Will Israel launch a military ground operation in Gaza? - By Israel Kasnett -
The question many are asking: Does Israel have the ability to tackle that right now, and if so, why hasn't it taken this course of action?
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has come under attack for his perceived inaction on the Gaza front with some saying that he is more concerned with election polling calculations. Palestinian terrorists in the Gaza Strip again attacked Israel, this time firing three rockets into the southern city of Sderot over the weekend, with two of them being intercepted by the Iron Dome air-defense system.
Some Israelis are calling for a military ground invasion into Gaza to damage, or even eradicate, Hamas. The question many are asking: Does Israel have the ability to do so, and if so, why hasn't it taken that course of action?
According to Efraim Inbar, president of the Jerusalem Institute for Strategy and Security, the government is certainly capable of conducting a large-scale operation. "The issue is not capabilities, but political will," he told JNS.
"The political calculations are complicated," he added. "It is possible to argue that a demonstration of determination can be helpful to Netanyahu in the elections."
But does Netanyahu have the political will? According to what he told the media ahead of his flight to Kiev this week-the first in 20 years for an Israeli prime minister-it would seem he does. He said, "If it is required, we will embark on a large campaign with considerations to the elections-with elections or without elections."
Yisrael Beiteinu chairman Avigdor Lieberman was among those who voiced their frustration with the prime minister. "He is an excellent presenter but a weak leader who lacks leadership and is incapable of making decisions in times of crisis," he wrote on his Facebook page.
Blue and White chairman and former Israel Defense Forces' Chief of Staff Benny Gantz said "the deterrence hasn't been eroded, it's been erased."
Former Education Minister and now Yamina Party member Naftali Bennett called for more drastic action. He said, "We need to move on to a policy of persistent attacks, chasing after the terror leaders. They have to start fearing for their lives."
Inbar seems to disagree with Bennett. He said Netanyahu "is not trigger-happy, which is commendable."
Inbar also said that going for a victory over Hamas "is naive."
"We should remember that we cannot eradicate a well-rooted Hamas," he said. Israel should "debilitate Hamas's military capabilities," he insisted, but admitted that the terror group would rebuild as soon as Israel leaves.
"It is a long, repetitive struggle," said Inbar. He believes that Israel's ability to conduct a war of attrition "shows our strength."
'The more Machiavellian explanation'
Yoram Schweitzer, a researcher at the Institute for National Security Studies (INSS) and head of its program on terrorism and low-intensity conflict, told JNS that Israel's current policy is that of containment. "Israel is capable of harming Hamas in a much more harsh way. There is no question," he said.
However, he emphasized that "we are trying to work with mediators to try and calm the situation, and not allow it to get out of hand. ... Hamas understands Israel's limitations and is provoking Israel accordingly."
Schweitzer offered that the shorter explanation for Israel's decision to adopt a containment strategy "is Israel's reluctance to enter at this stage into a more comprehensive conflict."
"The broader perspective," he said, "may be that Israel wishes to maintain the conflict with Hamas on a low level, but uses it in order to prevent any Hamas-Palestinian Authority cooperation or any resumption of peace talks with the P.A."
Schweitzer believes that Netanyahu is trying "to hold the rope on both sides." He said the prime minister doesn't want to allow for resumption of talks with the current P.A. government and would like to prevent Hamas from doing too much harm. "That is the more Machiavellian explanation," he quipped.
A question often asked by experts and the Israeli public alike is whether or not Israel should maintain the status quo.
According to Schweitzer, an Israeli ground operation has "all kinds of components."
He said that "Israel would like to conduct the first operation in order to harm the Hamas leadership in a way that would be effective. This requires a much more aggressive and surprising attack."
Schweitzer thinks that the basic question if Israel does indeed launch a ground operation is whether it can achieve its military goals in Gaza without having to spend more than a short time there.
"This is not an easy dilemma," he acknowledged. "The solution is not optimal, but this is a dilemma that any government would have."
Still, the question lingers: Will Israel launch a ground operation in Gaza?
According to Inbar, "it is inevitable."
Forebodings of war? - Manfred Gerstenfeld -
Less than a month before Israelis go to the polls, warnings of war appear - but Israel's Left still supports creating a Palestinian state.
The security situation became a more central issue in Israeli politics this week due to a number of new terrorist attacks and attempted attacks. A car ramming attack took place near Elazar. One Israeli youngster was severely wounded, his sister, moderately so. The IDF thwarted an infiltration attempt from Gaza killing five armed Palestinian terrorists. Several rockets were fired from Gaza. Arson that began in Lebanon while the wind was blowing toward Israel spread fires close to Israels Northern border.
Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu reacted by saying that Israel will embark if needed on a wide scale campaign in the Gaza Strip irrespective of the upcoming elections. He said so at Ben Gurion airport on his way to Ukraine for a two day trip.
In reaction to an earlier lethal terrorist attack, Yamina leader Ayelet Shaked said that the government should act to stop the transfer of payments to convicted terrorists by the Palestinian Authority. She and another prominent candidate of her list, Naftali Bennett also asked the government to annex the Gush Etzion bloc of settlements.
