If we believe Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, he “tried to avoid” the 2014 war on Gaza “in every possible way”.
In a special Knesset committee hearing on Wednesday, Netanyahu defended the actions taken by Israel’s military in those 50 days of Operation Protective Edge in Gaza, following a scathing state comptroller report released in February.
Netanyahu confirmed that the abduction and killing of three Israeli youths in the West Bank by a Hamas squad maneuvered him into a tough corner. The discovery of the bodies, coupled with an intelligence warning about a Hamas plan to perpetrate a major attack by means of a tunnel near the crossing on the Gaza-Israel border, generated double pressure.
The bodies of those three teenagers, kidnapped on June 12, 2014, were found on June 30. Netanyahu vowed a tough response to the killings, but his government need not have responded. Israeli citizens took the law into their own hands. A 16-year-old Palestinian was found burnt alive on July 2.
Far-right demonstrators then mounted a violent hunt for random Arab passersby on the streets of Jerusalem, and coalition party ministers and members of the Knesset issued militant declarations.
When the government proper intervened, it bombed dozens of sites in the Gaza Strip a day after the bodies of the teenagers were found. Israeli forces did not practice restraint nor did they allow the Palestinian authorities to take on its responsibility in tracking down the culprits.
As for destroying the tunnels crossing from Gaza into Israel as one of Israel’s main objectives in the war, Israel is not required to launch a murderous offensive just because Hamas is building some tunnels.
There were political alternatives already on the agenda and up to the eve of the operation. They involved easing the siege of Gaza and ensuring the continued payment of the salaries of tens of thousands of Palestinian Authority employees there. But under pressure from then-foreign minister Avigdor Lieberman, Netanyahu rejected this idea and that of other ministers who are complaining today about the missed opportunities of 2014. Netanyahu did not do enough to promote that alternative at the time. The premier found himself embroiled in a war that he hadn’t planned for and for which he was not prepared.
The damning state comptroller report outlined failures of the highest levels of Israel’s political and defense establishments, primarily focusing on the failure to properly recognize and prepare for the threat of underground attack tunnels dug by Hamas, and to share information regarding this threat despite the opportunity to do so.
Netanyahu’s government had no strategic goals when the war started in early July 2014. The strategic goals should have come first “as required in a proper decision making process,” said the report. But it found that that those goals were only set after the Israeli military had put forward its operational plans. So, the policy was to shoot first and ask questions later.
Netanyahu has failed to address the substance of the state comptroller’s comments on his government’s contribution to the events leading up to the war. He has tried to downplay or even dismiss the findings of the report.
Netanyahu stated during the hearing that his goal was to avoid war, but if it became necessary, the goal was to “limit the cost to each family”.
Apparently, he was only referring to Israeli families. It was Netanyahu’s war that led to the death of 74 Israelis and 2,251 Palestinians, approximately half of them civilians.
