Already numb with grief over the flower of Israel’s youth falling in the war in Gaza, Israelis have been further shattered by the killing on Monday of no fewer than 21 reservists in one deadly incident and three other soldiers the same day.
Not surprisingly, this has increased calls from the public for an end to the war. Even more understandably, the families of the Israeli hostages are becoming ever more desperate about the captives’ likely horrific fate in the dungeons of Hamas, and are stepping up demonstrations calling for a deal to end the war and secure the hostages’ release.
Would that it were that simple. Israel faces a horrific binary choice: to end the threat from Hamas, or end the ordeal of the hostages. It almost certainly can’t achieve both.
Hamas will not give up all the hostages without a guaranteed end to Israeli hostilities and a pledge not to assassinate the Hamas leaders. If Israel were to agree to that, a revitalised Hamas would remain a mortal threat to Israeli lives, more hostages would be taken in future and more Israelis murdered.
The residents of Israel’s communities near the border with Gaza would be unable to return safely to their homes; nor would the families that have been evacuated from communities near the border with Lebanon, where Hezbollah’s 150,000 missiles are embedded in the civilian population ready for the signal to strike the entire Jewish state and where Hezbollah’s Radwan force remains poised to invade Israel to order to murder and abduct more Jews.
There is hardly an Israeli family that isn’t personally affected by this war. In such a tiny country, almost everyone has family members on the front lines, has relatives or friends who have been murdered or been abducted into Gaza, or knows people in such situations. Melanie Phillips.
