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The Gaza War Is Part of a Larger War with Iran; ‘Total Victory’ in Gaza Right Now Isn’t the Best Approach
An armored personnel carrier (APC) maneuvers near the Israel-Gaza border, amid the ongoing conflict between Israel and Hamas, in Israel, March 10, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Amir Cohen
Israeli history must be retold as a sequence of three long historical wars. The Iron Swords War does not stand on its own. The campaign in Gaza is a critical transition stage, both conceptual and practical, during which Israel is moving from defense to offense in a long war with Iran’s proxies. To realize its achievements, Israel needs a pause of a few years during which the strategy and military power for the offensive will be formulated.
True learning is required at the political and military levels, and national reconciliation is required. Decisive emergency steps will have to be taken to build a military power that is more suitable to the broader war.
Israel’s historical wars
The Iron Swords War is stuck. Despite impressive tactical performances by the IDF, Israel is trapped between war goals that are far from being realized in the Gaza Strip, and attrition from which there is no way out in the north.
On the political level, as the IDF deepens its destruction of the dusty Gaza cities and the US presidential election approaches, Israeli isolation is tightening and increasingly threatens Israel’s economic future and place in the family of nations. It is true that Israel is persecuted by international institutions that are inherently hostile to it and that a progressive political trend with blatantly antisemitic characteristics is on the ascendant. None of that changes the serious consequences of the continuation of the fighting on the international and economic levels.
Israeli strategic discourse is also stuck between supporters of “absolute victory” and those pursuing a hostage deal. It is no coincidence that these camps overlap the public fault lines of October 6. The obvious is only more apparent — the leadership is unable to separate the political discourse from the strategic discourse, between the political and the military.
Sometimes, the best way to get out of a conceptual and practical impasse is to take on a new perspective. The Six-Day War established a misleading standard according to which wars last a few days and are built in one piece. The reality is different. Wars are historical phenomena that usually last quite a bit longer than days. They are also much more diverse.
In the Second World War, for example, there were at least three sub-wars in its European context alone. They were the struggle for control of Europe and its resources; the German campaign in Africa, which was designed to cut Britain off from India; and the war in the Atlantic, which was designed to isolate Britain from America.
The strategic history of Zionism is also made up of several long wars. The first was the struggle between the rival national movements in Palestine-Israel. Zionism won that struggle in the War of Independence. That conflict was also a historical transition from a war between national movements to Israeli-Arab wars. Ben-Gurion understood this on the eve of the war. In a brilliant preparation process, he completely changed the concept, organization, and means of the Hebrew Defense Force. Thanks to these preparations, the IDF was able to switch from defense to attack in April-May 1948 when it implemented Plan D and a series of offensive operations, the first of which was Operation Nachshon. An accurate understanding of the nature of the expected war and the appropriate organization of the IDF in preparation for it led to the defeat of a coalition of Arab countries.
Over the following four decades, Israel successfully faced the threat of Arab armies combined with terrorism. Although the Arabs changed their strategy from time to time (for example, during the War of Attrition in the Suez Canal), the State of Israel managed to repeatedly defeat the military element that threatened it. The Israeli-Arab war actually ended with the Israeli-Egyptian peace agreement and the Syrian refusal to escalate the First Lebanon War in 1982 into a wider Israeli-Syrian war.
The blow phase of the Iran-Israel war
Since the days of the security strip in Lebanon and even more so since Israel’s withdrawal from it, the Jewish State has been fighting a third war: an Iranian-Israeli war through Iran’s proxies. This war has a religious background and a regional nature. Like all wars, this one has its own military character, different from that of the previous Israel-Arab wars.
Unfortunately, Israel has conducted this war over the past 25 years with the wrong strategy. That strategy is based on the assumption that Israel is the strong side – that it is a regional power capable of deterring Iran’s emissaries through its advantages in firepower and intelligence quality without removing the military threat. On the military level, we mistakenly assumed that our military power – especially our air power – was adequate, and that the addition of the defense leg and other minor adjustments were not required. Regrettably, there are those even today who embrace Israel’s ability to destroy the state of Lebanon, as if that were an effective military answer to the threat of Hezbollah.
The current war in Gaza must be understood as one campaign within that larger war. And it is not just any campaign. The current campaign in the Gaza Strip is the stage of Israeli recovery and awakening.
At the political level, the October Seventh Attack was the moment of awakening and recognition of the failure of Israel’s current strategy. This is a parallel moment to the awakening of Europe on September 1, 1939 to the fact that the policy of appeasing Hitler had failed. But a political awakening is not enough. From May 1940, it took Churchill four years to build the necessary military capability and confidence and harness American assistance to take on the Nazis. All the while, Britain suffered painful defeats before the conditions were met for an attack in Europe in June 1944.
