What Happened Today, Special Edition: Israel at War, Day 23
October 30, 2023
The Big Story
On Friday evening, IDF forces poured into Gaza in what appeared to be the opening stages of Israel’s long-awaited ground invasion. Photographs and satellite images suggest a three-pronged assault, with armor and infantry entering the Gaza Strip from the northwest, along the Mediterranean coast; from the northeast, near Beit Hanoun; and from the east, south of Gaza City, where video taken Monday morning showed Israeli tanks driving down Salah al-Din Road, Gaza’s main highway. The likely purpose is to cut off the northern part of the Gaza Strip, where the bulk of Hamas fighters are believed to be located, from the south, where Israel has directed the civilian population to flee and where it is allowing for the delivery of humanitarian aid.
At a press conference on Saturday morning, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu announced that Israel was entering the “second stage” of the war. Defense Minister Yoav Gallant outlined the three stages of Israel’s war plan earlier this month: The first was to destroy and degrade Hamas personnel and infrastructure through airstrikes, artillery bombardment, and limited ground incursions. The second, and apparently current, stage is “lower-intensity operations” to eliminate Hamas “pockets of resistance.” The third is to establish a “new security regime” in Gaza. Gallant’s emphasis on the limited nature of the planned Israeli campaign, however, contrasted with Netanyahu’s promises on Saturday that Israel was entering a “long and difficult” war to destroy Hamas. Hanging over both men’s comments was a Friday report in The Washington Post that the Biden administration had urged Israel to abandon its plans for a major ground offensive in favor of a more “surgical” approach targeting Hamas leadership and infrastructure.
Details of the Israeli operation—including the number of troops involved—remain scarce. Israeli officials claim that their forces have killed “dozens” of Hamas terrorists, including several senior commanders, and the IDF announced early Monday that it had rescued an Israeli hostage, IDF Priv. Ori Megidish, in an overnight raid. Also on Monday, in response to the escalation of IDF ground operations, Hamas released a video of three Israeli hostages denouncing Netanyahu and demanding a cease-fire. The prime minister called the video a “cruel psychological manipulation.”
In other news Monday, Israeli news outlets reported that the head of the Mossad intelligence service, David Barnea, visited Qatar over the weekend—Qatar serves as one of Hamas’ main patrons, along with Iran—to negotiate the release of hostages held in Gaza.
IN THE BACK PAGES: Ran Baratz on Oct. 7 and the Spirit of 1948
→The United States ordered the Israelis to restore communications to Gaza over the weekend, after Israel shut it off Friday night ahead of its ground invasion. Why? As U.S. National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan explained on MSNBC, “Aid workers need to be able to communicate, civilians need to be able to communicate, and of course journalists need to be able to document what is happening in Gaza to report it to the wider world.” The IDF’s need to block Hamas’ communications during the active phase of a ground operation, by contrast, is evidently low on the White House’s list of concerns.
→Hamas’ tunnel network hides enough food, water, fuel, medicine, and ammunition for the group’s 35,000 to 40,000 militants to fight without resupply for three to four months, according to a Lebanese official quoted in The New York Times. As the international community, including the United States, pressures Israel to relieve the humanitarian crisis in Gaza, “Hamas’s stockpiles,” the Times notes, “raise questions about what responsibility, if any, it has to the civilian population.” Hamas’ answer to those questions? “None.” As Mousa Abu Marzouk, a member of the Hamas politburo, explained in an Oct. 27 interview on Russia Today TV, “It is the responsibility of the U.N.” to protect Gazan civilians, and “it is the responsibility of the occupation [i.e., Israel] to provide them with all the services, as long as they are under occupation.” In other words, Hamas’ position, apparently shared by much of the Western press and NGO sphere, is that Israel must subsidize Hamas’ war effort by relieving the terrorist group of the burden of feeding its own people.
Read more here: https://www.nytimes.com/2023/10/27/world/middleeast/palestine-gazans-hamas-food.html
→In a rare glimpse of the actual state of stockpiles in Gaza, journalist Motaz Azaiza offers a tour of the “bare shelves” in Gaza stores, courtesy of @imshin:
Tiktok failed to load.Enable 3rd party cookies or use another browser
→A lynch mob in Dagestan stormed an airport in search of Jews on a flight from Israel. In response to calls from pro-Palestinian Telegram channels to “avenge Gaza,” hundreds of people in the Muslim-majority Russian Republic of Dagestan flooded the tarmac of Makhachkala airport on Sunday evening, accosting passengers from a Red Wings flight from Tel Aviv and demanding to know if they were Jewish. A video shared on X by @visegrad24 showed the crowd surrounding a man who claimed to be Uzbek, accusing him of being a Jew, and ordering him to produce his passport:
Dozens of the rioters were injured in clashes with police, although the passengers on the flight were unharmed. Carmel News reported that among the passengers on the flight were Dagestani children who had received medical treatment in Israel.
