Global News : Passport : Ricks : Drezner : Walt : Rothkopf : Lynch
The Cable : The AfPak Blog : Net Effect : Shadow Govt. : Madam Secretary : The Call
"We have no grand political scheme"
I spent the morning at a lecture organized by GWU's outstanding Homeland Security Policy Institute's Ambassador's Roundtable Series featuring Israel's Ambassador to the United States Sallai Meridor. It was a profoundly dismaying experience. Because if Ambassador Meridor is taken at his word, then Israel has no strategy in Gaza.
Asked three times by audience members, Meridor simply could not offer any plausible explanation as to how its military campaign in Gaza would achieve its stated goals. Indeed, he at times seemed to offer this absence of strategy as a virtue, as evidence that the war had been forced upon Israel rather than chosen: "we have no grand political scheme... we were forced to defend ourselves to provide better security, period." With current estimates of 550 Palestinians dead and 2500 wounded, and the region in turmoil, the absence of strategy is not a virtue.
Meridor's narrative is assuredly familiar to anyone who follows the op-ed pages. He argued repeatedly that "this was not a matter of choice, not something we picked or were hoping for", but rather a war launched by Hamas to which Israel was forced to respond. Hamas must be understood as part of the global struggle against radical Islamic terrorism, he insisted, a war led by Iran ("the world's largest exporter of terror") and employing "sub- conventional weapons of mass destruction" (suicide bombers). The goal, he explained, was to create "a better, more secure situation for us and the Palestinians" by degrading Hamas's capabilities and by re-establishing the credibility of its deterrence.
But how, exactly? After he failed to respond to an initial question about the end-state Israel hoped to achieve, I asked him directly about his government's strategic logic. How, precisely did Israel's government expect its military campaign to achieve its goals? His answer tellingly focused almost exclusively on body counts and targets hit: over 1000 Hamas targets hit ("not a small number"), many headquarters and tunnels and rocket production facilities destroyed. Tactics over strategy.
But as to a political strategy tied to the military campaign, nothing. No guidance as to whether Israel would re-occupy Gaza, or on what terms it would accept a cease-fire. No thoughts as to whether the campaign would cause Hamas to fall from power or help the Palestinian Authority regain political power. An absolute refusal to entertain a question about the negative effects of the images from Gaza on the wider region (the important image of the war, he nearly spat, should be that "terror is not allowed to win"). Would the military assault at least change Hamas's strategic calculus? "This is for the future, only the future will tell."
In short, Meridor quite literally offered no strategy beyond hitting Gaza hard and hoping for the best. "In terms of creating damage we are certainly on the right path," noted the Ambassador. Few would disagree with that assessment, at least. But some might hope that the bloody, battered path might actually be leading somewhere.
Advertisement
FOREIGN POLICY is published by the Slate Group,
a division of Washingtonpost.Newsweek Interactive, LLC.
All contents ©2009 Washingtonpost.Newsweek Interactive, LLC. All rights reserved.
What is
Abu Aardvark?
Writing under this pseudonym, Marc Lynch began his influential Middle East politics blog Abu Aardvark in 2002...
Contact me at:
abuaardvark [at]
gmail.com
Follow me on Twitter, @abuaardvark
Follow me on
:
@abuaardvark
Very depressing commentary
Very depressing commentary from the Ambassador.
Thanks for the report.
Meridor and End Strategy
It seems irrational to expect, as Marc Lynch seems to, a party to a war to reveal his end strategy in advance, especially in the Middle East. As social scientists are fond of teaching, uncertainty on the part of the enemy compels caution (c.f. the groundbreaking work of Ithiel de Sola Pool, MIT)
David Sternlight
Los Angeles
Strategy
Mr. Sternlight-
I suggest that you are reading "strategy" incorrectly.
It does not seem at all irrational, to me, but rather commonplace, that a party to a war should be able to "offer [a] plausible explanation as to how its military campaign [] would achieve its stated goals," which is really the subject of the post, not military strategy.
Bombing doesn't work
From the Blitz to the Tokyo firebombings to Gaza today, bombing does not work. There is something of a seductive logic to the notion that by simply killing swathes of people, they will subsequently rise up in fear and demand of their politicians to end the conflict somehow. This was exactly the logic of Coventry, Dresden and Tokyo (which killed more people than the Atomic bomb). However, as each example clearly demonstrates, this logic is hopelessly floored and indeed causes exactly the opposite: the population to come together under their retribution-promising leadership against their clear enemy.
If Israel think, therefore, that they can intimidate, scare and (essentially) bomb the Palestinians into some kind of submission or political acquiescence - as, in the absence of any other appreciable strategy, one might assume - history suggests that this strategy will unequivocally fail.
www.thegulfblog.com
Bombing works a little bit.
While it's true that bombing doesn't have the effects on enemy attitudes that bombers desire, still it has material effects.
Very time an israeli bomb destroys a palestinian rocket, that's one rocket that will not be shot at israel, doing little damage but requiring people to sit in air raid shelters.
Every time an israeli bomb kills a palestinian suicide bomber, that's one suicide bomber who will never sneak across the border and blow himself up.
Every time an israeli bomb destroys a palestinian government building, that's one government building that will not be used by Hamas to do things israel might disapprove of.
Every time an israeli bomb kills a palestinian child, that's one child who will not grow up to be a suicide bomber.
Etc.
What an appalling notion.
"Every time an israeli bomb kills a palestinian child, that's one child who will not grow up to be a suicide bomber."
Yes, it's an appalling
Yes, it's an appalling notion.
And worse, the ones who get killed aren't the marginal children.
