Hostages Complicate Planning For Military Operation in Gaza.

"Israel faces an excruciating dilemma as it weighs the next phase of its war in Gaza: If it lets talks on the fate of at least 200 hostages held by Hamas play out, it risks getting bogged down in indirect negotiations with a group it has vowed to crush.

But if it goes ahead with a looming ground operation before more hostages are released, it risks even higher casualties and international pressure to limit its operation as it battles the Palestinian fighters in the densely populated enclave.

It is one of many crosscutting decisions confronting Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's cabinet and Israeli commanders as they weigh when to move from the aerial bombardment of Gaza to the far-more-challenging ground-combat stage.

Along with the risk of civilian casualties, a large-scale invasion of Gaza could spark a second front if Hezbollah, the Iranian-backed militant group in Lebanon, seizes the opportunity while Israel is engaged against Hamas and unleashes the thousands of rockets and armed drones in its arsenal. Much of Israel's security establishment sees Hezbollah as its most dire threat.

If Israel opts for a more-limited operation in Gaza to prevent the conflict from spreading and to protect civilians, it could become ensnared in a grinding counterinsurgency conflict that will leave Hamas damaged but still a threat after its Oct. 7 assault on Israel killed 1,400 people.

"There's a continuing debate in the cabinet about just how far to go," said Chuck Freilich, a former deputy national-security adviser in Israel and a senior researcher at the Institute for National Security Studies, a Tel Aviv think tank. "Israel has to show that there are no circumstances in which you can get away with conquering Israeli territory, even if briefly, and slaughtering Israel's population."

The risk to Israel from Hezbollah is so great that some former Israeli officials argue Netanyahu's government should rethink plans for a Gaza ground war and launch a pre-emptive strike across its northern border, disregarding pressure from the U.S. to avoid widening the war.

"We have nothing strategically to gain from a long-term war that could last a year in Gaza," said Shimrit Meir, a top foreign-policy official in the previous Israeli government. "We have a strategic gain that we can achieve in an operation in the north, which is dismantling some of Hezbollah's missile capabilities that threaten us directly."

Israel has called up about 360,000 military reservists, one of the largest mobilizations in its history, in preparation for the war's next phase in Gaza. Israeli officials said the ground offensive will target Hamas fighters and leadership who use an extensive network of tunnels and fortified bunkers to elude Israeli drones and warplanes.

"We will operate at a time, place and manner that we choose, and it will be based on our operational interests," said Lt. Col. Richard Hecht, a spokesman for the Israeli military, referring to the planned Gaza ground operation.

When Israel last sent troops into the narrow streets of Gaza City in 2014, militants unleashed a devastating barrage of automatic gunfire, antitank missiles and rocket-propelled grenades, killing 13 Israeli soldiers in a two-day battle. This time will be different, Israeli commanders said, because its air attacks are destroying Hamas's defenses before troops, tanks and armored vehicles go in -- and because Israeli leaders are prepared to accept more casualties to destroy Hamas.

"Most of their capability on the northern side [of Gaza] has been hit, and they're trying to reuse some of it and we're hitting them again," a senior Israeli officer said on Saturday. Once the ground attack begins, he said, "You will see more of a supporting role" by the Israeli air force as it provides cover to infantry and armor units moving into Gaza.

Netanyahu is facing behind-the scenes pressure from the U.S. and others to time the start of the invasion to give negotiations by Qatar and other intermediaries on freeing at least some of the hostages time to continue, as well as for more humanitarian aid to flow into Gaza for civilians endangered by the fighting, some analysts said.

Hamas's leaders see the hostages as their best leverage for at least delaying the Israeli invasion, giving it more time to prepare its defenses or, in the best scenario from their perspective, for reaching a deal with Netanyahu's government that will include a bombing pause and the release of thousands of Palestinians, they said.

Hamas released two U.S. citizens on Saturday, the first of any of the captives it took in the Oct. 7 raid on towns, military bases in southern Israel and on a huge all-night, outdoor concert that had attracted 3,000 people of many nationalities to an open field near the Gaza border.

Along with Israelis, citizens of more than 40 other countries were killed or went missing during the attack, according to Israel's foreign ministry.

Among the hundreds being held in Gaza are dozens of Israeli soldiers, including several women, whom Hamas has made clear it has no intention of releasing without concessions from Israel.

Even so, Israeli officials have shown no interest in being drawn into prisoner-exchange talks with Hamas that would curtail, even temporarily, its military operation.

Unlike in the past, where Israel went to great lengths to bring home prisoners held by Palestinian militants, the shock of the Oct. 7 attack has left Israelis supportive of a military blow that would crush Hamas, even at the risk it would execute some of the Israeli hostages or use them as human shields, said Zohar Palti, the former head of the Political-Military Bureau at Israel's Ministry of Defense.

"I don't think this is something that should affect us, mainly because otherwise we will be paralyzed," said Palti, a fellow at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, a think tank, referring to Hamas's use of hostages to create pressure on Israel to limit its military response.

President Biden, who visited Israel last week, has voiced strong support for Israel's military response.

The Biden administration has moved equipment and forces to the region at the same time it has pressed for steps to secure hostages' release and to protect civilians in Gaza.

U.S. officials are especially concerned that even Israel's formidable military could face difficulties handling an invasion of Gaza and a large-scale rocket and drone attack against its territory if Hezbollah decides to enter the fray, U.S. analysts and former military officers said.

Israel can likely withstand a major Hezbollah attack at the same time it is conducting a ground operation in Gaza, but it might have to counter Hezbollah with a limited response, rather than undertake two simultaneous offensive operations, some analysts said." [1]

1. Hostages Complicate Planning For Military Operation in Gaza. Cloud, David S.  Wall Street Journal, Eastern edition; New York, N.Y.. 23 Oct 2023: A.1.