Shaked came out strongly against a report in the Haaretz daily. It claimed that she had offered Netanyahu assistance in obtaining immunity from prosecution in return for him to allow her to become a candidate for Likud in the elections. She said that she never spoke to Attorney General Avichai Mandelblit about criminal probes of politicians especially not about Netanyahu.
Many election polls have so far been published. If one does not take into account MK Avigdor Liberman's Yisrael Beytenu - neither the government nor the combined opposition parties have a majority. Yet there seems to be hardly any compelling reason to cause voters from either block to switch sides.
This stimulates the competition between the Likud and Blue and White who will receive the most seats. In the April elections both ended up with 35 MKs. Neither of them approaches this figure in any of the current polls. That is particularly bad for the Likud as it has absorbed the Kulanu party led by Moshe Kahlon which gained an additional four seats in April.
While the efforts to draw people in from the opposite camp seem to have failed, there are claims that the two big parties are trying to draw voters away from their potential allies. For the Likud that means that the right-wing Yamina is a target. The Democratic Union list leader, Nitzan Horowitz has accused Blue and White that it aims to draw away his voters.
The Ynet site published that Blue and White leader MK Benny Gantz had hired a firm to find out who was leaking confidential information from his list. The site reported that a leading person from the Yesh Atid party which is part of the Blue and White list was the culprit. This story once again raises the question whether the Yesh Atid component of Blue and White and the factions led by Gantz and MK Moshe Yaalon will stay together after the election.
Likud Labor and Social Affairs Minister Haim Katz has resigned from the cabinet. The Attorney General had announced his intention to indict him on charges of fraud and breach of trust. Katz will remain an MK and is expected to be re-elected in the September elections.
State Attorney Shai Nitzan has recommended to Mandelblit to indict Interior Minister and leader of the haredi Shas party Aryeh Deri for tax crimes, fraud, money laundering and obstruction crimes. Deri has an earlier criminal record.
Meretz leader Nitzan Horowitz, has stated that if his list would join a center-left coalition, it would ask for a freeze on settlement construction except for major settlement blocks, close to the pre-1967 green line. It would also insist on peace negotiations with the Palestinian Authority as an immediate priority for the government, with the aim of the establishment of a Palestinian State.
Horowitz suggested about Gaza that it was a small enclave with millions of people who have no other option than to throw missiles at Israel and carry out terrorist acts. The list's third candidate, former IDF deputy chief of staff Yair Golan, has said that Israel should cooperate with Hamas to stabilize the security situation for the residents of southern Israel.
Parties can pool excess votes, not required for their seats. This may enable one of them to get an extra seat. Yisrael Beytenu and Blue and White have entered in such a surplus-vote sharing agreement. It has also become known that Yisrael Beytenu leader Liberman has met before the municipal elections in Jerusalem in 2013 with the since then deceased leader of the radical ultra-orthodox faction rabbi Shmuel Auerbach. This in order to gain support for Liberman's candidate for the mayoralty Moshe Lion. Liberman is running the current campaign of his party expressing major opposition to the haredim.
The Likud has joined a court appeal from the far-right Otzma Yehudit party to the Supreme Court. They want to exclude the Joint Arab list from competing in the election. The Likud said that it was opposed to Knesset members who incite to violence or support terror, This is what one of the components of the joint Arab list - Balad - has done in the past.
Iran Kicks Off 'Massive' War Games, Unveils Homemade Russian Missile System - Adam Kredo -
'The drill is a real one because the battlefield, enemy, and the fighters are real'
The Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps' ground forces kicked off a "massive" set of war drills Thursday as the country unveiled its own homemade version of Russia's advanced S-300 missile defense system in yet another showing of Tehran's growing readiness for a possible war.
Iranian military leaders said the war games will mix with actual fighting as the IRGC forces seek to cleanse what they described as "anti-revolutionary terrorist groups" from along the country's borders. The operations follow an attack on IRGC units in July that killed one and injured one other.
"The drill is a real one because the battlefield, enemy, and the fighters are real," Brigadier General Mohammad Pakpour, commander of the IRGC's ground force, was quoted as telling the country's state-controlled press. "Some terrorists might be hiding at the bordering areas and they will be targeted during the Qadir drills."
The war games come as Iran unveiled its own version of the Russian-made S-300 missile defense system, a highly advanced radar system that Iran had been seeking to employ for years.
The radar can target ballistic missiles, such as those Israel or America might use in a war, and is said to be capable of targeting multiple points at once.
"Bavar 373 is the most important indigenized missile defense system whose design and manufacturing started a few years ago and can engage multiple targets in high altitudes," Gen. Amir Hatami, Iran's defense minister, said at a Thursday ceremony unveiling the new military hardware.
Iranian military leaders say the system is even more advanced than its Russian counterpart and can detect 60 targets simultaneously while engaging six of them at once.
"The system is much more powerful than the Russian S-300 and some of its features could be compared with S-400," Iran's state-controlled Fars News Agency reported, referring to the even more advanced Russian version of the missile system.
Iran began building its own version of the missile system after Russia balked on selling it the S-300 following pushback from America and other Western nations seeking to confine Tehran's advancing military might.
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