As Israel marks the 41st anniversary of the Yom Kippur War, Israel Defense Forces chief of staff Lt. Gen. Benny Gantz describes a “very high potential for instability at any one of [Israel’s] fronts,” including Gaza, Sinai, Syria, and Lebanon.
At the same time, though not bordering Israel, Iran and its nuclear program force the Jewish state “to maintain eye contact. ”
In an interview with Israel Hayom, Gantz was asked whether Israel win the summer war with Hamas.
“I think that absolutely, yes. It is important to constantly separate the issue of military achievement from the question of victory and loss, and the question of toppling the enemy. These are three entirely separate concepts. Our objective was to devastate Hamas’s capabilities and invalidate their strategic assets as much as possible, with an emphasis on fire power and terror tunnels.
“I think we made great gains in terms of combating the terror tunnels and fire power. They still have some capability – about 20-30 percent of their short-range rockets – but they sustained a debilitating blow to their fighters, their commanders, their manufacturing facilities, their command centers, and their combat capabilities.”
Given the widespread view that Israel hadn’t anticipated the extent and sophistication of Hamas’s terror tunnels, Gantz was asked whether Israel may at some point be taken by surprise again the way it was during the 1973 Yom Kippur War.
Defense officials, he responded, “don’t think and we don’t say that the failures of the Yom Kippur War will never be repeated.” He added, however, that Israel’s “intelligence abilities are at an extremely high level, with a lot of information and know-how and better access than ever to the intelligence consumers from the strategic level all the way to the operational level in the field. But still, intelligence is not infallible, and it probably never will be.”
As to why Israel didn’t re-conquer Gaza and topple Hamas,Gantz said “These are issues that have been very seriously discussed, and decisions were made that I think are right. On the whole, I am pleased that most of the military’s decisions were approved, but they were all extensively debated, with and without us. Re-conquering Gaza was never part of our objective, as defined by the government itself. If the government decides to redefine the objectives, we will provide the appropriate recommendations. That is how it works.”
The most substantial threat currently facing Israel, according to Gantz, comes from the northern front, which he described as “the most menacing arena in terms of scope and the probability of confrontation.”
Asked if there was any pinpoint intelligence about a specific threat from Hizbullah in Lebanon, Gantz said military planners “understand that it is part of their combat style to launch such actions. We heard [Hizbullah head Hassan] Nasrallah say, ‘I will conquer the Galilee.’ He doesn’t mean it literally, but I think he is hinting at offensive actions that we’ve seen from Hizbullah in northern Lebanon and in Syria.”
Asked about possible terror tunnels in the north, Gantz said there is no knowledge “of any active tunnels, but we are constantly on the lookout.”
“The purpose of tunnels,” he added, “is to cross an area that is covered by the IDF, both operationally and in terms of intelligence. In the south, they used tunnels because the above-ground route was blocked. In the north, the terrain is different; it is not that simple. The topography is such that it can be crossed above ground as well.
Does Gantz ever ask himself why Israelis tend to complain and criticize despite enjoying relative quiet and prosperity compared to the rest of the Middle East?