Road to Victory Starts, Ends with Israel E.J. Kimball
https://www.newsmax.com/politics/hamas-hezbollah-iranian/2023/11/30/id/1144266/
To this day, Hezbollah remains a powerful force in Lebanon and a dire threat to Israel, especially those living in the north.
At some point, the war between Hamas and Israel will come to an end.
A looming but important question: what’s next?
What comes next after an Iranian-funded terrorist organization manages to kill over 1,200 Israelis and take 240 of its citizens hostage into Gaza?
The future of the region must be addressed, and whatever resolution is generated must include increased security measures in volatile areas like Gaza, the West Bank, and the northern border with Lebanon.
Additionally, the U.S., and more broadly, the U.N., must give the Jewish State full autonomy and support in dealing with this dangerous conflict.
We are now aware that the Biden administration is putting pressure on the Jewish State to restrain its operations against Hamas by conditioning aid to Israel.
Not only is this giving Hamas exactly what it wants, it continues this long cycle of Israel listening to western influence and ultimately causing more harm to Israel and the Jewish people.
In a recent interview with the BBC, former Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett remarked that Israel’s biggest flub over the past 20 years was listening to the advice of Western nations rather than doing the job at hand.
Right now the job is to eliminate a Jihadist enemy, Hamas, and defeat its genocidal mission.
In essence, Bennett is emphasizing the importance of Israel asserting its independent security interests and relying on its own strategy to ensure the safety and well-being of its citizens in the face of regional threats.
While the United States and Israel share a strong allyship and ideological outlook, the objectives of the two countries in this conflict are quite different.
Israel is focused initially on destroying Hamas, its enemy in Gaza.
The U.S. is focused, mostly, on deterring World War III and a direct confrontation with Iran, Hamas’s (and Hezbollah’s) underlying authoritarians and the true puppet master of evil throughout the region.
The U.S. has its heart in the right place, but it’s not an effective strategy. Israel is a trusted ally and the only democracy in the Mideast — we as Americans must stand behind them and support their tough, but necessary decisions to ensure the safety and security of Israelis as they fight an enemy with complete disregard for ethics, morality, common decency and the rule of law.
Recent remarks by a Hamas leader hiding in Qatar reveal the tunnels in Gaza were built to protect Hamas, not civilians, and shifting responsibility to the UN and Israel for civilian protection.
The hard truth is that while countries like the United States and international organizations say they want what’s best for Israel, they don’t know what’s best for the Jewish state.
In previous conflicts in which the UN got involved in the name of “peacekeeping,” tensions only escalated.
The Second Lebanon War in 2006 started with a cross-border raid by Hezbollah into Israel from southern Lebanon. It ended with U.N. Resolution 1701 — a decision heavily supported by the U.S. — which called for a ceasefire and the deployment of the Lebanese Armed Forces and an expanded UN Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) in the southern part of the country.
The UN was ultimately criticized for not being able to prevent Hezbollah’s rearmament in southern Lebanon and for not fully implementing its mandate to disarm the group.
There were also concerns about the effectiveness of UNIFIL in preventing hostilities and ensuring the security of the region.
To this day, Hezbollah remains a powerful force in Lebanon and a dire threat to Israel, especially those living in the north.
The ultimate way for Israel to achieve victory here is to annihilate Hamas, with support, not intervention, from its Western allies. In pursuit of this goal, it must address obvious weaknesses in its border security, particularly with Gaza, the West Bank, and southern Lebanon.
Enhancing and strengthening border control measures and destroying all terror infrastructure is critical to both monitor suspicious activity and address impending threats.
A stronger defense posture will provide a better foundation for targeting terror groups like Hamas and Hezbollah, given these jihadi groups want nothing more than to kill the Jewish people and wipe Israel off the map.
From there, discussions around diplomacy and peacekeeping should proceed with individuals who genuinely seek a peaceful resolution and actively recognize Israel’s right to exist as the Jewish homeland.
None of the Iranian proxies targeting Israel will reach a point of enlightenment to peacefully coexist with the Jewish State.
In allowing Israel to lead the charge and pursue the defeat of Hamas, the closer we can get to achieving stability in the Mideast. The road ahead will be bumpy, but there’s a clear path forward, and it starts, and ends, with Israel.
EJ Kimball, is a foreign policy and national security expert as well as director of policy and strategic operations for the U.S. Israel Education Association (USIEA), a Birmingham-based nonprofit whose mission is to educate members of Congress on the U.S./Israel relationship.
Comments are closed.