On the military level, the IDF attack in Gaza dismantled the organized military power of Hamas and took a huge toll on all Gazans, terrorists and non-terrorists alike. It does not appear that the continuation of the attack contains the potential for further significant achievements. Therefore, the current operations in Gaza should be perceived not as a stand-alone war but as one campaign within a longer war. This is a critical campaign designed to enable a historic transition from a strategy of containment and deterrence to a strategy of removing the threat and breaking the Iranian stranglehold. In the theory of the military campaign, a campaign that enables the transition from defense to offense is called a “systemic blow.”
Churchill could not go on the attack in Europe in May 1940 but had to spend time and effort building the conditions for it, and the same applies to us. An army that built itself according to the concept of “deterrence rounds” and did not imagine a decisive war in Gaza cannot be ready for such a war overnight. What conditions do we need to create that will enable us to realize the achievements of the war in Gaza and prepare ourselves for an attack?
On the military level, it is necessary to build the IDF in a way that will enable a relatively quick and effective removal of the military threat in Gaza and Lebanon. The IDF must be built to realize this goal without being dragged into a long campaign of attrition that harms us and serves our enemies. What are the military barriers preventing us from conducting this form of warfare?
In the Gaza Strip, the barrier is mainly the IDF’s limited ability to locate and destroy the underground infrastructure on a sufficient scale and at a sufficient pace. The success of Hamas in dragging us into a long campaign of attrition is due to the disconnect between our tactical success above ground and Hamas’ ability to sustain its organization underground.
In Lebanon, the barrier has to do primarily with Hezbollah’s firepower and precision attack capability. Every military planner understands that in the face of the power of the enemy’s anti-tank missiles in the north, a power that has only increased and been perfected during the months of the current war, and in the face of the ability the enemy has developed to penetrate our air defense systems, the State of Israel currently does not have a decisive short war option.
Beyond these two points, there are, of course, the vital matters of replenishing supplies, refreshing and retraining forces, renewing intelligence, better preparing the civilian home front and national infrastructure, and other preparations.
At the national level and within the IDF as well, Israel must unite and renew its internal forces. A leadership that will renew trust must be chosen and appointed.
If we understand the current campaign in Gaza as a blow designed to enable a transition from containment and defense to attack and decisiveness, it will be possible to see its historical achievements:
The October 7th attack exposed the wider Iranian plot to the world. Iran’s attack on Israel on April 14 made Iran’s intentions even clearer.
The war united the new regional coalition under fire under American leadership against the Iranian threat. Regional normalization born out of the campaign in Gaza is a critical achievement for the decisive campaign.
The operation in Gaza set Hamas’ capabilities back years and created the conditions for the return of our abductees in a deal, thanks to our control of the Strip and our right of veto over its rehabilitation. It will also allow military freedom of action in Gaza in the future in a way that prevents the re-emergence of a threat of the same severity.
The conditions we created must be realized, not eroded. Now it is necessary to return the abductees, return the displaced to their homes, and use the time we have gained through blood to prepare for the decisive campaign. Like Churchill, we too need a few years to rebuild in order to overwhelm the military forces on our border while solidifying the regional coalition and using it to neutralize Iran’s interference. Unless the unexpected happens and we reach the Hamas leadership and release the abductees militarily, it seems that the potential of the current campaign has been exhausted.
Conclusion
National willpower and fighting spirit are of course necessary conditions for victory, but they are not enough. A professional approach to the act of war requires examining the relationship between strategy, leadership, and concrete military capabilities. To win the Second World War, Britain needed a change of leadership in the government and among the armed forces, changes in the professional military concept, and the building of concrete military capabilities that were more suitable than those developed before the war.
The Iron Swords War achieved a temporary removal of the Hamas threat, allowing for critical political and military learning and essential time. Israel’s economy must be restarted to support preparations for the next campaign.
Israel would be well advised to avoid doubling the size of the IDF as a traumatic response to October 7. Instead, we should be content with a moderate increase in the size of the forces and focus on the two crucial variables described above: the capabilities to locate and destroy underground infrastructure, and to suppress the enemy’s launch capabilities in the north against both our forces and the home front.
The course of preparation must be led quickly, decisively, and without delay. We are nine months into the war, still running out of resources, and not preparing for an attack. Far from it.
