In subtle but increasingly vocal ways, Israel’s military leaders are signaling that the country has achieved all it can militarily in Lebanon and Gaza, and it is time for politicians to strike a deal.
This comes as Lebanon’s prime minister says a ceasefire between Hezbollah and Israel could be imminent. Both American presidential candidates have also made it clear that they do not want wars in Gaza and Lebanon to be on the agenda when they take office.
When the Israel Defense Forces’ top general sat down with officials in northern Gaza — who are waging one of the fiercest military operations since last year’s invasion — he went further than ever in suggesting that the military phases of both conflicts should end.
“In the north, there is a possibility of reaching a definitive conclusion,” said Herzi Halevi, Chief of the General Staff, referring to the war against Hezbollah in Lebanon. In Gaza, he said, “if we remove the Brigade commander from northern Gaza, it will be another collapse… I don’t know what we will find tomorrow, but this pressure brings us closer to more achievements.”
What these achievements should be is a matter of much consternation.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has repeatedly promised “absolute victory.” His defense minister and longtime political tormentor Yoav Gallant bristled at this goal. In August, he told a closed-door parliamentary committee meeting that the idea of “absolute victory” in Gaza was “absurd,” according to Israeli media.
Gallant’s dark view of Netanyahu’s war aim was made official when, earlier this week, he reportedly sent a private memo to the prime minister and the rest of his cabinet saying the war had lost its way.
“The current situation in which we operate, without a valid compass and without updated war objectives, undermines campaign management and cabinet decisions,” Gallant wrote, according to Israel’s Channel 13, an affiliate of CNN .
In Gaza, he wrote, Israel must secure the release of the remaining hostages, make sure there is no military threat from Hamas, and promote civilian rule. This is a far cry from the existing maximalist war objective of eliminating Hamas’ military and governance capabilities.
THE CNN asked the Israeli Ministry of Defense for a comment on the memo. A spokesman for the prime minister declined to comment.
Lebanon’s interim prime minister, Najib Mikati, said on Wednesday (30) that he was optimistic that a possible ceasefire between Hezbollah and Israel could be reached “in the next few hours or days”, after speaking with the envoy from the USA Amos Hochstein, who arrived in the region this Thursday.
Israel last month carried out a massive nationwide bombing campaign in Lebanon and killed Hezbollah’s elusive leader, Hassan Nasrallah. In his interview, Mikati indicated that Hezbollah is no longer insisting that its conflict with Israel will only cease when the war in Gaza ends. This would allow him to accept a ceasefire without ending the Gaza campaign.
“There is at the moment a desire to abandon the war in Lebanon while we are at the front,” a person familiar with the Israeli government’s thinking told CNN .
Gallant said Hamas and Hezbollah have now become completely ineffective as Iranian proxies.
“These two organizations, Hamas and Hezbollah, which have been groomed for years as a long arm against the State of Israel, are no longer an effective tool in the hands of Iran,” Gallant said during a memorial service on Sunday. “We know that some objectives cannot be achieved by military action alone, and therefore we must honor our moral obligations to bring our captives home, despite the painful compromises involved.”
And yet Netanyahu remained defiant. When the Knesset, Israel’s parliament, returned from recess this week, the prime minister appeared to repeat his maximalist objective and indicated he was unlikely to accept a conclusion so soon: “Absolute victory is an orderly and consistent work plan that we fulfill step by step.” step,” he said.
Meanwhile, Israel and Hamas are engaged in indirect negotiations in Qatar for the first time in two months. Netanyahu’s office said on Monday that if a limited proposal — a brief ceasefire in exchange for the release of hostages — was offered, “the prime minister would accept it on the spot.” However, a source familiar with the negotiations said to CNN that Netanyahu continues to refuse to give any concrete guarantees of a path to a greater agreement to end the war.
“The most important war objective has not been achieved, which is to bring the hostages home,” another official familiar with the negotiations told CNN . “Gaza will not end until the hostages are home.”
This content was originally published in Military personnel signal that they carried out a mission in Gaza and Lebanon; Will Netanyahu listen? on the CNN Brasil website.
Source: CNN Brasil
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