October 401, 2023, "The War"

My 289th post on The War

Today’s Image

Meet “former” Minister of Defense Yoav Gallant. Yesterday our Prime Minister fired Gallant, basing his decision on Netanyahu called a “lack of mutual trust”. This photo was captured during his speech last evening on Israeli TV where he paid his respects to all the men and women fighting The War on all its fronts.

The tragedy of October 7, 2023 was exacerbated by the total failure of both the IDF and the governments’ abilities to respond. Despite this failure Gallant managed the IDF through the crisis and led our armed forces effectively through our responses in Gaza, Lebanon, Iran, Syria and places that are not even talked about in the press. In every single poll taken in the country since the war, Gallant received the highest level of trust amongst the population. He met regularly with the troops and even the families of the hostages. He mitigated several crises with the Biden Administration and became a trusted “partner” with his counterparts in US Secretary of Defense Austin and CENTCOM General Michael Kurilla. When the US Administration started withholding arms shipments, it was Gallant who went to Washington to listen to the US concerns and communicated effectively with his counterparts there.

Personally, I have never met Gallant, but the individual who replaced me as Chairman of the Lone Soldier Center served as a Lieutenant General in the Army and is a confidant of Gallant. During The War, he along with several other peers served as Gallant’s confidants and advisors. He says only great things about the man.

He is being replaced by a “Netanyahu tacky” Israel Katz. Katz has no experience of consequence in the IDF and has no ability to lead our combined forces through this period. Netanyahu, is in effect, going to be the Minister of Defense. This is not the first time when Netanyahu served both as Prime Minister and Minister of Defense. But, it never happened at a time of active war. Our first Prime Minister, Ben Gurion, held both the premiership and the role of minister of defense during the War of Independence in 1948. But those were very extenuating circumstances. So we are now in untested waters and our Prime Minister is placing the country in a precarious situation, unnecessarily. Rather than having a small group of qualified leaders that can disagree, argue about trade offs but come up with a balanced decision, all significant military decisions will now be decided by one and only one person, whom more than half the country does not trust - Prime Minister Netanyahu.

There are three key figures that report to the Minister of Defense - the Chief of Staff Herzi Halevi, Chief of Shin Bet Ronen Bar and Chief of Mossad David Barnea. It was rumored that one or more of them wanted to resign, but it is expected that they will remain in office as their departure would result in a more severe breakdown in trust in the running of The War.

This action, in my opinion, is a terrible loss for the country. This analysis, in English, by Matti Friedman in The Free Press does a fairly good job of describing the sentiments of many in the country.

Probably the best description of the underlying causes for this severe action is provided by Ron Ben Yishai in today’s Yediot Ahranot newspaper. Unfortunately, it is only available in Hebrew so I will summarize. Yishai provides four basic causes for this drastic action. The first is the upcoming legislation that will enter the Knesset for a vote soon regarding both the stipends for the ultra-orthodox, which I wrote about yesterday, as well as the draft exemption legislation for the ultra-orthodox. Gallant understands the near term personnel needs of the IDF and has publicly stated that he will not support any of this legislation, even though he is a member of the ruling coalition. It is not only that he has publicly stated his own position, but he has also encourage opposition amongst other members of the government. Ironically, Netanyahu recently (about one month ago) encourage a small party of four Knesset Members to join the coalition, headed by Gideon Sa’ar. He and his party announced that they will oppose that legislation.

The second reason cited by Yishai is the well leaked, and now public, disagreements on how to handle the ending of The War in Gaza and the return of the hostages. Gallant and his direct staff have all pushed the position that the government should reach a deal to end the war and bring all the hostages home. They argue that there will be other opportunities in the future when Hamas will launch an attack that will justify the re-entry of the IDF into Gaza and the ultimate elimination of Hamas as a governing and military power. Netanyahu’s extreme right wing coalition partners refuse to consider this path, so it places the government in a bind…. and the IDF in a war that no one knows how to end, at this time. With Gallant pushing to “come to a deal” it places a thorn in the side of the Prime Minister who has promised a complete victory. But very few people here think that we can arrive at a complete victory if the price we pay is the lives of the hostages.

