Amos Yadlin and Udi Evental
Foreign Affairs, Nov. 21, 2023
“The era of intermittent cycles of fighting and cease-fires in Gaza is over.”
In a barbaric surprise attack launched by Hamas on October 7, more Jews were slaughtered than on any day since the Holocaust. Thousands of elite Hamas militants from the Gaza Strip infiltrated small communities and cities in southern Israel, where they proceeded to commit sadistic, repulsive crimes against humanity, filming their vile deeds and boasting about them to friends and family back home.
The assault was devastating for the Israeli people. Around 1,200 people were killed that day (the equivalent of around 42,500 Americans, adjusting for population) and some 240 were kidnapped—including young children and elderly people—and taken into Hamas’s vast tunnel network beneath Gaza.
It was also devastating for the Israeli state. On that fateful day, the country’s long-standing security doctrine crumbled in the face of a perfect storm; as a consequence, its intelligence and military institutions were unable to keep citizens safe. For years, the country’s political and military establishment had allowed intolerable threats to gather by seeking to maintain the status quo in the conflict with the Palestinians and to establish a modus vivendi with the de facto Hamas state in Gaza based on deterrence, aiming to extend periods of tranquility.
Israel cannot return to the status quo that existed before October 7. The state’s task now is to bring all the hostages back home and to make it impossible for Hamas and other adversaries, notably the Iranian-backed Lebanese militant group Hezbollah, to carry out further terrorist attacks against Israeli citizens or pose direct threats to their security. Simultaneously, the government and the political establishment must accept responsibility for their strategic errors. They should prioritize national security interests above political survival and work to foster unity among Israelis, preparing them for the demanding times and challenges that lie ahead. And once the danger posed by Hamas has been eliminated, Israel must renew the process of promoting stable security and political arrangements with the Palestinians.