Prefatory Note: This essay was sent to me by a reader, an American resident in Israel, Mr. Ira Slomowitz, with a request that I publish it on Un-Woke in Indiana if I thought it worthwhile—which I most certainly do. The essay speaks for itself and requires no lengthy introduction by me. I’ve edited it, lightly, to correct a few typos and for the sake of clarity, but otherwise it appears here as it came to me.
I thank Mr. Slomowitz for entrusting me with its publication.
The lack of readiness of the Israeli armed forces to prevent the vicious Hamas attack eleven days ago contrasts sharply to the bold, courageous, and relentless response of that same IDF in the hours after the attack. Within thirty hours Israeli soldiers, police and paramilitary police along with the Emergency Defense Teams of the kibbutzim and settlements killed over 1,500 Hamas terrorists and captured alive hundreds of others. The turnaround in the fighting was achieved within hours and complete control of the previously conquered territory was achieved within two days.
What we have seen here is what we often see in Western armies, the US included, where arrogant and ideologically motivated decisions by the senior political and military leadership leads to a near disaster, only to be saved by the bold actions on the ground of officers and soldiers. Since the unilateral withdrawal from Gaza, Israel’s Prime Ministers and Defense Ministers (including most assuredly Benjamin Netanyahu and the new senior partner in the coalition, former Defense Minister and IDF Chief of Staff Benny Gantz) and the IDF’s General Staff feels that the job of the IDF is to maintain quiet rather than to fight and win wars. This comes from meetings with senior western political and military personnel and, frustratingly, is adopted as the proper policy for a country fighting for its life in the Middle East.
The intelligence community, which does some incredible operational work in and outside of Israel, also seems to think it can know the intentions of our enemy leaders because it assumes it knows their interests. Like anyone trying to understand why someone paid for something that you find useless, you can never really know another person’s interests, let alone someone or some group whose very existence is based on a nihilistic ideology. Just five days before the attack, despite a week of heavy Hamas movement on the border fence, the IDF’s Director of Military Intelligence gave a public assessment stating that it was not in the interest of Hamas to start a war because we have been allowing Gazans—20,000 a day, many of whom, surprise, surprise were Hamas operatives gathering intelligence—into Israel and they want to take care of their people.
But Hamas has never intended to build an economically feasible entity of any sort. They consider Gaza as a base to prepare for the destruction of the State of Israel and the mass slaughter of all the Jews (and probably Christians and Druze) that live here. This is their interest. Not electricity or food for the people. Not jobs for the young. Certainly not freedom and a life of prosperity. Any consideration of jobs, electricity and food is for the purpose of maintaining enough power to prepare for their assault. That is why they demanded and received $30 million a month from Qatar and 20,000 people to work in Israel—it absolves them of the responsibility to build a proper economy—something they have no interest in doing. With Qatari money, Israeli money, US money, European money and the UN infrastructure supporting them they are absolved of doing the hard work of building a minimal, let alone a thriving economy. But our senior military and political leaders were blind to this.
I am not here to condemn these very dedicated senior officers who have all proven themselves in tense combat situations. Every one of them has risked their lives and shown bravery under fire. There is no doubt in my mind that they have put their country’s interests before their own—and they proved it by dropping everything, picking up a gun and fighting on Saturday, October 7th.
There was the incredible bravery of a 61-year-old retired general, Noam Tibon, who received a phone call from his son telling him that he, his wife and their two children were locked in their safe room with terrorists all around. Tibon put on his old uniform, took his pistol and with his wife got into his car, talked his way through checkpoints (ex-generals can do what they want here) found a few special forces soldiers and told them “I have done this before.” He led them into his son’s kibbutz and there they killed quite a few terrorists. Two of the soldiers got hurt so he drove them in his car back to where he’d left his wife. She took them to the hospital. General Tibon found a friend trying to help and they drove back to the kibbutz in his car. He regrouped, taking the weapons of the injured soldiers, and led the makeshift unit to his son’s house, killing more Hamas along the way, knocked on the door of the safe room his son, daughter in law and grandchildren were sheltering in, and said, “It’s Grandpa.”
