Israel vs Hamas

I had just begun my undergraduate studies at Bethel College (University) in Minnesota when Israel's Arab neighbours launched a surprise attack on the country coinciding with Yom Kippur in the Jewish calendar. This was the fourth major Arab-Israeli war and lasted from 6 to 25 October 1973. Half a century later, Israel is at war again after Hamas' surprise attack on Israel at the weekend. But the current situation is different from what it was fifty years ago. Over the ensuing decades Israel has managed to make peace with several of its neighbours, beginning with Egypt in the Camp David Accords of 1979. In 1994 Israel and the Kingdom of Jordan signed a peace treaty, and even the Palestine Liberation Organization recognized Israel under the Oslo Accords of 1993.

Yet all these successes in coming to terms with previously hostile powers have not eliminated the threat of nonstate terrorist groups, which are much more difficult to deal with through ordinary bilateral channels. Even a small amount of progress in normalizing relations between Israel and its neighbours can easily be reversed by a single terrorist act. Sad to say, if most people on all sides prefer peace, a small group of militants possesses an effective veto over any effort at reconciliation, with ordinary people suffering the consequences. There is no simple way to rectify this obvious injustice. Because Hamas has been in control of Gaza since 2007, it now possesses some of the characteristics of a state actor, albeit one with a tiny territory.

The big question in all this is how Israel, despite its vast intelligence capabilities and its military preparedness, could have been caught off guard by this recent incursion. We cannot answer this yet, but I cannot help thinking that Israel's recent internal turmoil has played a role in this. When a country is so focussed on domestic strife, it may become less aware of threats from without.

Earlier this year I posted a four-part blog series under the general title, "Israel's precarious democracy." Here are the links to this series:

1. Historical and demographic background
2. Institutional factors
3. Immigration and the Law of Return
4. Options for the future

Although some things have changed over the past four months, what I wrote then is still relevant today.