AS CIRCUMSTANCES CHANGE, the Israeli left must reconsider its stand on the war on Gaza. So should liberal supporters of Israel abroad.
During the first weeks of the war, following the October 7th atrocities, many on the Israeli left, myself included, refused to call for an immediate ceasefire. We were, even then, well aware of the tremendous suffering and loss among innocent Palestinians, and critical of some of the ways in which the war was conducted. Still, many of us were convinced--justifiably, I still think--that the October 7th attacks and their aftermath left Israel with no reasonable alternative to a large-scale military action in Gaza, despite its horrendous price.
In the weeks after the attacks, many Israelis, especially on the left, witnessed with incredulity and pain the shameful responses of many outside Israel, including some who consider themselves a part of the left. We were quick to expose the lies and hypocrisy of those who think of themselves as freedom- and justice-fighters, the self-proclaimed supporters of victims wherever they are, who suddenly had no sympathy for the victims of the October 7th atrocities, or no understanding of the need to prevent such atrocities from occurring again. Our defence of Israel was not unreserved, but it was a defence nonetheless.
Some of us also harshly criticised unsubstantiated claims about allegedly indiscriminate Israeli attacks in Gaza, or amateurish dismissals of the significance of deterrence (and so of the need to re-establish it). I myself called for modesty in public discourse, recognising the complexities and paucity of information available to most of us. Such modesty, I suggested, should prevent us from reaching confident conclusions, and should perhaps encourage us to seek and tentatively put our trust in the more reasonable among Israeli decision-makers.
But the reality in Gaza and the region is dynamic, and Israel's war should no longer be supported. The main remaining aim of the military operation as it is currently run is the political survival of Binyamin Netanyahu. The Israeli prime minister knows that any reasonable agreement regarding Gaza is likely to topple his extreme-right coalition. This, together with the likely strengthening of protests calling for his removal once the war effort is no longer centre-stage, is not a prospect Mr Netanyahu will relish.
It is very hard, perhaps impossible, to pinpoint an exact moment when such a war crosses the line into moral indefensibility. This is especially so seeing that in some respects (the suffering of innocent Gazans) it was horrible from the start, and that in others (the struggle to secure the release of the hostages) it remains justified even today. Still, two factors make it clear that that line has now been crossed: considerations of deterrence, and the information received from inside the Israeli decision-making establishment.
Leaving the October 7th atrocities without a forceful, devastating response would have left Israeli deterrence dangerously weak. The moral need to restore deterrence--and it is a moral need, as deterrence saves many lives, on all sides of all borders--could have perhaps justified the bringing about of otherwise horrendous devastation in Gaza. But this has already been achieved: Israel has demonstrated to anyone in the region paying attention not just its firepower, but also its willingness to use it ruthlessly. And it is hard to believe that the operations still taking place in Gaza--to a large extent more a maintenance effort than an aggressive one--add anything by way of deterrence value.
The reports emanating from people in Israeli military and decision-making circles are that the war is not just being run incompetently, but also that Mr Netanyahu's resistance to any attempt to discuss "the day after", as well as the absence of anything resembling a strategic plan, threatens to undermine even the military achievements already (temporarily) secured. That such reports repeatedly come from those in the know--much more so recently than in October or November--helps to lift, to an extent, the fog of uncertainty. Less is called for, then, by way of epistemic modesty: the likely value of continuing the war effort is minimal.
As the positive value we could expect from the war effort has been continuously declining in recent months, the price has continued to be very high. The death toll in Gaza is beyond imagination, and continues to rise. On all accounts, many thousands of the dead and injured are children. There are now fewer deaths as a result of Israeli bombings than earlier on, but more owing to hunger. Even conservative predictions about hunger and disease are more depressing still. Even if the price, in terms of the death and suffering of innocents, could have been justified earlier on, with deterrence and other values on the line, it cannot be justified now.
Some things, of course, do not change. That Hamas is a ruthless, fanatical terrorist organisation, indifferent to the fate of its own civilian population, and happy to use civilian hostages as playing cards, has not changed. It remains as true as ever that Hamas's leadership could have ended the suffering months ago by releasing the hostages and leaving the Gaza Strip; it still can. Consequently, it is also true that if Hamas remains powerful in Gaza, this will be a huge obstacle to any manageable post-war governance of the territory. And further threats, both to Israel and to the entire region, remain to be dealt with. So solutions remain highly complex. Some modesty is still called for.
But the general direction is clear: Israel should take part in shaping an overall, internationally supervised and implemented strategy for the region that would include--along the lines of plans suggested by the Biden administration--a plan to minimise further death and suffering in Gaza. The international community should push Israel in that direction--if need be, forcefully.
Given Mr Netanyahu's determination to be an obstacle to any such progress, given his government's (at best) indifference to the loss of innocent Gazan lives, and indeed given his indifference to the fate of even Israeli hostages and Israeli soldiers, a necessary condition for progress is his removal from office. #
David Enoch is the Professor of the Philosophy of Law at the University of Oxford and a professor of law and philosophy at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.
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