The current path of an agreement with Hamas through Egyptian mediation is not a good option. Nothing can come of it for us. At most, a Hamas commitment to silence. Big deal. We already got one in "Pillar of Cloud", it is worth what it is only worth for a limited time, until the frictions begin and then it is worth nothing.
Hamas, on the other hand, could emerge from such an agreement as a big winner. Despite all the Egyptians' efforts to give it nothing, look at what it is going to get, from its perspective, in the agreement:
1. Hamas members will receive salaries, including 17,000 members of the military wing. This means that the people who fired rockets at us and dug tunnels will receive money at the end of this conflict, with our tacit consent. True, we are not giving the money and it will not be in the agreement, but we agree that it will go through Abu Mazen and every Gazan on the street will understand this connection perfectly well. They did not receive money, so they fired and then they received money.
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2. Israel will open the crossings more and allow regular passage of people from Gaza out through the Erez checkpoint. A great achievement by Hamas, which will only be attributed to military activity. This is a huge mistake. I personally think that Erez should be opened every day of the year, except for the days after "Protective Edge". Our message to Hamas should be – you will get nothing for the fighting. Nothing.
3. Israel will increase the fishing range of Gaza fishermen. Again, in general I am in favor of this, because the blockade policy did not seem wise to me, but not now. Now it is forbidden. It should be given during routine days and only to Abu Mazen.
4. Israel will allow the export of goods from Gaza, something we have almost not allowed for years. Another significant achievement for Hamas, in this context.
5. The Rafah Crossing will open. True, this is an Egyptian matter, but again, this should only happen following the fighting. Hamas will have to swallow a big bone in the form of the presence of Palestinian Authority personnel (Hamas agreed to this even before the conflict as part of the reconciliation agreement), but still at this time, an opening will be interpreted as a Hamas success.
In short, we get nothing out of the series. Neither denuclearization nor a supervision regime, which we can enforce anyway, without asking Hamas. We are once again teaching the entire neighborhood that only by force can we get something from us, even if it involves things that we should actually have had no problem giving without any pressure. In this regard, Israel should announce that it is abandoning the talks in Cairo and will not renew them.
The second option is to go for a more extensive military operation. Without exhausting you with recycling previous articles, let's say that Israel has no good options in this context. The prime minister, apparently, does not really believe in the ground army's ability to execute, or prefers not to believe because he does not want to launch a large-scale operation. Either way, at this stage it is very difficult to restart the military machine, wasting a lot of precious time and almost all international legitimacy. On the other hand, in the option of attrition, there are many advantages for Israel. Hamas is already supposed to be on the last reserves of its ammunition. The threat of the vast majority of rockets is an empty threat. Our defense is almost hermetic. Except for the communities surrounding Gaza, most of the public is not really threatened by rockets. Most importantly, Hamas has no real option to rearm. Israel, on the other hand, can continue bombing from the air with almost no risk. True, there are no very high-quality targets, but undoubtedly, these bombings have much more potential to cause damage than Hamas' rockets. It is very possible that after a month of attrition, Hamas will lose almost all of its ability to launch rockets at Israel, and a unilateral Israeli ceasefire, along the lines of "Cast Lead," will seem like a palatable option to it.
From Raviv Drucker's website:
http://drucker10.net/?p=2349
