On Thursday, the first day of Sukkot 5785, October 17, 2024, Yahya Sinwar, mastermind of the Hamas criminal attack on innocent Israelis on October 7, 2023, was killed in the southern Gaza city of Rafah.
IDF drone video of Sinwar’s last minutes:
It’s a crucial piece of information because, on Friday morning, the hordes of senior politicians and leading pundits who tried to stop Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu from conquering Rafah are lining up to cheer the IDF (never its supreme commander) for the successful kill that could not have been carried down had the PM paid attention to their nonsense.
Yahya Sinwar’s reign of terror has come to a fitting end. He will no longer murder, torture, and abduct Israelis. All those who seek to destroy the Jewish people will face the same fate. We will not stop until we bring a total unmitigated defeat to Hamas and release our hostages. pic.twitter.com/2lpXH1OyJF
— Amir Ohana – אמיר אוחנה (@AmirOhana) October 17, 2024
So, let’s take a trip down memory lane to examine what those nice, defeatist men and women (attempting to take down Israel’s democratically elected leader) had to say about the IDF entering Rafah.
JOE BIDEN
On May 9, your president and mine, Joe Biden, warned for the first time that he would halt shipments of American weapons to Israel should the IDF attempt to take over Rafah. “I made it clear that if they go into Rafah – they haven’t gone in Rafah yet – if they go into Rafah, I’m not supplying the weapons that have been used historically to deal with Rafah, to deal with the cities – that deal with that problem,” Biden said.
That threat was not made because Biden cared about the poor civilians who were getting killed in Gaza, although that was the excuse he used. Biden was merely carrying out the US long-held doctrine on Israel which suggests Israel must not be allowed to be annihilated but it must also not be allowed to decisively win a war.
On Thursday, Biden proclaimed: “To my Israeli friends, this is no doubt a day of relief and reminiscence, similar to the scenes witnessed throughout the United States after President Obama ordered the raid to kill Osama Bin Laden in 2011. Israel has had every right to eliminate the leadership and military structure of Hamas. Hamas is no longer capable of carrying out another October 7.”
But, go check out his unusually long release, “Statement from President Joe Biden on the Death of Yahya Sinwar,” and try to find there the word “Rafah.” It ain’t there, because mentioning the city’s name would bring back the whole thing about how the president was going to embargo Israel if it dared go there.
KAMALA HARRIS
In March, Vice President Kamala Harris cautioned Israel against entering Rafah, where Hamas had taken refuge human-shielded by civilians. In an interview, she stated that the United States would not dismiss the possibility of “consequences” should the Israeli military proceed with a large-scale invasion.
“Any major military operation in Rafah would be a huge mistake,” Harris said on ABC’s This Week on March 24. “I have studied the maps – there’s nowhere for those folks to go. And we’re looking at about a million and a half people in Rafah who are there because they were told to go there.”
She studied the maps and concluded the poor Gazans couldn’t go anywhere if the IDF had dared enter the city. Here’s a question: did she study the maps of Dearborn Michigan, home to the largest Palestinian-American community, perhaps a few thousand Gazans could find refuge there. Also, the maps of Canada appear promising.
In her celebration of Sinwar’s death on Thursday, Kamala rejoiced: “Today, Israel confirmed that Yahya Sinwar, the leader of Hamas, is dead and justice has been served, and the United States, Israel, and the entire world are better off as a result.”
Again, plug the name “Rafah” in her speech – you won’t find it there.
EHUD OLMERT
Israel’s prime minister during the disastrous 2006 Second Lebanon War, Ehud Olmert, later to become Prisoner 9032478, following his incarceration for corruption, published an op-ed in Haaretz on May 2, titled: “Don’t Enter Rafah, Go Out into the Streets,” where he suggested:
“Rafah is not an important target that will ultimately define the outcome of the conflict between Israel and Hamas.
“Although it is emotionally difficult, almost impossible, to accept this, it is important to understand: Israel will not emerge victorious from this confrontation. Arrogant talk about ‘total victory’ expresses stupidity, arrogance, and above all an effort to escape from the appearance of non-victory in order to avoid the unequivocal public trial that is expected to follow.”
By the way, Olmert did not limit his attacks on Netanyahu’s victory to Israeli publications – he has been romancing Turkish and Arab channels, delivering his message of defeatism and burning hate for the PM who is succeeding where he failed miserably.
EHUD BARAK
Here’s an interview with the prime minister who fled from south Lebanon in 2000, abandoning Israel’s Christian allies who were promptly slaughtered by Hezbollah. In the interview below on Channel 12, Barak says: “Action in Rafah today is a very serious strategic error, which could cost us dearly… for a useless action, which in its end people will ask: So, what did we do here?”
How about, we found and killed the mega-terrorist who dreamed up the October 7 atrocities?
אהוד ברק: “פעולה ברפיח היום היא שגיאה אסטרטגית קשה מאוד, שעלולה לעלות לנו ביוקר…בשביל פעולה דרדל’ה, שבסופה ישאלו: אז מה עשינו פה?” pic.twitter.com/z9xH7LnZ83
— גאיוס (@il7217) October 17, 2024
SO MANY MORE
Throughout the past months, so many generals, senior IDF officers, politicians, and military and security commentators said that Netanyahu made a strategic mistake by entering Rafah, and called for an end to the fighting there. Today, after Israel’s capture of Rafah has delivered Yahya Sinwar’s dead body, it turns out that they were wrong.
Of course, they will never acknowledge their mistake and do the proper thing, like resigning and raising chickens for a living. Watch Amit Segal, the token right-winger on the News12 panel, trying to deliver a simple message: the panelists he was facing and so many former IDF generals were wrong, Netanyahu was right. Segal cut many of the angry interruptions from the other panelists to concentrate on his message, but I’ll tell you, it was hard to watch.
The only comfort right-wingers in Israel can derive from this is the fact that, once the undefeated, most-watched News12 channel is losing out at an increasing frequency to the right-wing Channel 14. Israelis may be slow to change their watching habits, but they’re not idiots.
General (Res.) Yisrael Ziv, former head of the Operations Division at the IDF General Staff, last April told 103FM there was no strategic advantage in fighting in Rafah. … All of this may be connected to some political words that some people speak to their base, but in practice, it has no security significance, nothing.”
MK Gadi Eisenkot (National List, Gantz’s party) said the right thing to do was to bring an end to the war in Rafah.
Major General (Res.) Noam Tivon also said, “We are told that if we only conquer Rafah, we would be one step away from victory. These statements are disconnected from reality.”
Former deputy head of the National Security Council, Eran Etzion, said last April that “Entering Rafah will not change the situation at the strategic level.”
Military and security affairs commentator Alon Ben David, said: “It is not terribly important, Rafah.”
And pundit and radio host Ben Caspit said: “There is nothing in Rafah.”
Opps…