The next campaign in the Thirty Years’ War with Iran and its proxies should begin with the rapid and effective removal of the Hezbollah threat in the north through the occupation of southern Lebanon at the same time as the destruction of most of the enemy’s missile capabilities. The removal of the threat from the north will make it possible to divert most of our forces to the recapture of the Gaza Strip, if necessary, and the implementation of a plan to stabilize it without Hamas. When the time comes, it will also be possible to consider the Israeli interest towards the Syrian regime, which relies on a drug economy and Iranian support.
Striving for “total victory” here and now stops us from taking vital preparatory steps and delays both learning and healing. It depletes our strength; it does not enhance it. Continuing to pursue “total victory” right now is a dangerous mix of politics and strategy. Victory requires the right combination of spirit, strategy and appropriate preparation. The historical role of the Iron Swords War is to create the conditions for the formation of all three.
Brig. Gen. (res.) Eran Ortal recently retired from military service as commander of the Dado Center for Multidisciplinary Military Thinking. He is a well-known military thinker both in Israel and abroad. His works have been published in The Military Review, War on the Rocks, Small Wars Journal, at the Hoover Institution, at Stanford, and elsewhere. His book The Battle Before the War (MOD 2022, in Hebrew) dealt with the IDF’s need to change, innovate and renew a decisive war approach. A version of this article was originally published by The BESA Center.
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US State Department Revokes Visas of UK Punk Rap Act Bob Vylan Amid Outrage Over Duo’s Chants of ‘Death to the IDF’

Bob Vylan music duo performance at Glastonbury Festival (Source: FLIKR)
The US State Department has revoked the visas for the English punk rap duo Bob Vylan amid ongoing outrage over their weekend performance at the Glastonbury Festival, in which the pair chanted “Death to the IDF.”
The State Department’s decision to cancel their visas would preclude a planned fall concert tour of the US by the British rappers.
“The [US State Department] has revoked the US visas for the members of the Bob Vylan band in light of their hateful tirade at Glastonbury, including leading the crowd in death chants. Foreigners who glorify violence and hatred are not welcome visitors to our country,” Deputy Secretary of State Christopher Landau wrote on X/Twitter on Monday.
During a June 28 set at Glastonbury Festival, Bob Vylan’s Pascal Robinson-Foster ignited a firestorm by leading the crowd in chants of “Death, death, to the IDF,” referring to the Israel Defense Forces. He also complained about working for a “f—ing Zionist” during the set.
The video of the performance went viral, sparking outrage across the globe.
The BBC, which streamed the performance live, issued an on‑screen warning but continued its broadcast, prompting criticism by government officials for failing to cut the feed.
Prime Minister Keir Starmer and festival organizers condemned the IDF chant as hate speech and incitement to violence. The Israeli Embassy in London denounced the language as “inflammatory and hateful.”
“Millions of people tuned in to enjoy Glastonbury this weekend across the BBC’s output but one performance within our livestreams included comments that were deeply offensive,” the BBC said in a statement following the event.
“These abhorrent chants, which included calls for the death of members of the Israeli Defense Forces … have no place in any civil society,” Leo Terrell, Chair of the US Department of Justice Task Force to Combat Antisemitism, declared Sunday in a statement posted on X.
Citing the act’s US tour plans, Terrell said his task force would be “reaching out to the U.S. Department of State on Monday to determine what measures are available to address the situation and to prevent the promotion of violent antisemitic rhetoric in the United States.”
British authorities, meanwhile, have launched a formal investigation into Bob Vylan’s controversial appearance at Glastonbury. Avon and Somerset Police confirmed they are reviewing footage and working with the Crown Prosecution Service to determine whether the performance constitutes a hate crime or incitement to violence.
United Talent Agency (UTA), one of the premier entertainment talent agencies, dropped the duo, claming “antisemitic sentiments expressed by the group were utterly unacceptable.”
The band defended their performance on social media as necessary protest, stating that “teaching our children to speak up for the change they want and need is the only way that we make this world a better place.”
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Dem House Leader Hakeem Jeffries Urges Mamdani to ‘Aggressively Address’ Antisemitism in NYC if Elected Mayor

Rep. Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY). Photo: Wikimedia Commons.
US House Democratic leader Rep. Hakeem Jeffries (NY) urged Democratic nominee for mayor of New York Zohran Mamdani to “aggressively address the rise in antisemitism” if he wins the general election in November.
“‘Globalizing the intifada’ by way of example is not an acceptable phrasing,” Jeffries said Sunday on ABC’s This Week. “He’s going to have to clarify his position on that as he moves forward.”