In a separate incident in Khasavyurt, Dagestan, hundreds gathered outside a hotel where a Jewish guest was staying and demanded that he come down or be dragged out. Russian President Vladimir Putin, whose state media channels have been broadcasting anti-Israeli propaganda since the outbreak of the Israel-Hamas war, on Monday blamed Ukraine for orchestrating the pogroms.
→Shani Louk, the 23-year-old German Israeli woman whose naked body was filmed being paraded around Gaza in the back of a pickup truck on Oct. 7, has been confirmed dead in what Israeli President Isaac Herzog referred to as a “beheading.” Israeli authorities said they found a bone from the base of a skull that matched Louk’s DNA. She was previously believed to be alive in Hamas captivity.
→Quote of the Day:
Jonathan Schanzer, a former Treasury Department official and now the senior vice president for research at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, recalled a meeting he had in 2015 with American intelligence and law enforcement officials about suspected Hamas operatives inside the United States.
During the meeting, he recalled, the officials told him they were trying to turn the Hamas operatives into “assets” in the fight against the Islamic State.
That’s from a New York Times article on the Israeli and U.S. intelligence failures leading up to Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack on Israel. Also of note: Shin Bet observed Hamas activity early in the morning of Oct. 7 but assumed it was witnessing a training exercise. It might have learned the nature of the attack if it had been eavesdropping on Hamas’ handheld radios, but Israeli signals intelligence had stopped doing so years earlier because they “saw it as a waste of effort.”
Read more here: https://www.nytimes.com/2023/10/29/world/middleeast/israel-intelligence-hamas-attack.html
→The Pentagon announced on Monday that U.S. forces had been attacked 23 times by Iranian proxies in Iraq and Syria between Oct. 17 and 30. On Friday, the United States responded by sending “deterrence signals” to Tehran, striking two apparently unmanned Iranian-linked targets in Iraq and Syria. Iran didn’t seem to get the message: On Sunday, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps-affiliated Tasnim News Agency boasted of three fresh attacks on U.S. bases in Iraq and Syria.
→A majority of Muslim Americans believe that Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack against Israel was justified, and they view Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh more favorably than they do Joe Biden, according to a new national poll from Cygnal. The poll found that 57.5% of Muslim American respondents agreed that “Hamas was justified in attacking Israel as part of their struggle for a Palestinian state,” though an even larger majority, 68.8%, agreed that “Israel has a right to defend itself against Hamas’ attacks.” Haniyeh’s rating among Muslim Americans was 38.6% favorable vs. 34.5% unfavorable, for a net favorability of +4.1. For Biden, those numbers were 45% vs. 45.8%, respectively, for a net favorability of -0.8.
Read the rest of the survey here: https://www.cygn.al/new-national-poll-muslim-americans-say-hamas-was-justified-in-attacking-israel-majority-of-americans-say-iran-should-be-held-accountable-majority-support-israels-right-to-self-defense/
TODAY IN TABLET:
Feminists Are Consenting to Hamas’ Rape Culture, by Gil Troy
And they're doing it proudly, on campuses and capitals around the world
Verdi’s Jewish Opera Grandly Staged at the Metropolitan, by David P. Goldman
Nabucco reveals the Hebrew roots of Italian nationhood
SCROLL TIP LINE: Have a lead on a story or something going on in your workplace, school, congregation, or social scene that you want to tell us about? Send your tips, comments, questions, and suggestions to scroll@tabletmag.com.
The Spirit of ’48
For countless long hours, on Oct. 7, the darkest of dark days, the state vanished. But then, in the midst of a war for survival against armed savages, an exceptional, unparalleled heroism emerged, a heroism that we had almost forgotten existed.
By Ran Baratz
First, we need to take a deep breath, confront reality squarely and speak the truth, the whole truth. For too long, we have allowed ourselves to be deceived, relying on comfortable and reassuring fictions from others. Now, we must acknowledge that the security challenge lying ahead of us is long-term and will require us to readapt and to rethink the situation. There will be a battle for Gaza and perhaps in the north too, but it would be a grave historic mistake to assume that when they are over, the security events are over too, and that we will be able to return to a situation similar to that which existed before the pogrom on Oct. 7. We will have to change our national priorities, not only because a series of convenient lies has been shattered, but because fundamental security concepts—not only ours, but of our enemies too—have been shattered.
But before that, from within the immense national pain in the wake of an unprecedented event in the history of our state, I want to refute a claim that, while understandable as an initial reaction to the horrifying massacre, is absolutely wrong from a historical perspective: the claim that Zionism failed because we faced the worst pogrom since the Holocaust.
The last part is certainly correct. There’s no denying that the enemy dealt us a very severe blow, demonically targeting innocents with brutal savagery. But it is equally clear that the first part of the claim is untrue. It was not Zionism that failed, it was the state that faltered; it was the state and its security institutions and decision-makers that failed. But Zionism?
