This Barbaric Neighbourhood

"Outside of Lebanon, which Iran effectively controls through Hezbollah, Iran’s chief area of operations in Israel’s neighborhood is Syria, where Iran has been going from strength to strength. With each passing day, the Russian- and Iranian-Hezbollah-controlled regime of Syrian President Bashar Assad reasserts and reinforces its control over much of Syrian territory. As it does so, the threat of a major war that will pit Israel against Hezbollah forces in Lebanon, and against Hezbollah, Iranian, and Syrian forces operating under Russian protection in Syria, rises."
"Gaza plays a role here, as it has in the past, because if Israel is sucked into deploying large numbers of forces to Gaza to fight Hamas, it will leave its Northern Front vulnerable. That is precisely what happened in the summer of 2006."
"Until September 17, Russian President Vladimir Putin was sitting on the fence, with everything concerning Russian relations with Israel on the one hand, and Russian relations with Iran-Hezbollah on the other hand. Until September 17, Putin was interested in preventing an Iranian war against Israel even as he enabled Iran to assert control over Syria through Hezbollah and the Assad regime. To that end, while fighting with Iran to secure Assad’s continued hold on power, he agreed to a coordination mechanism with Israel that enabled Israel to attack Iranian targets in Syria that directly threatened Israel. According to the Israeli government, in the 12 months preceding September 17, Israel carried out more than 200 airstrikes – or more than 4 strikes a week – against Iranian targets in Syria."
"On September 17, Russia abruptly changed its posture. That day, Syrian forces manning an S-200 surface to air missile battery in Damascus accidentally downed a Russian spy plane."
"Rather than blame the incompetent Syrian forces that indiscriminately shot off missiles that downed their plane, the Russians blamed Israel, which had completed a strike in Syria 15 minutes before the Russian jet was downed."
"Russia’s seemingly irrational assault on Israel, blaming it for an action undertaken by Syria, was a calculated move. By attacking Israel, Russia was able to use the episode as a means to end its tactical cooperation with Israel in Syria and swing entirely to Iran’s side. Russia moved rapidly to complete its pivot to Iran."
"Right after the Syrians shot down the Russian plane, the Russian Defense Ministry announced that it was deploying the more advanced S-300 surface to air missile system in Damascus. Barely a week later, the S-300 landed at Russia’s Khmeimim air base in Syria and was quickly assembled and deployed."
Caroline Glick: Iran Opens a War Against Israel from Gaza, Breitbart

An explosion is seen during an Israeli airstrike on Hamas's television station in Gaza City on Monday. (Ahmed Zakot/Reuters)

Israel's government is treading on tenterhooks. It has long known through its intelligence services that it will eventually face a massive attack, from Iran-sponsored Hezbollah joined with Syrian forces on its northern border at the Golan Heights, and from its border with Gaza, launched by Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad. The Palestinian Authority and Hamas famously detest one another, and Mahmoud Abbas knows that without Israeli protection his time would be limited.

Now that time-frame of a potential joint attack by weapons-provisioned Hezbollah and Hamas has drawn nigh. Iran is impatient, as Caroline Glick points out, to hasten the downfall of Israel before the U.S. sanctions newly strengthened take much more effect on its already-floundering economy. Over the years since Israel's last confrontation with Lebanon's Hezbollah and Hamas in Gaza, both terrorist groups have had ample opportunity and support from Iran and from Qatar, to build their arsenals with more technically advanced rocketry.

Israeli soldiers take cover near the Israel-Gaza border on Monday. (Tsafrir Abayov/Associated Press)

Israel has the capacity to go into Gaza and entirely clean out Hamas and Islamic Jihad, but it would be costly in human lives since both terrorist groups don't mind using civilians as shields, the larger the death toll of civilians, particularly children, the more impact their claims of Israeli brutality and 'genocidal' intent resonates with the West, particularly the European Union, a major funder of both the PA and Hamas through UNHCR auspices which helps pay 'martyrdom' salaries.

Moreover, in the diversion of troops to Gaza, Israel would be leaving its northern flanks open to Iran's plan for its surrogates to launch the kind of conflict it relies upon to destroy the Jewish state it terms the "Zionist entity". Close to 500 Hamas rockets have been launched at civilian targets across the border into Israel, aimed at border communities like the town of Sderot in the past several days. There is relative quiet at the moment because of a joint agreement brokered by Egypt.

Mourners carry the body of Hamas militant commander Nour el-Deen Baraka, who was killed during an Israeli raid late Sunday. (Adel Hana/Associated Press)

But this is what Islamists know as a 'hudna', a temporary break in hostilities to enable them to rebuild their resources. Israel just a week ago engaged in what any country under constant enemy fire would be classified as performing a suicidal favour, helping Qatar to deliver $15-million in cash directly to Hamas, ostensibly to help Gazans suffering privation. Gist for Hamas's armaments mill, all of it, just as Hamas has used the diverted generosity of EU funding to build sophisticated tunnels into Israel from Gaza.

Israel's border towns and those further afield are in lockdown, the border area is closed, tens of thousands of civilians in Israel have taken to bomb shelters while schools are closed and agricultural work has been suspended. The 'truce' whereby both Israel and Hamas have agreed to a suspension in hostilities is as unreliable as depending on a volcanic eruption not to disturb townfolk below.

Israelis demonstrate against the cease-fire reached with Hamas, Sderot, southern Israel, November 13, 2018.Ilan Assayag

An Israeli incursion by IDF commandos into Gaza to gather intelligence was foiled when its presence was detected and a fierce shootout resulted where the commandos killed 7 members of Hamas including a high-ranked official, leading to the rocket bombardment that followed. There is no rationality behind the Hamas charter to destroy Israel. Effectively the 1.8 million Palestinians living in Gaza are hostage to the terrorist agenda. "No political solution exists for Gaza, just as there isn't one with ISIS", declared Prime Minister Netanyahu realistically.

An Israeli soldier stands near a burning bus after it was hit by a mortar shell fired from Gaza on Monday. (Tsafrir Abayov/Associated Press)

Part of Israel is furious that their government has agreed to a temporary ceasefire, leaving them as vulnerable to attack as they always have been by an enemy whose agenda is their total eradication. Israel's Minister of Defence resigned in a rage that his nation would not strike the defining blow against the volatile haters whose sole agenda is destruction of Israel. There are no easy solutions to an intransigent problem of one group claiming victimhood and martyrdom their goal to destroy those from whom they plan to wrest land they claim as theirs alone.

Israel is perpetually distracted and disturbed by the censure that lands its way from nations with whom it shares democratic values and dedication to the rule of law. Israel's outlook is humanitarian in nature, and it absorbs populations of various ethnic and religious groups with guarantees of equality among all. In the process it accepts the election to the Knesset of Palestinians whose loyalty is not to Israel but the Palestinian fixation on Palestinian aspirations to prevent 'normalization' with Israel.

No other country in the world must accept the presence of those within determined to wait out the opportunity to aid in its destruction, let alone being surrounded by hostile neighbours who take every opportunity to destroy the possibility of reaching a solution to the impasse between the two entities; Jews and Arabs, while promulgating the fiction that the West is so fond of that Palestinians have been disadvantaged and victimized and Jews are their oppressors.

Iron Dome missiles intercept rockets fired from Gaza, November 13, 2018.   Ilan Assayag