Today’s Image
No, this is not a new version of “Where’s Waldo”. This is a photo of a recent protest held by members of the ultra-orthodox against the Government’s moves to start drafting them into the IDF. You might not believe this, but they dress like this because they claim that they wish to distinguish themselves from the general population. Today there are 60,000 young ultra-orthodox men eligible for the draft but do not serve because their leaders refuse to let them, insisting that they must spend all their time studying Talmud Torah. This is while other Israelis are being called up for the third time to serve in reserve duty in this war. You will be reading more and more about this issue in my posts as time goes on.
Gaza Rockets
For the first time in months, terrorist operatives inside Gaza managed to launch a barrage of 20 rockets into Israel this morning. Several were neutralized by Iron Dome, but most landed in open areas. No one was injured and there were no reports of damage. The rockets were launched from inside Khan Younis. It is my expectation that the IDF will likely gear up for a return operation into Khan Younis in the coming weeks. It was the major operating center for Hamas and most likely many of their isolated fighting forces have returned there to re-organize and plan future operations.
Casualties
During operations in Rafah, IDF soldier Sgt. Ori Itzchak Hadad - 21 (Z’’L) was killed in action. He, along with nine other soldiers in his unit were hit by an explosion in a booby trapped building. Every single residence and other facility inside Rafah is rigged with explosive booby traps. By now the IDF is experienced in dealing with them, but it is just a matter of probability that someone makes a mistake or forgets to look for something. Very unfortunate. To date 319 IDF soldiers have been killed during operations in Gaza.
Gaza Operations
IDF operations in Gaza City’s Shejaiya neighborhood continue with dozens of Hamas combatants killed in the past 24 hours. The IDF located several weapons manufacturing and storage facilities. All were struck by missiles launched by IDF drones.
Isolated IDF infantry attacks are continuing in Rafah and along the Netzarim Corridor. Along central Gaza and in the vicinity of one of the southern districts of Gaza City, IDF forces have been operating for the past week successfully destroying more than 100 Hamas operations facilities as well as an estimated 100 combatants killed. They also uncovered a hideout inside a Mosque used by Hamas that was booby trapped. The IDF struck the facility from the air and large secondary explosions erupted suggesting that the Mosque was being used as a large arms storage facility. During these operations the IDF soldiers uncovered a 1 km long tunnel. They mapped it and you can see the map here. The officer speaking the video says that they destroyed the tunnel, but I do not think they posted a video of it.
Lebanon Operations
IDF conducted fighter jet strikes on Hezbollah positions in southern Lebanon. As IDF reconnaissance forces spot Hezbollah combatants entering a building, the IDF immediately moves to blow up the building along with the combatants inside.
Yemen Operations
The US CENTCOM said today that it has destroyed three Houthi USVs (Unmanned Surface Vessels) in the past 24 hours.
Egypt/Iraq/Syria/Iran/Jordan
IDF security forces managed to uncover an attempted arm smuggling operation conducted by Jordanian nationals across the long border with Jordan. Security cameras are mounted all along the border fence with Jordan and are constantly monitoring activity using Machine Vision and AI. Israeli border police were immediately dispatched to the area where the smuggling took place, confiscating all the weapons. But the Jordanian nationals had already escaped. Most likely, these efforts are being orchestrated by Iran and its proxies in either Iraq or Syria. Previously, you might recall, that I have talked about efforts by the proxies to both undermine the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan as well as facilitating attacks on Israelis from within Judea/Samaria (West Bank). You can read more here.
IDF General
The big story of the day is all the cross blaming going on inside the government over who made the decision to release the Director of Gaza’s Shifa Hospital from prison. He was captured and imprisoned because he was complicit in enabling Hamas to run its operations from within the hospital and because he directly contributed to the death of several hostages while they were imprisoned at the hospital. Israel’s Shin Bet (~FBI) claims that it has run out of room at all the prisons and no new ones are being constructed to deal with the many, many terrorist combatants being captured. One of the facilities, Sde Teiman, is being closed because it was built as a make shift temporary facility and it is not adequate. Shin Bet is blaming National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir for not contracting additional prison facilities to house all the captured prisoners. And now Ben Gvir is demanding the resignation of Shin Bet Director, Ronen Bar. The Shin Bet also released another 50 detainees at the same time as Abu Salamiya, the director of Shifa Hospital. Again, because of the lack of adequate prison facilities. Those released were determined by Shin Bet to pose the least threat to Israel and the IDF.
