Killing 274 people from the enemy camp – the majority of them civilians – and injuring a thousand to free four from his own camp: this is one way of seeing the spectacular operation which enabled the liberation on Saturday, in the center of the Gaza Strip. of four of the (perhaps) 60 and some hostages still alive in the hands of Hamas since the horror of October 7, 2023.
Last week there were still some 120 unreturned hostages. A rough estimate this spring spoke of 25% already dead among these captives. The most realistic recent assessment would be closer to 50% of hostages dead.
Nearly 75 people killed for each release: this is a measure of the consideration given, in Israel, to an Israeli human life, in comparison with a Palestinian human life… which will never, by far, have the same value or the same same moral or political weight.
The Israeli survivors, for whom we can of course rejoice, after all these months of captivity in terrible conditions, have names – Noa, Almog, Andrey, Shlomi -, faces, families, stories, anguish told in detail (on all screens in Israel).
The Palestinian deaths, men, women and children, combatants and civilians, are essentially a mass and numbers – apart from the occasional field report on little terrorized Ahmed who has just lost his parents in Khan Younes.
According to a quote attributed to Stalin, “a death is a tragedy; A million deaths is a statistic.” Here, the Israelis represent the first term of the aphorism (every life is sacred)… and the Palestinians, the second term.
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There is of course another way to view an episode like this. This is the Israeli point of view, taken up by commentators who 100% support the positions of the Jewish state.
It consists of saying that all Palestinian deaths since October 7 are ultimately the fault of Hamas and affiliated guerrillas. All without exception. This analysis is regularly delivered by the American commentator Bret Stephens in the New York Times (journal which also makes room for different points of view on the same subject).
Basically and in summary: Hamas is terrorist and wants the annihilation of Israel; any attack, any bombing against Hamas is only self-defense; collateral victims can be explained entirely by the despicable and systematic practice of the “human shield” (combatants taking shelter among civilians); it is Hamas and not Israel that is cheap on human life. QED.
This reasoning, which systematically exonerates the Jewish state in the massacres of civilians, was found in the quote given this weekend by Republican Tom Cotton to Fox News.
The Arkansas senator, Donald Trump’s possible “vice-presidential candidate,” said: “My advice to Gaza officials is this: If you don’t want your people killed in hostage rescue missions, you shouldn’t take hostages to begin with. If you have any in your possession… release them. And if, despite everything, you persist in keeping hostages, then do not hide them in areas populated by civilians. »
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The deadly attacks that accompanied the weekend’s rescue may have given Israelis a rare moment of joy. But basically, this one-off operation in no way resolves the current impasse.
Eight months after the start of its merciless war against the Islamists, Israel is still far from having achieved its declared objectives of dismantling the military and political capabilities of Hamas.
There is certainly a clear weakening of the organization. According to Israeli assessments, corroborated by American intelligence, some 50% of Hamas’s 25,000 armed men have been killed since October 7.
But there was no eradication. In recent weeks, Palestinian guerrillas have resurfaced in the center and north of the enclave (Beit Hanoun, Gaza City, Nousseirat)… from where they were supposed to have been completely “cleansed”. Politically and diplomatically, the organization still exists, notably in Qatar, where part of the (unsuccessful) negotiations are taking place.
We can imagine that in addition to the 50% survivors among the Hamas forces, with senior local leaders still at large (Yahia Sinouar, Mohammed Deif), the recruitment of desperate young people came to make up part of the losses. We do not know what remains of the initial arsenal and whether there has been a partial reconstitution of this arsenal.
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This weekend’s episode, in addition to adding a quarter of a thousand casualties on the Palestinian side, further discredits the idea that negotiated hostage releases could be part of the solution. It reinforces, in Israel, the idea that an entirely military solution remains possible. On the Palestinian side, it reduces the incentive to negotiate, to the extent that hostages will be less and less part of the equation.
At the same time, Israeli leaders are grappling with escalating hostilities on the northern border with Lebanon. They face international opprobrium and US impotence (which they themselves have made worse). Not to mention the legal proceedings before the International Criminal Court and the International Court of Justice.
Nahum Barnea sums it up well, in Yediot Aharonot yesterday: this spectacular rescue “does not resolve any of the problems that Israel has been facing since October 7. This does not solve the problem in the North; it does not solve the problem in Gaza; it does not resolve the many other problems that threaten Israel internationally.”
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