When they were younger colonels, retired General Yair Golan and former IDF Chief of Staff Aviv Kohavi, using typical Israeli hutzpah, went over the heads of their commanders and demanded that then-PM Ariel Sharon let them destroy the terror cells in Nablus, Jenin and elsewhere during the second intifada. It was they who developed the tactics (used later by the US military) to do it. When Yair Golan heard what was happening on October 7th, he went to the area of the nature-music party, and organized resistance and evacuation of wounded, saving dozens if not hundreds of lives.
The bravery, boldness and determination of today’s brigade, battalion, company, and platoon commanders, along with their soldiers, saved the day and forced the quick turnaround that happened. We now know from the amount of ammunition, medical supplies and food that Hamas brought with them that they planned a monthlong attack reaching to the center of the country. Their goal was and always has been to “liberate Palestine” and massacre the Jews who live in Israel—to make the land Judenrein, much like their heroes and WWII partners, the Nazis.
The commander of the Duvdevan Battalion, a special forces unit that specializes in urban and anti-terror warfare (two of my sons fought in it and one is still assigned as a reservist), upon receiving a phone call from a comrade in arms in the south, immediately sent his on-call company down, meeting them there. The rest of the unit was called down and those in the reserves were called up immediately to cover their main area of Judea and Samaria (West Bank).
The battalion commander led his troops in brave battles, liberating a kibbutz and killing nearly a hundred terrorists. They were there by 10am and fought for twenty-eight hours. This was true as well of many other special forces and regular infantry units, as commanders and soldiers left their homes and headed straight to the battlefield. Reserve officers and soldiers went to their bases without being called up (including my third son) and, after getting their equipment, drove in personal vehicles to the war zone.
In the kibbutzim itself, the Emergency Defense Teams, whose job is to hold positions until the army arrives, fought bravely. These teams are made up mostly of men and women who are former combat officers and soldiers, often in their 40s, 50s and 60s, who hold personal and “long” weapons, and train in the defense of their kibbutzim, towns, and villages. They held off terrorists for hours and many of them were killed saving their friends, families, and neighbors. Sadly, previous governments under the influence of the US left with their obsession with gun control and fear of anyone not “official” defending themselves (they have a broad definition of vigilantism) wanted to limit or even eliminate these essential units. The long guns (M16’s mostly) were taken away from one kibbutz, resulting in horrible loss of life. Once again, elite opinion—meaning ideas taken from western media and universities, ended in tragedy.
I have three sons, a son in law and six nephews in combat units, doing their active or reserve duty now (and a daughter and a niece who served in the past). I have tremendous confidence in the IDF’s tactical brilliance and in the boldness and bravery of its officers and soldiers. We will win this war because the quality of our soldiers is greater than that of the terrorists. We will win since our soldiers want to live for their country and build up their country for their children, while the enemy wants only death and destruction. We have this misconception that the willingness to die for one’s country is the great motivation. But to steal a line from General George S. Patton, those who want to live for their country and contribute to its greatness are always the braver, bolder soldiers. That is why free countries win against dictators and terrorists as long as the culture—political and otherwise, lets them.
As I stated above, the officer corps in the field are of such high quality and such brave temperaments that there is no way we cannot win. And the soldiers themselves follow, and if the situation demands, they will lead, too. For now, it seems that the tide has turned and those responsible understand their mistakes (although, besides the current Chief of Staff, they won’t admit as much in public). If they hesitate this time, I would expect a true revolt. As my sons have told me, the reservists are saying they are not taking off their uniforms until Hamas is defeated. There is nothing like the threat of the loss of power to motivate a politician or a general.
My only fear is the bear hug from Biden-Blinken, for whom appeasement is their bread and butter, to Bibi-Gantz. May God protect us from fools and devils.