“With respect to the Jewish communities that I represent, I think our nominee is going to have to convince folks that he is prepared to aggressively address the rise in antisemitism in the city of New York, which has been an unacceptable development,” he added.
Jeffries’s comments come as Mamdani has been receiving an onslaught of criticism for defending the controversial phrase “globalize the intifada.”
Mamdani first defended the phrase during an appearance on the popular Bulwark Podcast. The progressive firebrand stated that he feels “less comfortable with the banning of certain words.” He invoked the US Holocaust Museum in his defense, saying that the museum used the word intifada “when translating the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising into Arabic, because it’s a word that means ‘struggle.’”
The Holocaust Museum repudiated Mamdani in a statement, calling his comments “offensive.”
Mamdani has continued to defend the slogan despite ongoing criticism, arguing that pro-Palestine advocates perceive it as a call for “universal human rights.”
Mamdani, the 33‑year‑old state assembly member and proud democratic socialist, defeated former New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo and other candidates in a lopsided first‑round win in the city’s Democratic primary for mayor, notching approximately 43.5 percent of first‑choice votes compared to Cuomo’s 36.4 percent.
The election results have alarmed members of the local Jewish community, who expressed deep concern over his past criticism of Israel and defense of antisemitic rhetoric.
“Mamdani’s election is the greatest existential threat to a metropolitan Jewish population since the election of the notorious antisemite Karl Lueger in Vienna,” Rabbi Marc Schneier, one of the most prominent Jewish leaders in New York City, said in a statement. “Jewish leaders must come together as a united force to prevent a mass Jewish Exodus from New York City.”
Some key Democratic leaders in New York, such as US Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer and Gov. Kathy Hochul, have congratulated and complimented Mamdani, but have not yet issued an explicit endorsement. Each official has signaled interest in meeting with Mamdani prior to making a decision on a formal endorsement.
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Israel Eyes Ties With Syria and Lebanon After Iran War

Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Saar attends a press conference with German Foreign Minister Johann Wadephul (not pictured) in Berlin, Germany, June 5, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Christian Mang
Israel is interested in establishing formal diplomatic relations with long-standing adversaries Syria and Lebanon, but the status of the Golan Heights is non-negotiable, Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Saar said on Monday.
Israeli leaders argue that with its rival Iran weakened by this month’s 12-day war, other countries in the region have an opportunity to forge ties with Israel.
The Middle East has been upended by nearly two years of war in Gaza, during which Israel also carried out airstrikes and ground operations in Lebanon targeting Iran-backed Hezbollah, and by the overthrow of former Syrian leader and Iran ally Bashar al-Assad.
In 2020, the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, and Morocco became the first Arab states to establish ties with Israel since Jordan in 1994 and Egypt in 1979. The normalization agreements with Israel were deeply unpopular in the Arab world.
“We have an interest in adding countries such as Syria and Lebanon, our neighbors, to the circle of peace and normalization, while safeguarding Israel‘s essential and security interests,” Saar said at a press conference in Jerusalem.
“The Golan will remain part of the State of Israel,” he said.
Israel annexed the Golan Heights in 1981 after capturing the territory from Syria during the 1967 Six-Day War. While much of the international community regards the Golan as occupied Syrian land, US President Donald Trump recognized Israeli sovereignty over it during his first term in office.
Following Assad’s ousting, Israeli forces moved further into Syrian territory.
A senior Syrian official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said Syria would never give up the Golan Heights, describing it as an integral part of Syrian territory.
The official also said that normalization efforts with Israel must be part of the 2002 Arab Peace Initiative and not carried out through a separate track.
A spokesperson for Syria‘s foreign ministry did not immediately respond to a Reuters request for comment.
The 2002 initiative proposed Arab normalization with Israel in exchange for its withdrawal from territories including the Golan Heights, the West Bank, and Gaza. It also called for the establishment of an independent Palestinian state with East Jerusalem as its capital.
Throughout the war in Gaza, regional power Saudi Arabia has repeatedly said that establishing ties with Israel was conditional on the creation of an independent Palestinian state.
Israel‘s Saar said it was “not constructive” for other states to condition normalization on Palestinian statehood.
“Our view is that a Palestinian state will threaten the security of the State of Israel,” he said.
In May, Reuters reported that Israel and Syria‘s new Islamist rulers had established direct contact and held face-to-face meetings aimed at de-escalating tensions and preventing renewed conflict along their shared border.
The same month, US President Donald Trump announced the US would lift sanctions on Syria and met Syria‘s new president, urging him to normalize ties with Israel.
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