Meanwhile, all the opposition leaders from left to right are accusing the Government of being negligent in allowing this to happen. Parents of Cpl. Noa Marciano (Z’’L) publicly castigated the government for this action. Marciano was taken hostage while alive and was later murdered inside Shifa Hospital.
Abu Salamiya further claimed that he had been subjected to torture and food deprivation and that prisoners did not receive medication. The Israel Prison Service did not immediately respond to a request for comment. But, one would not expect him to say anything different given his role in killing Israelis while running the hospital.
If you wish to read more you might take a look at this.
There is talk of efforts by the IDF under instructions from the Government to start testing the ability to turn over administrative responsibilities to non-Hamas personnel in several communities in northern Gaza. According to these reports, senior leaders within 2-3 communities in the north will be given responsibility for the distribution of aid within their communities. The IDF will be assigned to provide active security assistance to prevent Hamas or gangs from shooting at these leaders. An effort like this was tried about two months ago without success as the leaders were either immediately threatened or killed by Hamas. I presume that the IDF believes that in these isolated communities, Hamas is no longer a force. Nonetheless, it seems to me a bit early and, perhaps, far fetched to expect this change now.
There are some conflicting reports stating that the US Army is proposing to train several thousand individuals from Gaza, identified by the Palestinian Authority Intelligence Chief, Mahed Faraj, to be trained in the use of guns and policing their communities. But the Government, to date, refuses to deal with or give any responsibility to the PA. So it is not clear where this will go either. I suspect we will learn more in the next few weeks. You can read more in the Wall Street Journal article posted in the “In your copious spare time… “ section.
Hostages/Ceasefires
Egypt insists that despite the lack of changes in position by either Israel or Hamas, that it is still pushing efforts for a ceasefire. I honestly do not know what that means.
Politics/Protests
The two left wing political parties, Labour and Meretz, agreed yesterday to unite into a single party they will call The Democratic Party, or Democrats. The reality is that there is not enough support for both parties and if they ran separately in a future election only one of them would qualify to sit in Parliament. At current polling, the combined party will be luck to get 6 seats out of a total of 120 in Parliament. I find much irony in this announcement. First, their choice of name - The Democrats. Are they trying to emulate the US Political Party - The Democrats? Also, through this merger the last remaining vestige of the Political Parties that founded the State of Israel, The Labour Party, have disappeared. At one point, during the 1950s, there were several different parties that constituted various factions of the Labour Party. Altogether they held a full majority of seats in Parliament. But, through the slow discrediting of socialism and the aftermath of the Oslo Accords, with the emergence of the Second Intifada, the Left in Israeli Politics has slowly become a very minor player in the overall dialogue over the future of the country.
The saga of the ultra-orthodox draft into the IDF continues. Minister of Defense Gallant briefed the Knesset Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee, that is working on the draft of such a bill, informing the Committee that it would be preferable to deal with this through regulations rather than legislation. He told the Committee that the IDF needs to recruit another 10,000 soldiers beyond its current draft numbers. But, it is only equipped to handle an incremental 3,000 ultra-orthodox this year as they require special training and facilities, e.g. they can’t have women instructors and more. He went on to tell the Committee that at one point a previous Government had a regulation prepared that would enable the gradual increase in ultra-orthodox recruitment move at a steady compounded rate of increase by 5% each year until it reached 50% of all those eligible. But talks in the government broke down when no agreement could be reached on how to deal with those who dodged the draft. You can read more about his testimony here.
And In Your Copious Spare Time…
This article in the Wall Street Journal discusses the ability of Hamas to regroup and is overall describing a situation where Hamas regroups in areas previously evacuated by the IDF. I do not take issue with the facts presented in the article, but Israel and the IDF fully expect to be operating in Gaza for many months, if not years to come. So no one here is surprised by this situation. Hamas had about 20 years to build tunnels and smuggle in more arms than one could imagine. It is not possible to destroy them and the infrastructure, without killing a large number of civilians in the process, unless you manage the situation like the IDF has.
And here is another article from the Wall Street Journal talking about one scenario for the “day after”. It is an unproven idea that bears many risks. There is no one clear solution without huge risks, so perhaps it is worth trying on a small scale to see what issues arise and determine how to deal with them.
And here is an analysis on how both Israel and Hezbollah have been preparing for the next major war between them. I believe that this just emphasizes the view from here that there is no such thing as “peace” here in this part of the world. There is managing problems and reducing friction between warring parties.