TWO JEWS, THREE VIEWS is the JEWDICIOUS podcast. Today we share a conversation between Michael Golden and Michael Oren, the former Israeli Ambassador to the United States, about the state of the war. Excerpts from the podcast are included below, and have been edited for length and clarity.
ON THE ELUSIVE CEASEFIRE DEAL:
Amb. Oren:
I'm of the strong opinion and have been since day one that the only way to get Hamas to agree to anything is by increasing the pressure on Hamas, the military pressure. I think even the Biden administration has come to understand that by holding us back in Gaza, certainly in Rafiah and Khan Yunis and other places, has actually strengthened Sinwar's hand and that I think the Biden administration would very much like to see this deal go through. Hamas is rejecting. It's a good deal, it's the best that Hamas is going to get, and we have to maintain that pressure all the time.
HEZBOLLAH AND WAR IN THE NORTH
Amb. Oren:
What's happening in the north is Hezbollah is waging the type of war which is always Israel's nightmare, which is a war of attrition. We don't like wars of attrition. We like to bring them to decisive end very quickly if possible. And this is not just a war of attrition, it's a creeping war of attrition. It descends southward and westward every day. I went up to the north last week and we were hit by a barrage of rockets in lower Galilee, not in upper Galilee, not far from the Sea of Galilee, so it's getting further southward all the time. And it's rendered that entire part of the country almost uninhabitable, it has kept a major share of the IDF bogged down, killed and wounded dozens of people, and displaced, displaced more than 80,000 people, uprooted. So that's an intolerable situation.
I understand the constraints on the Israeli government in terms of the ammunition, in terms of support from the United States. The Biden administration definitely does not want Israel to take on Hezbollah at this time. And war with Hezbollah is not a tactical war as it is with Hamas, it's a strategic war. Hezbollah is one of the most powerful military forces in the Middle East and perhaps elsewhere with as many as 170,000 rockets, which each one of them is bigger, longer range, heavier and more accurate than the rockets in Hamas's arsenal. They can target army bases, they can target houses. Hamas can't do that.
Now, there are efforts by the White House to broker a deal to convince Hezbollah to withdraw north of Litani River in accordance with UN resolution 1701 from 2000. Hezbollah completely ignored that resolution. I don't know what kind of leverage the United States can bring to bear to get Hezbollah to apply or implement that resolution right now. It's certainly worth a try, but I'm not particularly sanguine about it. At the end of the day, Israel's going to have to defend itself. One way or the other, Israelis know this. Believe me, they know this. And it's a brutal realization.
HOW HAMAS FACTORS INTO CONFLICT WITH HEZBOLLAH
Amb. Oren:
Hamas wants a war between Israel and Hezbollah. It wants a war that's going to further drain Israel's resources and further complicate Israel's relationship with our allies. So Hamas holds out. And the problem is that the leaders of Hezbollah, Hassan Nasrallah, have said that as long as Hamas doesn't agree with a ceasefire, we won't agree to ceasefire. And so you have that A equals B, now B equals C. And where's the C? Israel's going to have to go to war not just against Hamas, but also against Hezbollah. That's the syllogism. A equals B, B equals C, therefore A equals C. Therefore, in short, Hamas's refusal to accept the ceasefire, it means war between Israel and Hezbollah. And that's the syllogism and it is a brutal one.
ON WHAT NEEDS TO COME NEXT
Amb. Oren:
In terms of getting out of it now, there are two ways that I suggest we get out of it. One is that the United States stop holding Israel back in Gaza, that we finish this up already quickly, and we certainly have a window to do this now because the world is not focused on Gaza. The world's focused on the United States. And secondly, that the United States puts what I call teeth into ‘don't.’ You remember what ‘don't’ was, — that was the one word that both the President and the Secretary of State declared at the beginning of October at the outset of this war. The ‘don't’ was aimed at Iran and Hezbollah. ‘Don't’ attack Israel. But you can't just say it, and Iranians have ignored it, Hezbollah has ignored it. Iranians fired 350 projectiles at us on April 13th. Hezbollah shoots at us every single day. They completely ignore the ‘don't,’ so you got to put teeth in the don't. United States has to say to Iran, ‘Hezbollah, you fire another rocket at Israel, you're going to have to answer to us as well.’
ON THE STATE OF MAKING ISRAEL’S CASE IN THE MEDIA
Ambassador Oren:
At the end of the day, IDF is going to do what it's going to do. If you would've asked me that same question several weeks ago, Michael, I would've said that we still have to do absolutely everything to give time and space to the IDF. Even though we feel sometimes that it's futile, that we're just talking to ourselves, we have to go out there and defend Israel in the media and on social media on campuses. Certainly the Israel supporters around the world deserve that type of support. They do. Especially our students on campuses deserve that support. We can't abandon them.
But having said that, something's happened in the last few weeks that I didn't necessarily anticipate the last time we spoke, and that is that first of all, the story has gotten tired. It's like with Ukraine. And the press has just gotten tired of repeating the same story night after night. And so they're moving on to other things, which is, in a way, and I don't want to sound cynical about this, is very good news for Israel. But it's very bad news for Hamas because Hamas is banking on that press obsession with Israel that's going to generate pressure on governments, to generate pressure on Israel to accept an unconditional ceasefire. You know how that works.
MICHAEL GOLDEN is the Editor-in-Chief of JEWDICIOUS.
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