The third reason provide by Yishai is the timing as it pertains to the US elections. It was a calculation by Netanyahu that firing Gallant now would not cause the hundreds of thousands of people into the streets like it did back in March of 2023 when he tried, but failed, to fire Gallant previously during the Judicial Reform debates. More on this later.

And the fourth reason he gives relates to the recent arrests made of staff members in the Prime Minister’s Office that were deliberately leaking sensitive information to the Western Press in violation of their oaths for the purpose of thwarting some of the delicate negotiations that were ongoing with regards to hostage recovery. Many of those being arrested come from the extreme right wing elements of the political echelon. It is felt that the results from the investigation are likely to be embarrassing to the Prime Minister.

There is another reason, in my view, that Yishai did not give. Netanyahu has a severe management flaw. He cannot tolerate others who have the potential of either replacing him or questioning his authority. Some would say it is a sign of someone with a narcissistic personality. Others might say it is a sign of someone with dictatorial tendencies. I have seen this in play ever since I arrived in Israel back in 2010. There are many good people who became “casualties of questioning Netanyahu” around. That is why there are so many other parties led by former Likud members.

As for me, I was stuck last night on one of the many highway arteries in the country making my way back to Jerusalem from Tel Aviv for more than four hours in what would ordinarily have been a 50 minute drive. Protestors were blocking the freeway traffic. Once I get over my anger with these protestors, and a light head cold, I am likely to be joining the protests that demand new elections. Stay tuned….

Errata… just as I was publishing this post, Yishai’s article appeared on the English version of Yediot’s web site - here it is.

Casualties

One civilian, 18 years old, was killed in rocket fire. The victim’s name has not been disclosed yet.

Rockets & Missiles & Drones

One rocket was launched from central Gaza at a community along the Gaza border but was intercepted.

Today some 150 rockets were fired by Hezbollah into Israel. One resulted in the death of one civilian a bit north of Haifa. Several targeted central Israel, including Tel Aviv. One rocket landed not far from the airport. Then this one landed on a car in a parking lot in the Israeli city of Ra’anana:

One drone launched by Hezbollah was intercepted in Israeli airspace.

A drone launched from within Iraq was intercepted today before reaching Israeli air space.

Lebanon Operations

An Israeli fighter jet launched missiles in the Baalbek area of Western Lebanon, near the Syrian border. The missiles destroyed several buildings that were used to construct rockets.

Yemen Operations

I make note that since the US forces bombed the underground arms storage facilities managed by the Houthis in Yemen, three weeks ago, no commercial ships have come under attack.

IDF/Government

Senior Likud officials are taking the offensive against those party members in the Knesset voicing public opposition to the ultra-orthodox draft exemption bills. This is a form of intimidation intended to pressure all the ministers to fall in line with the government’s position to go ahead with the legislation. Because the government is unable to collect enough votes to pass a bill providing stipends to ultra-orthodox families regardless of whether the husband enlists in the IDF or not, the bill has been tabled. The ultra-orthodox parties, in response, have announced that they will not support any other bills submitted by the government until their bill is passed. It is not clear yet how this is going to play out…

Aid

COGAT (Coordinator of Government Affairs in the Territories) and the World Health Organization announced together today that all children in Gaza have now received both doses of the anti-polio vaccine, completing this complex but necessary aid operation.

The Israeli Government informed the United Nations earlier in the week that it will no longer honor its agreement from 1967 enabling UNRWA to freely operate from within the countries borders. Today the UN replied by saying that it does not have the wherewithal to replace the organization so Israel will have to take over the responsibilities managed by UNRWA. This feels like a game of chess. I do not know how the government will react.

Brief Note

I am a bit “under the weather” so I hope you will understand why this post is so brief.