Israel is Losing, but Netanyahu Won’t Back Down on His War Aims

International politics is the art of the possible. Israel cannot reach the war aims it has set out. It can only win if it narrows its aims, matching ends with means.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government has plainly spelled out what Israel wants to achieve: recover the hostages, secure the borders with Gaza, and destroy Hamas. A fourth aim has been added: Israelis forced to evacuate their homes in the north by Hezbollah’s bombing have to be able to return.

Failure to Achieve War Aims in Gaza

Israel is not achieving its war aims against Hamas. First, it has only obtained a handful of the hostages. Some have been killed; the fates of many others are still unknown.

Second, Hamas has not been destroyed. Destruction of a terrorist organisation is difficult to measure. Some point to leadership decapitation. However, as Jenna Jordan has pointed out, attriting terrorist leaders seldom brings about their organisations’ collapse. Factors such as popular support, ideology and organisational structure play bigger roles in deciding these groups’ fates.

When Israel assassinated Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran, for example, Yahya Sinwar, the alleged mastermind behind the 7 October attacks, succeeded Haniyeh. It is not clear what price Hamas paid for Haniyeh’s death.

Another measure used to determine if a terrorist group has been destroyed is if its territorial sphere has been reduced or removed. Israel has failed to deprive Hamas of the territory it governed prior to the war. Hamas has been battered in Gaza, but it is still a political force to be reckoned with. Unaffiliated Palestinian clans have refused to join in a post-war reconstruction effort for fear of retaliation by Hamas.

Third, Israel has not been able to secure its borders. While it has regained control over some border crossings, the underground infrastructure that has allowed Hamas to engage in smuggling weapons and carrying out attacks is still in place.

Overthrowing Hamas Will Not Make Israel Safer

Some argue that peace is not possible if Hamas stays in power.

Israel has potent incentives to overthrow Hamas, starting with the group’s inability to make credible commitments to peace. It may also seem cheaper for Israel to overthrow Hamas than to deter it in the future. However, these factors overlook the dismal failures of foreign-imposed regime changes (FIRCs).

First, any post-Hamas governing entity will face a legitimacy problem. A state has a monopoly over the legitimate use of violence within a particular territorial domain. New regimes must satisfy both domestic and international audiences. A post-Hamas regime’s proximity to a foreign patron (in this case, Israel) would make it look like a Trojan Horse to its domestic audience, robbing it of its legitimacy to govern.

Second, FIRCs seldom bring about the changes they were intended to make. Regime change ‘often fails to improve relations between interveners and targets’.

As in the case with the Taliban in Afghanistan, regime change will not eliminate Hamas’s membership. Hamas’s members could go into hiding, opportunistically capitalising on grievances, from Palestinian anger over the new government’s inefficiency to misbehaviour by Israeli settlers. Or they could stir up trouble whenever it suited them or their foreign patrons.

Lebanon: The Graveyard of Israeli Governments?

Netanyahu wants to avoid another decade-plus quagmire in Lebanon (a la Menachem Begin) as much as he wants to steer clear from being seen as capitulating or backing down against Hezbollah, like Ehud Barak or Ehud Olmert. After having initially enunciated limited aims in the fight against Hezbollah, however, questions remain over whether a plan for the ‘day after’ Hezbollah is defeated even exists. 

Israel’s military aims toward Hezbollah in the current conflict are narrower than its aims toward Hamas, but they may prove to be just as costly. Israel is diverting resources from Gaza to fight Hezbollah. The 98th Division, which had been fighting in Khan Younis, has been redirected to the Lebanese border.

Netanyahu’s government signalled that it believed that it could reach a deal with Hezbollah by increasing the costs of conflict through airstrikes, eliminating senior leaders such as Hassan Nasrallah and his rumoured successor, and taking out the group’s infrastructure. While the Biden administration continues to be ‘extremely concerned’ over the possibility of an all-out war, it also believes military pressure could force Hezbollah to back down. 

Two variables stand in the way of a potential deal. 

First, Netanyahu could face a similar political fate to Olmert if he does not follow through on his threats against Hezbollah. During the 2006 war, Olmert issued a series of explicit, public threats demanding the group return the Israeli soldiers it had captured and disarm, or else face severe military punishment until it capitulated. However, Olmert subsequently backed down on his threat to keep fighting until the soldiers were returned and Hezbollah disarmed. His approval ratings collapsed as a result, rendering him a ‘lame duck’ for the rest of his term in office. Failure to carry out public threats damages a country’s reputation for resolve and reveals a leader’s inability to manage foreign and military policy.

Second, Naim Qassem, the Deputy Secretary General of Hezbollah and now its de facto leader, has signalled a willingness to go along with Lebanese Parliamentary Speaker and leader of the Shia Amal party Nabih Berri’s efforts to reach a ceasefire. This suggested that the group was walking away from its earlier commitment to only negotiate once a ceasefire had been reached between Israel and Hamas. However, Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Aragchi emphasised to reporters that Iran, Hezbollah’s main backer, would support a deal ‘…on the condition that it would be…synchronised with a ceasefire in Gaza’.

Hezbollah would suffer reputational consequences if it gave in to Israel’s demands. Some argue that strong states face difficulties compelling weaker opponents to change their behaviours. A weaker actor could thus easily cultivate a reputation for debility, inviting further aggression in the future. Pursuing a ceasefire could jeopardise a potential bid for the leadership by Qassem. 

Overconfidence: Why Bibi May Not Narrow Israel’s War Aims

The key to avoiding overstretch and another quagmire in Lebanon is for Israel to narrow its war aims. However, Netanyahu may not be so inclined.

The domestic imperatives are obvious. The first is that his current coalition partners are far-right Kahanists Bezalel Smotrich and Itamar Ben-Gvir, who are both ardent hawks. 

A second, less obvious reason involves false optimism. In this context, false optimism refers to an over-assessment of one’s military capabilities and effectiveness. Netanyahu has been famous for engaging in bluster but pursuing restrained military options guaranteed to pay political dividends. The folly of positive illusions has led leaders to engage in conflicts including the Boer War, both World Wars, the Vietnam War and the invasion of Iraq in 2003. 

However, the folly of overconfidence may be feeding Netanyahu’s desire to expand Israel’s war aims in Lebanon. Bibi may be feeling optimistic about Israel’s chances of victory after having successfully delivered several blows against Hezbollah’s senior leadership, as well as pulling off unexpected tactical successes in the form of detonating pagers and walkie-talkies that belonged to Hezbollah members.

After a year at war, Israel is not achieving its aims in Gaza and faces another quagmire in Lebanon. However, domestic political and cognitive constraints on its leadership stand in the way of narrowing its war aims.

The views expressed in this Commentary are the author’s, and do not represent those of RUSI or any other institution.

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