If israel kills 500 palestinian children, that's 500 palestinian children who won't grow up to attack israel. But that definitely doesn't mean that there will be 500 fewer palestinians in the next generation who attack israel. There could easily be a thousand palestinians who would not have attacked israel, who will because of the 500 who were killed.
It's hard to do the math on this kind of thing.
If israel could just kill a particular 50,000 children and get peace on their terms, they'd do it as fast as they could gtet the names to the death squads. But it doesn't work that way.
Palestinian children are
What is one to say to that?
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090109/ap_on_re_mi_ea/un_un_gaza_humanitarian_toll
Not being upfront about their
Not being upfront about their aims is not the same as having none. Israel almost certainly has clear aims but prefers ambiguity.
Israel cannot openly say it wants to topple Hamas and replace it with Fatah. In 1982, it could not openly say it wanted to topple the Lebanese government and place Gemayel and the Phalangists in power.
So when people argue "but how will this stop the rockets?" they are assuming Israel really cares about the rockets, when in fact it does not. I'm sure the people in Sderot do, but quite honestly this "war" (more like ghetto uprising) is not for their benefit and indeed they wont benefit from it.
Meridor also cannot say he wants to box Obama into their confrontation with Iran/Hizbollah, the latter of which will certainly be the target of the next government after the elections. (assuming all goes according to plan in Gaza)
This is not to say all their objectives will be met-I think they will not-but they do have clear objectives.
What's the great mystery?
What's the great mystery? After this, there's a good chance that Hamas rockets across the border will cease. Hizbullah has stopped firing rockets from Lebanon, hasn't it?
Hopefully that was sarcastic
In any event, maybe Hizbullah had stopped, but hey it's 2009! All missiles must go! Let's shoot a few just for funsies.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/09/world/middleeast/09mideast.html?hp
Grand Strategy
What if the strategy is to simply contain gaza as much as they can, and respond militarily to gazan attacks? Why isn't that a 'workable' strategy, to respond when attacked? What if the long term goal is simply to maintain the status quo? In some ways, it seems like Israel may have simply given up on a peace process in relation to Gaza, but why isn't that in itself a strategy? It doesn't seem like it would be any more ineffectual than anything else they can try with Hamas.
The Middle East has certain
The Middle East has certain ways of behavior, which existed long before the creation of the State of Israel. Although some are foreign or even antithetical to Western ways, one has to speak the local language to be understood.
One such value is "step on my toes and I'll drop a house on you." The Israelis, after trying Western ways of dialogue with Hamas and the PLO for years without success have finally come to realize that to be understood they must speak "Middle East" to them.
It's no good for Westerners to whine about it. Instead, the West must adapt to local language when dealing with people who seem only to understand that language. Can you say, "shock and awe"? I knew you could.
The Israelis, after trying
The Israelis, after trying Western ways of dialogue with Hamas and the PLO for years without success have finally come to realize that to be understood they must speak "Middle East" to them.
So when were those years? 1948 to 1953, maybe? No, couldn't have been, back then israel affirmed there was no such thing as a palestinians, there were only arab refugees.
Maybe the first few years of the first intifada? No, back then israel was dropping houses on them.
It's no good for Westerners to whine about it. Instead, the West must adapt to local language when dealing with people who seem only to understand that language.
I see. So what westerners need to say to israel is "Stop with all this continual destruction that's getting on our nerves. Make peace or we will drop a house on you." And then do it repeatedly until israelis understand that we mean it.
Maybe somebody could explain
Maybe somebody could explain what's wrong with what Peterkins is saying. Since the 2006 war Hezbollah has stopped the cross-border provocations that led to the war; the war was an effective deterrent. (And they're disavowing the rockets fired today--they aren't the only ones with Katyushas in Lebanon). How would Israel "degrade Hamas's capabilities" in a war other than by destroying their armaments and infrastructure and killing their fighters? How would Israel "re-establish the credibility of its deterrence" other than by responding to aggression with massive retaliation rather than the concessions Hamas was hoping for? Meridor answered Lynch's question by giving concrete examples of how Israel is doing these things. To some extent the end state doesn't matter in achieving these goals; if Israel just stopped attacking today Hamas would still have a very different expectation of how Qassam attacks would be responded to than it did the week before the war.
why no stragegy
I suspect the reason the Israeli ambassador did not give us a strategy is that there simply isn't one that could work.
Several people have mentioned that Hezbollah has stopped its rocket attacks since 2006. Alas, Hamas is far more focused on the destruction of Israel than is Hezbollah. Does anyone really believe that it would decide to stop attacking Israel if Israel's military left? Or is permanent occupation the plan, and how workable would that be? Like I said, there is no rational plan.
Several people have mentioned
Several people have mentioned that Hezbollah has stopped its rocket attacks since 2006.
Has anybody noticed whether israel has stopped attacking Hezbollah since 2006?
That would probably make a difference, wouldn't it?
Israel never stopped attacking Hamas, whether there was an official cease-fire or not.
A non de-nile denial
A comment by veteran CBS correspondent Bob Simon in a recent interview with Charlie Rose was intriguing: "At dinner in Tel Aviv," he said, "Everything is discussed except politics ... family, friends, theatre, music, Tuscany ... you name it, it's discussed. But not the politics of the situation ... Because they are tired of it? Yes. And because they are in a state of denial. They are living a very good life. The life in Tel Aviv is a good life and they don' want to be bothered with these questions ..." So, just close your eyes and fire, then ...
If you listen to Israeli
If you listen to Israeli radio or television, you will notice that the different ministers and officials almost always state different goals for the Gaza operation. There is no coordination as to exactly what they are trying to do, aside from bombing Hamas and the rest of the people there.