Last Friday, the Israeli prime minister’s office announced that “the Security Cabinet has approved the prime minister’s proposal for the defeat of Hamas. The IDF [Israel Defence Force] will prepare for the takeover of Gaza City while ensuring the provision of humanitarian aid to the civilian population outside the combat zones.”
Hamas responded to Netanyahu’s plan in an official statement, saying that it “clearly reveals the true motives” behind Netanyahu’s withdrawal from the final round of negotiations, despite the parties nearing a final agreement.
“Netanyahu’s plans to escalate the aggression leave no doubt that he seeks to get rid of his captives and sacrifice them in the service of his personal interests and extremist ideological agendas,” Hamas said.
“Gaza will remain defiant against the occupation and attempts to impose guardianship over it. Expanding the aggression against the Palestinian people will not be a walk in the park, and its cost will be high and painful for the occupation and its army.”
It is not only Hamas that sees the implementation of the Israel plan to control the Strip as facing numerous challenges. Over the past few days, there has been significant discord between the Israeli military and political leadership.
Two official sources told the US network CNN that during last week’s meeting “Lieutenant General Eyal Zamir cautioned that fully conquering Gaza would trap the military within the enclave and put the remaining hostages at risk. Such a move would also increase the burden on Israeli forces when the military is already suffering from attrition and burnout rates amongst reservist forces.”
The latter have already led to the amendment of several laws, particularly those related to conscription, in an attempt to adapt to the current operational requirements of the Israeli army, and units such as special forces, commandos, and reconnaissance teams within infantry brigades have been directly affected by recent decisions.
The Israeli military has extended its standard service period by one year from the existing 30 months. Soldiers currently undergoing training in special forces units will serve an extra four months starting in March 2027. Future recruits assigned to reconnaissance units will be required to complete an additional eight months of professional service. Those joining commando units will commit to a full extra year of service.
An assessment of the battlefield in Gaza chaired by the Israeli chief of staff last Thursday said that “we are not dealing with theory. We are dealing with matters of life and death, with the defence of the state, and we do so while looking directly into the eyes of our soldiers and the citizens of the country.”
“We intend to defeat Hamas. We will continue to act with our hostages in mind, and we will do everything to bring them home.”
This means that the Israeli Army has aligned with the country’s political leadership to implement a plan for full control over the Gaza Strip, bearing in mind the statement of Netanyahu on Sunday that he expects to complete a new Gaza offensive “fairly quickly.”
All this leads to the inevitable conclusion that Israel is about to open the gates of hell – not only to the residents of Gaza, but also Israeli society itself. The reasons lie in the complex equation imposed by both sides of the conflict, Israel and Hamas, due to their stubborn insistence on rigid conditions during negotiations and their lack of flexibility, all the while ignoring the catastrophic humanitarian crisis currently unfolding in Gaza, including acts of genocide, and the growing concern within Israel over the fate of the hostages.
Times of Israel correspondent Emanuel Fabian, who spent some time in Gaza last week accompanying the Israeli forces, wrote recently that “Hamas, while heavily weakened after 22 months of fighting, is still a capable force in some areas of Gaza.” In northern Gaza’s Beit Hanoun, the Israeli army completely destroyed Hamas’ forces, with the apparent last three gunmen in the area surrendering to troops over the weekend, he said.
However, in Khan Younis in the south, recent footage showed a squad of at least 12 well-armed Hamas gunmen trying to set up an ambush for IOF troops, indicating a high level of competency among the group’s forces in the southern Gaza City.
This was expected from the outset, when Israel prepared its new plan to occupy more than 70 per cent of the Gaza Strip. The strategy involves advancing into areas where the army has not previously operated, encircling Hamas operatives from all directions, and constructing barriers in parallel with engineering efforts to isolate Hamas battalions from one another.
Then, a strike force with superior combat momentum will be employed, supported by aerial and artillery cover, with the aim of luring as many Hamas fighters as possible into kill zones to exhaust their armament capabilities, while simultaneously destroying underground tunnels and ammunition depots
Even with the relative success of this new strategy compared to its predecessor, particularly in terms of losses, which have been limited to just 48 soldiers, it will still require a long period to fully eliminate Hamas operatives.
Past experiences show that when Hamas fighters are surrounded and lose the ability to manoeuvre, they continue fighting to the last breath, even if it means deploying large numbers of fighters at once.
Israeli military casualties will inevitably rise, as direct engagements are bound to occur. This is compounded by threats to kill the hostages if Hamas fighters are completely surrounded and raises the question of whether the Israeli political leadership can take responsibility for such a situation, given its failure to deal with the 7 October 2023 attacks.
According to the Times of Israel, the Palestinian population of Gaza has largely not been moved to the south of the Strip, with over a million civilians still residing in Gaza City in the north and some 350,000 in Deir Al-Balah in the centre of the Strip.
Over 600,000 are in the Mawasi area on the coast of southern Gaza.
With the start of the new operation, civilians will be urged to evacuate southwards or gather in designated areas, and this will be requested rapidly in an Israeli attempt to make swift advances towards the targeted zones.
The Palestinian population includes women, children, the elderly, and the injured. Not all are young, and not all have vehicles. Many move on foot, which will slow their evacuation and may leave them trapped in combat zones between the warring sides.
These areas will likely be closed to aid flights and will not receive humanitarian assistance, which could signal another impending humanitarian catastrophe, and it is inconceivable that Israel is unaware of this.
What are Israel’s aims in this new escalation? Perhaps they are to destroy Gaza’s infrastructure and wage relentless warfare that limits civilian options and ultimately pushes them outside the Strip to escape the horrors of war. We may find answers to this question in the difficult period ahead in the Middle East crisis.
* A version of this article appears in print in the 14 August, 2025 edition of Al-Ahram Weekly
Short link: