Israel’s current large-scale operation is the last one in Gaza

AS ISRAEL’S OFFENSIVE in Gaza ends its tenth week there is little sign that it is lessening in intensity. The Israel Defence Forces (IDF) have deployed an entire airborne division in and around the southern city of Khan Younis, where it believes that senior leaders of Hamas, which on October 7th murdered 1,200 Israelis and took 240 people hostage, are now holed up. Three armoured divisions are still operating in the northern sector. Fierce fighting has been occurring in the Shujaiya and Jabalia areas of Gaza city. The IDF is destroying tunnels, where Hamas fighters take refuge, and infrastructure, both military and civilian, in the city and its outskirts. Israel’s bombardment continues: more than 18,000 Gazans, mostly civilians, have died.

Yet the current large-scale offensive is almost certainly the last of the war against Hamas. “We have been at peak deployment for over two months now,” said one security official. “The next stage will be a lower-intensity mobile campaign.” The big question for Israeli generals is whether that shift will thwart Israel’s main war aim: destroying the military capabilities of Hamas, the Islamist group bent on destroying Israel that has governed Gaza for 16 years.

Israel has little choice but to scale back its offensive. Its main ally and supplier of arms, America, is insisting on lower levels of firepower to avoid more mass killing of civilians. The bombardments have destroyed much of Gaza city, the biggest in the strip, and have displaced 1.8m people, nearly four-fifths of the enclave’s population. Israeli operations will have to avoid the tent cities in the south where they now shelter. The continued mobilisation of 360,000 reserve soldiers is beginning to strain Israel’s economy.

As the most intense phase of the offensive nears its conclusion, Israel is trying to give its citizens the impression that resistance from Hamas is collapsing and that it now controls extensive territory in the strip. Footage has appeared on social media of dozens of men rounded up by Israeli soldiers, who order them stripped to their underwear in order to be searched for explosive belts. The IDF has raised the Israeli flag in Palestine Square in Gaza city and lit Hannukah candles at several battlefield locations. But this is not yet the “victory picture”—the image that confirms a final triumph—that Israeli citizens are demanding from their leaders.

The IDF may have destroyed as much as half of Hamas’s force of perhaps 30,000 fighters. But Hamas still has thousands of soldiers left. They emerge from tunnels to carry out ambushes on Israeli soldiers, of whom around 100 have been killed. Hamas is still holding more than 130 hostages who were not released when the two sides called a truce and exchanged captives in November. They are in danger from the constant bombing. On December 8th Israeli soldiers were wounded in a failed attempt to rescue a hostage. Hamas later showed gruesome footage of a dead hostage, a 25-year-old Israeli civilian. Hamas claims that the Israelis killed him in their rescue attempt, Israel that Hamas murdered the man shown in the video.

Nor has Israel managed to obliterate Hamas’s leadership or destroy its infrastructure. The IDF has killed a number of senior field commanders. But Yahya Sinwar, the group’s overall boss in Gaza, and Muhammad Deif and Marwan Issa, the commanders of its fighting force, have so far survived. That is thanks in part to Hamas’s network of hundreds of miles of tunnels, which Israel has failed to destroy despite its firepower and its drone-borne surveillance capabilities.

More than a friendly nudge

In public there is little indication of American pressure on Israel. On December 8th the United States vetoed an emergency resolution by the UN Security Council calling for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza. Britain abstained. All the other 13 members voted in favour of the resolution. The American veto underlined just how dependent Israel has become on its strategic ally for diplomatic support. It needs more American arms, too. America’s State Department has recently approved a shipment to Israel of almost 14,000 120mm tank shells, one of the main munitions that the IDF is using in its ground operation. Both governments deny that President Joe Biden’s administration has set any sort of deadline for the Israelis to finish their offensive.

But American pressure is mounting in private. Several sources have confirmed that during his recent visit to Israel Antony Blinken, the American secretary of state, told the Israelis that they would have to end the offensive by the new year. Differences are becoming apparent between the two governments on how to govern Gaza once the fighting reduces. Mr Biden has called for a ”revitalised Palestinian Authority” to take over. On December 12th Israel’s prime minister, Binyamin Netanyahu, seemed to reject that idea. He declared that Gaza will “not be Hamastan and not Fatahstan”, a reference to the Fatah movement that dominates the Palestinian Authority on the West Bank.

Mr Netanyahu’s statement may have been grandstanding for a domestic audience. Behind the scenes, Israel is already discussing with the Biden administration plans in which the Palestinian Authority plays a role. But in any scenario the IDF will continue to maintain a big presence in Gaza for a while yet. And it may well be the case that Hamas will continue to control parts of the strip. The bombardment, and therefore the suffering of Gaza’s people, may lessen somewhat. But their future is more uncertain than ever. ■

Stay on top of our defence and international security coverage with The War Room, our weekly subscriber-only newsletter.