The results of Operation Guardian of the Walls will be examined according to one basic question: did Israel fight "yesterday's war" and stay trapped in the concept of periodic rounds of fighting, or did Israel use Hamas' surprise to create a new reality for the Israel-Gaza relationship?
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The strategy of containing rocket attacks on civilians from the Gaza Strip is a fundamental violation of the agreement the state undertakes to defend its citizens. There is no other place in the world where civilians live under the threat of rockets as a matter of routine, with the end of each round promising another one to come.
Bringing the front to the Israeli home front strikes a critical blow to Israel's status as a regional power; damages Israel's deterrent capabilities – which are vital in this area – as legitimizes turning Israeli civilians into living targets for any existing and future enemy.
The tactical battle against the tunnels is countered by an pathetic, almost across-the-board approach by the political echelon and the military and the media that rocket attacks on Israel's cities, its vital infrastructure, and its airport are almost a matter of fate and impossible to contend with.
The paralyzing Israeli thinking when it comes to Gaza allows a relatively small terrorist organization to build up military capabilities to the south of us, similar to the Hezbollah terrorist army. Hamas' force-building increases between every round of fighting, Israel is addicted to the idea of a long-term truce and opts for pointed tactical operations instead of a strategy that will ensure the security of thousands of its citizens, particularly in the era of a perfect storm of a multi-front conflict.
Israel has no choice. The extent of the rocket fire we have endured in the past decade demands that we anchor the concept of taking Gaza's rockets away as the central tenet of the "last round" – demilitarization along the lines of how Syrian President Bashar Assad divested himself of chemical weapons a few years ago.
Assad remained in power in exchange for giving up chemical weapons. Remember, removing heavy weapons from Gaza was the goal of Operation Protective Edge in 2014. We must not retreat from that target. Hamas will need to choose between power or rockets. It cannot continue to hold onto both.
The destruction of Hamas' infrastructure in the past few days puts this challenge in a different light. The IDF has been preparing for a "major" event in Gaza for years, and its abilities have improved unrecognizably since Protective Edge.
Israel has effective points of leverage on Hamas, other than a clumsy ground incursion, whereas Hamas still does not have the capability to paralyze us, like Hezbollah does to the north. But we will encounter capabilities like these in the next round, and we will have to pay much heavier prices, probably on more than one front.
The current Pavlovian opposition to changing Israel's strategy when it comes to Gaza was the basis for the idea of "the impossible price," which was prevalent in Israel prior to Operation Defensive Shield in 2002 when it came to Israel's strategy in Judea and Samaria. Back then, the 30 victims of the Hamas bombing at the Park Hotel in Netanya forced the cabinet to change its approach. The impossible became possible. The IDF won, and eradicated the terrorist threat for years. It's interesting how many casualties we would have sustained if that approach had remained in place forever.
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