One of the most densely populated places on Earth, the Gaza Strip is home for 2 million people in 140 square miles. It is also the home of the Hamas terrorist group that attacked Israel last week. Hamas has been a source of death and torment for the Israeli people for as long it has existed. After last week’s attack on Israel that resulted in hundreds of civilian deaths, Israel has made it its objective to eradicate Hamas, once and for all.
When Israel Defense Forces (IDF) pushed the terrorists back to the Gaza Strip, they began a siege of the area. Most of the area’s food, water, power, and fuel comes from Israel, and none has been allowed into the Strip since it began. In concert with this, the Israeli Air Force has begun a tireless aerial bombardment of the Strip, hitting key Hamas targets. Due to the density of Gaza, these strikes have caused considerable collateral damage, including a number of innocent Palestinian and Israeli lives. It has been the dream of military theorists to win wars from the air without ever having to put boots on the ground — up until today this has only occurred once, and that was through the usage of nuclear weapons.
Israel knows it has to send in ground troops into the strip to totally defeat Hamas, and analysts agree that this will be tough, bloody, door-to-door fighting that will cost far more lives than the current airstrikes. That is why Israel has been requesting Palestians to leave the Gaza Strip or remove themselves to parts of the strip that will be out of the direct line of attack. Simultaneously, Hamas leaders, who are often completely removed from the fighting, have been asking Palestinians to stay. What is left unsaid is that those Palestinians who stay will be used as human shields, and as propaganda, if and when they are killed.
The only reason that Israel hasn’t done this before is because both the Israeli people and Israel’s allies wouldn’t have stomached the deaths that it will require to root out Hamas. Now nearly every option is on the table to destroy Hamas. The West continues to show its support for Israel, and on Wednesday President Biden went to the Middle East to meet Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. A variety of topics were discussed including aid packages, Netanyahu’s undemocratic judicial reforms, American captives being held by Hamas on the strip, and the presence of two U.S. Navy Aircraft carrier groups within striking distance of Israel’s borders.
The reason that the U.S. has sent such an array of firepower to Israel, despite not being involved in the current conflict, is fear that this is just the beginning of a wider war. Hamas receives its weapons and training from several countries including Qatar, and Iran. It’s a concern that if these countries see their direct involvement in the conflict to have an impact they may attack Israel from its northern border. When proof arrived that Iran was directly involved with attacks two weeks ago, the U.S. cut off 6 billion dollars from Iran that are kept in overseas bank accounts. The reason that Qatar’s connection is being tolerated by the U.S. is because it’s seen as the best hope to get both American and Israeli captives out of the Gaza Strip and Hamas custody.
When Hamas conducted its initial strikes, it captured several hundred captives from the towns it attacked. These captives were taken back to the Gaza Strip in an attempt to gain a bargaining chip. Neither the U.S. nor Israel bargains with terrorists, and attacks on Hamas targets have been reported to have killed several captives. Even if the U.S. and Israel cannot directly deal with Hamas on this issue given the current airstrikes, they can use Qatar as a go-between. The hope is obviously that as many of the kidnapped men, women and children can be safely removed and returned home.
There is nothing that showcases the sheer violence, death, and misinformation that is present in this conflict, than Tuesday’s explosion at a Gazan hospital. On October 17, a hospital in Gaza was hit by an aerial attack, hundreds were killed. Hamas organized groups from inside the strip accused this as being an Israeli attack. The international press jumped on this information and quickly accused Israel of being responsible for the hundreds of deaths. Soon after, an IDF intelligence report was published saying that it was not an Israeli bomb that destroyed that hospital, but an errant Hamas rocket. As of October 18, the cause of the explosion still had not been determined, but U.S. intelligence and other experts supported Israel’s claim that the rocket in question was launched from within Gaza.
The situation in Israel and Gaza is changing quickly, with vast implications for world relations ranging from Russia to Southeast Asia. As the whole world watches, updates on the situation will continue to emerge in the coming days and weeks.