On that fateful Shabbat, we were thrown back in time 75 years. For a few long hours, we were taken by complete surprise and transported back to 1948, with the enemy having all the advantages and we all the disadvantages. Bunkers and shelters, the few against the many, with civilian communities under attack against overwhelming odds, with ill-equipped rapid-response teams, youngsters and retirees fighting alone against well-trained Hamas units armed to the teeth. Even worse, forward military outposts taken completely off guard, infiltrated thanks to precise intelligence and commando operations that paralyzed the IDF and the local and national command. For many long hours, Israel the state ceased to exist. All that was left were the citizens.
But there, in the depths of the abyss, far removed from all the failed technologies of the General Staff and disconnected politicians, when the people of Israel were unexpectedly thrust to their lowest point into a life-or-death struggle against armed savages, one fact became undeniably clear: We possess an overwhelming advantage over our enemies. In those moments, an indescribable valor arose, a tenacity that we had almost forgotten existed, a supreme courage that we had thought we would no longer need.
Our chief of staff ignored the reality. Our leadership forgot its role. They believed with all their hearts that war was a thing of the past. That air power, technology, cyber, intelligence, and special operations would suffice. That we were no longer vulnerable to any conventional threat. Arrogance clouded their judgment. Lack of professionalism and bluster overcame common sense, basic military principles, and national security responsibility.
But when the moment of truth arrived and the complacent ones at the top faltered, the answer emerged from the ranks. It came in the form of soldiers from the Golani, Nahal and armored brigades who took over the battle lines, fighting until the last bullet and then some. It came in the form of citizens, men and women, members of the rapid-response teams in their communities, who took up arms and engaged the enemy in pitched battles. It came in the form of reservists and police officers who upon hearing that something terrible had happened, took up arms and rushed down south on their own accord, charging into the line of fire, risking their lives to save as many as they could. Many, many like that. Stories of heroism beyond belief. Each and every one of these individuals took upon themselves the heavy national burden without question, doubt or hesitation. In those long dark hours when the state appeared to have vanished, the people of Israel rose to the occasion.
Even in the midst of our searing anguish, we must recognize that this marks a complete departure from our history in the diaspora. No Jewish community anywhere in the world could have displayed such extraordinary heroism, on such a grand scale and with such remarkable capabilities. We paid a terrible price for the professional and conceptual failures of the security and state systems, from the strategic level to the decisions in the field. There is no denying the magnitude of this failure. Nevertheless, the historical analogy is crystal clear. In every Jewish community, over a history spanning hundreds of years, what occurred would have been the first day of a pogrom, leaving the Jews only with a pervasive sense of helplessness, pain and despair. In Israel, just the opposite transpired. The pogrom ended with unwavering counterattacks, followed by a major counteroffensive. And instead of feeling helpless, what we now feel is an entirely different emotion: rage.
This rage is the diametric opposite of the fear, helplessness and despair that characterized the Jews in the diaspora. It is the antithesis of these emotions. This rage is concrete evidence of the profound transformation that has occurred within us. Our anger is directed at our leadership because we understand that the responsibility lies with us, that we are in control of the situation, and that our destiny lies firmly within our grasp. This is the essence of the Zionist revolution.
A warrior nation
So yes, the state faltered. But Zionism has triumphed. On that darkest of dark days, it became evident that the people of Israel is not a fragile “spider’s web,” and is characterized by neither coddling nor weakness. At the moment of truth, the warrior spirit within us stirred in a matter of minutes. Ultimately, in times of war, it is not the air force, cyber capabilities, technological fences, reinforced slurry walls or active protection systems that secure victory. It is the valiant fighters. And on the day of the pogrom, one thing became undeniably clear: Israel is a nation of warriors. We are all warriors and we will not retreat in the face of adversity.
In these circumstances, no enemy can defeat us. Undoubtedly, we have numerous challenges to confront. We have suffered a devastatingly painful blow that will resonate in Jewish history for all eternity. But even at that moment, when the leadership and the state utterly failed, we were not at the mercy of others. We are not consumed with fear; on the contrary, we are filled with extreme heroism. And that is why this people will prevail over its adversaries. Even if our leadership seems akin to the Generation of the Wilderness, this people is forged in the spirit of Caleb and Joshua.
We are reliving the spirit of ’48 in another sense because much remains to be said about the tectonic changes awaiting us at the strategic and operational levels, the new landscape of threats created by our failures, the national and security challenges we face, and the lessons we can already draw from the national mistakes we have made. We stand at a Ben-Gurion-like juncture, marked by the need for dramatic decisions and the reconstruction of our collective consciousness, as well as of our national institutions and strength.
But now we know—it is achievable. Because the spirit of ’48 remains vibrant within us. Because Zionism has emerged—and will continue to emerge—victorious. This truth may have been obscured by affluence and success, by the political conflicts that made us feel that we were in the midst of an irreconcilable social rift. The proliferation of national institutions, flush with budgets and authority, dulled our sense of engagement and personal responsibility. The people of Israel dozed off, but when the day of reckoning arrived, arising from the distress and crisis, it awoke from its slumber, cast off the dust of complacency and behold: It is a lion.
That is a beautiful essay by Ran Baratz. The state of Israel, indeed, has failed and needs to be rebuilt.