My condolenses to Israel. But how do you destroy such grassroots invisible decentralised movement as Hamas? Imagine tomorrow the "whole might of IDF colossus" actually crashes and does everything by the book, perfectly executed and Israel minister of defence announces that "Hamas is now officially dead". That doesn't spell the end of it in any way, and neither does any scenario that I can envision. Sadly there seem to be no easy solution to a problem raging on for 50 years or for millenia depending on how you count, so I am cautiosly optimistic but one thing I am dead certain is that there is more suffering up ahead
I absolutely agree; Hamas may be completely wiped out, with or without “collateral damage”, and guaranteed another organization would eventually take its place. I think what would be required to secure Israel’s interests and security in Gaza would be something akin to De-Nazification in Germany--as in ACTUAL oppressive and authoritarian security conditions with Israeli troops (and possibly American and other allied forces) occupying the area combined with aggressive reeducation programs and a MASSIVE (like Marshall Plan level) influx of cash into rebuilding infrastructure and setting up a thriving economy.
Despite me personally seeing very little meaningful difference between Nazism and extreme political expressions of religion (jihadism in this case), I think what makes that entire idea so problematic is pretty self-evident. Despite my obvious feelings on the Third Reich and it’s genocidal-by-nature regime, De-Nazification has always made me slightly uncomfortable. It certainly got the job done and along with the oppressive security conditions imposed by the Allies, effectively crushed the Nazi Werwolf movement before it got too out of hand, but the conditions were indeed oppressive, especially in the Soviet sector. Now place something like that in the context of Gaza with all the religious, political, and ethnic baggage that would undoubtedly come when it became clear that “Jews were re-educating Muslims” (which is how it would be framed). The ONLY way I could imagine an imposed reeducation and societal de-radicalization could work in terms of PR would be if it was spearheaded by liberal and moderate Muslims and even then, I dunno.
My condolenses to Israel. But how do you destroy such grassroots invisible decentralised movement as Hamas? Imagine tomorrow the "whole might of IDF colossus" actually crashes and does everything by the book, perfectly executed and Israel minister of defence announces that "Hamas is now officially dead". That doesn't spell the end of it in any way, and neither does any scenario that I can envision. Sadly there seem to be no easy solution to a problem raging on for 50 years or for millenia depending on how you count, so I am cautiosly optimistic but one thing I am dead certain is that there is more suffering up ahead
I absolutely agree; Hamas may be completely wiped out, with or without “collateral damage”, and guaranteed another organization would eventually take its place. I think what would be required to secure Israel’s interests and security in Gaza would be something akin to De-Nazification in Germany--as in ACTUAL oppressive and authoritarian security conditions with Israeli troops (and possibly American and other allied forces) occupying the area combined with aggressive reeducation programs and a MASSIVE (like Marshall Plan level) influx of cash into rebuilding infrastructure and setting up a thriving economy.
Despite me personally seeing very little meaningful difference between Nazism and extreme political expressions of religion (jihadism in this case), I think what makes that entire idea so problematic is pretty self-evident. Despite my obvious feelings on the Third Reich and it’s genocidal-by-nature regime, De-Nazification has always made me slightly uncomfortable. It certainly got the job done and along with the oppressive security conditions imposed by the Allies, effectively crushed the Nazi Werwolf movement before it got too out of hand, but the conditions were indeed oppressive, especially in the Soviet sector. Now place something like that in the context of Gaza with all the religious, political, and ethnic baggage that would undoubtedly come when it became clear that “Jews were re-educating Muslims” (which is how it would be framed). The ONLY way I could imagine an imposed reeducation and societal de-radicalization could work in terms of PR would be if it was spearheaded by liberal and moderate Muslims and even then, I dunno.
I’m not particularly optimistic either. But I like to hope for the best when I can (while prepping myself for the worst).