Conceptualize Hamas’s Defeat

In the weeks leading up to Israel’s incursion into one of Hamas’s last remaining redoubts in Gaza, the notion that Jerusalem was acting against its own interests had become a pearl of accepted wisdom.

“Hamas is stronger today than it was on October 7,” University of Chicago professor Robert Pape opined in June. Even if it wasn’t, Hamas cannot be destroyed by military means alone. “It’s a brand,” stated Hussein Ibish, a resident scholar at the Arab Gulf States Institute. “It is extremely stupid to declare a war [aim] that cannot be accomplished.” Washington Post columnist Eugene Robinson, citing the toll the war has taken on Gaza’s civilian population, accused the Jewish state of putting its own security on the line in an ill-conceived spasm of aggression. “How is any of this making Israel more secure?” he asked. “Or bringing the Hamas-held hostages home?”

Robinson’s answer is contained within the word “defeat,” which is what Hamas is, at long last, beginning to experience.

Over the weekend, the terrorist group under siege in the Gaza Strip reportedly gave “its initial approval” to a Biden-backed cease-fire agreement, having dropped its objection to terms that would compel Israel to put an end to its defensive war. The new terms don’t provide observers with much hope that the conflict is nearing a conclusion. “Hamas has expressed concern that Israel will restart the war after the hostages are released,” the Associated Press reported. Yes, continuing to survive over Israeli objections is, in fact, the whole point of holding hostages.

But Hamas’s options are limited and declining. According to documents obtained by the Times of Israel, Hamas operatives in Gaza are imploring the group’s more comfortably situated leaders in Doha, Qatar, to accept Israel’s terms. “The messages, shared by a Middle East official familiar with the ongoing negotiations, described the heavy losses Hamas has suffered on the battlefield and the dire conditions in the war-ravaged territory,” the report read. “The communications, from May and June, suggested that the war had taken a toll on Hamas fighters, with the senior figures urging the group’s political wing abroad to accept the deal despite the reluctance of Yahya Sinwar, the group’s leader in Gaza.”

All this is to say that the pressure the IDF is applying to Hamas on the battlefield is advancing Israel’s interests. The terrorist organization’s sudden pliancy, such as it is, is a function of the losses it has taken. That is what makes the return of the hostages Israel hasn’t yet liberated by force more likely. That is what has created fissures between Hamas’s leadership in Doha and its fighters on the ground. That is what has brought Hamas closer to defeat, and that is why Israel is more secure today than it was at the outset of the war that began on October 7.

It may be hard for Westerners to recognize what a war successfully prosecuted to an unambiguous conclusion looks like. For them, it’s an unfamiliar sight. But the fruits of such a victory are vastly preferable to the indeterminate standstills to which Western leaders are now accustomed. Victory is Israel’s objective. The closer it gets to its goal, the safer Israelis will be. It’s a simple formulation, but it has the advantage of being demonstrably correct.