distribution in the strip. The UN showed via UNRWA that its joy in dead Jews rivals that of Hamas. Twenty years ago, EU observers were placed on the Rafah crossings with little success. The Palestinian Authority is corrupt and only regrets that Hamas got to kill so many Jews without telling them. Other than the Americans whose presence I would not want in Gaza unless it is cleared out, there is no reliable body or country that could serve to replace the IDF and keep order. One might mention the UAE, but if they started killing Gazans to stop terror activities, how long before they would face some backlash at home? In short, Israel has no one to turn over the Gaza Strip even if it wanted to do so.
All of those bodies that pretend to be honest and fair have shown that they are completely corrupt and antisemitic. The UN played a key role in helping Hamas prepare, execute and follow through on the October 7th attacks. As Israel progressed through the enclave, many Hamas facilities were found embedded in UNRWA buildings. Returned hostages spoke of UNRWA supplies being in the possession of Hamas terrorists who held them. As an IDF officer explained it to me: while Hamas was busy building tunnels and preparing for the attacks, UNRWA took care of the social services, hospitals, etc. If Hamas, as the governing body in Gaza, had to deal with schools, food, and hospitals, it would not have had the bandwidth to prepare the attacks.
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The Palestinian Authority, like a recently fired football coach, is always offered as the perfect solution for the job opening of patrolling Gaza. Macron met his counterparts from Egypt and Jordan to demand that the PA be put in charge of Gaza. Is there anyone with an IQ over three who would seriously believe that the PA would shoot up a Hamas terror cell rather than let it get to the fence with Israel and launch an attack against the Jews? Given the choice between being a serious governmental body preparing to take on the trappings of statehood and remaining a bunch of terror hoodlums out for Jewish blood, the PA proves that you can’t teach an old dog new tricks. Few people know that the many militias associated with Yasir Arafat’s Fatah movement made for more attacks than did Islamist Hamas during the second intifada. Like the UN, the PA simply cannot be trusted to fight bad guys, seize weapons and run the place with zero tolerance for attacks on Jews.
An incident last week is indicative of the overall problem. The IDF identified Palestinian ambulances traveling in the strip. Soldiers opened fire and killed 14 people who were later described as Red Crescent workers. Some reports claim that there were terrorists among those killed, and there is no question that the Palestinians have historically used ambulances to move terrorists and weapons under the nose of Israel. So what can Israel do: every person, including doctors and every group, including the supposedly non-terror Red Crescent, is part of the anti-Israel program. There is literally no one in Palestinian society on whom Israel could rely to run Gaza or any other Palestinian area.
Egypt has been clobbered by the fighting in Gaza. First, it lost its very lucrative business along the Philadelphi Corridor. Then the Houthis wiped out their billion dollar business of running the Suez Canal. Ships do not come and hundreds of millions of dollars are lost every month. Nobody could seriously expect the Egyptians to patrol Gaza. From the example above, one can see that the Egyptians have no interest in taking on Hamas. Should they run Gaza alone or in conjunction with another body, Israel’s safety will be in grave danger.
To compound matters, Israel has the same problem in the north. Hezbollah is supposed to be north of the Litani River and disarmed. The Lebanese government may not like Hezbollah but until recently it did not have the courage to take on the Iran-backed terror group. The Lebanese army has the same problem: they have been shown to ignore armed Hezbollah terrorists and not actively work to disarm or confront the Shia terror group. Syria breaking from Iran via the uprising against the Assad regime has weakened Hezbollah by cutting off its primary route for arms supply. Still, Hezbollah exists and a day does not go by without Israel blowing up terrorists or some military infrastructure. Hezbollah supposedly offered to disarm in exchange for Israel leaving key positions that it is holding in south Lebanon. This is a new proposal, but let’s ask the question: who will be the body to certify that Hezbollah is disarmed and check in the future that nothing has changed? The Lebanese army, whose American equipment has been found in the past in Hezbollah’s hands? The UN, whose UNIFIL positions were only meters from fortified Hezbollah bunkers? Hezbollah will say that it has disarmed, Israel will leave, Hezbollah will rearm, and the north of Israel will become unsafe again.
While the world screams at Israel to stop making war, serious leaders might want to think for a minute or two why Israel cannot so easily disengage from Gaza or Lebanon (and now Syria). If Israel allows Egypt and the Palestinians to once again enjoy a common border, the entire Gaza Strip will fill up with weapons as before. Israel needs to figure out an endgame that serves its security needs while keeping the smallest footprint in foreign lands. Right now, other than the United States, there is no country that can reliably support the security of Israel and its citizens.
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