The Fighting in Gaza: Where is it Going? INSS Insight No.

85, December 31, 2008

Brom, Shlomo

On December 27, 2008, Israel embarked on an extensive offensive against Hamas’

military and government assets in the Gaza Strip in response to Hamas’ decision not to
extend the ceasefire and instead expand the scope of its attacks against Israeli civilian
targets. Despite the many assessments, including in the media, about the possibility of
military action, Hamas was surprised by the timing of the Israeli operation and its
extent. In the first stage of the fighting, the Palestinians sustained heavy losses – some
300 dead and 600 wounded – alongside widespread damage to installations, command
centers, and arms caches. Hamas responded with rocket and mortar fire against Israeli
settlements, though at least initially to a degree less than anticipated – probably because
of the shock caused by the heavy damage inflicted on its launch capabilities and some
successful interception by Israel of Hamas launch teams.
According to Prime Minister Olmert, the objectives of the operation are "to
improve the security situation in the southern part of the country" and in Defense
Minister Barak's terms, “to change the situation from the foundation and ensure that
there will be no more fire or other activity coming from the Gaza Strip.” Wider
objectives – such as overthrowing the Hamas regime or conquest of the Gaza Strip –
were not presented. This suggests that the method of operation has been chosen to exact
a toll of Hamas and weaken it in order to create a new balance of deterrence between
Israel and Hamas, assuming that Hamas will exercise more restraint in initiating attacks
against Israel once it grasps the steep price it will have to pay and its limited ability to
cope with the Israeli response. In other words, Israel is striving for a new, stable, and
long lasting ceasefire with a weakened Hamas under terms that reflect the change in the
balance of power. Among the new conditions would be a ban on Hamas activity near
the border with Israel and limiting, to the extent possible, the smuggling of arms into the
Gaza Strip.
Hamas will do what it can to prevent this outcome. It would seem that its basic
objective is also a new ceasefire, but on its own terms, i.e., with no limits on its ability
to operate in the Gaza Strip area and along the Egyptian border, and with crossings to
Egypt and Israel that are open regularly. Hamas' primary available tool is continued
harassment of Israel; this joins the basic drive to exact a heavy cost from Israel for every
blow against the organization, and the desire to avenge the large number of Palestinian
casualties and the Hamas activists heavily represented among them.
The primary component of Hamas’ response is its continued ability to launch
rockets and mortars of a long enough range to disrupt the daily routine of many Israeli
civilians. However, its main problem is that the IDF has successfully struck a significant
portion of Hamas' capabilities and to a considerable degree suppressed the
organization’s ability to deploy the forces left at its disposal. Therefore, Hamas is likely
to try to rehabilitate its ability to deploy its forces, ideally with reduced exposure to IDF
deterrent capabilities (the weather could be of assistance, if visibility worsens), and at
the same time resort to other means of attack. By its own declarations, Hamas will try
first of all to dispatch suicide bombers to Israel from the West Bank. A central question
is thus to what extent Hamas’ terrorist infrastructure in the West Bank, badly damaged
by preventive measures taken by Israel's security forces as well as by counter operations
by the PA, is capable of launching suicide attacks of significant scope. Certainly the
motivation to carry out such missions is very high. The organization can also try to
surprise the IDF with suicide attacks and kidnappings from the Gaza Strip area. In
addition, Hamas may deviate from its usual modus operandi and engage in a dramatic
terrorist attack abroad, assisted by elements such as Hizbollah or Iran.
As is common in these situations, Israel’s primary problem is finding an exit
strategy. That is, how are the achievements of the military campaign translated into the
desired results? Such a strategy impacts on the length of the campaign and the
additional steps that may be taken, and here a central question is whether ground
operations are necessary. The main risk is that – partly due to the success of the initial
military moves – Israel will get caught up in the view that it is necessary to eliminate
physically the rocket fire capabilities of Hamas and the other terrorist organizations
from the Gaza Strip. There is no way of attaining such a goal with standoff fire, and
even a partial conquest of the Gaza Strip would not be sufficient. The range of the
rockets, the short distances of the settlements from the Gaza Strip, and the narrow width
of the Gaza Strip are such that in order to completely prevent any fire on Israeli
settlements Israel would have to conquer the entire Gaza Strip and clear it of all armed
elements. The costs of such an operation – including the political and economic costs of
re-conquering Gaza and assuming responsibility for it, and the direct cost of such
fighting – are high, and therefore it is in Israel’s interest to avoid undertaking such a
mission.
Even if Israel avoids setting itself such an objective, there is still a risk that the
military action will be extended beyond what is strictly necessary, based on the idea that
standoff fire and limited ground maneuvers can effectively neutralize Palestinian fire
almost completely. This does not mean that there will be no need for certain ground
operations in order both to demonstrate to Hamas unequivocally the costs it has to pay
and to attack the elements that so far have been less hurt by the fighting, in particular
terrorist elements such as the Izz a-Din al-Qassam forces.
Statements made by Israeli leaders suggest they understand this analysis. They
are preparing the public for a long campaign, a lesson from the Second Lebanon War
when the leaders fostered unrealistic expectations, but it is fairly clear from the limited
objectives that they would prefer to end the fighting as soon as these limited objectives
are attained.
There are two possible mechanisms for attaining the goals. The first is striving
for an agreement or understandings with Hamas about a ceasefire under new terms
through mediators from the Arab world and beyond who would be able to negotiate
with both sides. This arrangement suffers from several drawbacks: first, Hamas’
difficulty in formally instituting a ceasefire under less desirable terms than before; and
second, Israel’s concern that these agreements lend legitimacy to Hamas. The first
drawback may be overcome by making sure the agreement also regulates the opening of
the border crossings, perhaps not in full as Hamas demands but in a way that would
respond to the needs of the population. The problem is that adding this element would
strengthen Hamas’ legitimacy even more. On the other hand, the advantage of an
agreement or understandings is the ability to create a more stable ceasefire than before,
in which it is very clear what is allowed and what is not, and perhaps even the ability to
establish a monitoring mechanism to handle ceasefire-related issues such as the
monitoring group in southern Lebanon after Operation Grapes of Wrath (1996).
The second mechanism is a unilateral ceasefire on the part of both sides (as the
result of a United Nations Security Council resolution, for example), under terms in
which the price of transgressing the ceasefire terms would be made very clear to Hamas.
This would require no agreement or formal understandings. Such a ceasefire is less
stable because the two sides may offer different interpretations of what is allowed and
what is not, without there being any sort of mechanism to handle problems that arise.
 Above all, it is necessary to find mediators who can examine the different
options and help end the fighting so that Israel's strategic objectives of the campaign
will be realized based on the military moves that serve these objectives.