Yesterday, the Tzahal (In English, Israel Defense Forces, or IDF) scored a victory equal to the killing of Osama bin Laden.

They really didn’t. Jabari can easily be replaced. He was a steady hand, but no genius. All it does it perpetuate a cycle.

negotiating the release of over a thousand “Palestinian” terrorists in exchange for him.

Are you suggesting they were not Palestinians? Evidence for this?

HAMAS responded with the most withering rocket attack in years. The Tzahal deployed Iron Dome anti-missile batteries to protect the Negev and the Mediterranean coast. Still, with more than 300 rockets fired, some rockets found their marks. One destroyed an apartment in Kiryat Malachi. The hit killed three adults and critically injured an infant.Today, missiles hit targets as far north as Tel Aviv. One fell into Rishon-le-Tzion, just south of Tel Aviv. Another fell into the sea off the coast of Jaffa.

Yay for missile defence, eh?

The most damning report came out in WND. Their sources told them that Iranian Revolutionary Guard advisers are helping HAMAS in this latest outbreak in the Israel Gaza conflict.

Shock horror.

Seven years ago, the Tzahal withdrew all their troops from the Gaza Strip. Rockets have rained on towns in the western Negev ever since. The hit in Rishon-le-Tzion suggests that HAMAS might now be getting better weapons. (And if the WND report is correct, we know where those weapons came from.)

It really doesn’t. Partially luck, partially learning from experience. Hamas rockets have been hitting Beersheba for years, and the distance is not significantly greater. OTOH, they were probably aiming for Tel Aviv so it really isn’t that much of a coup. Where do the weapons come from? Rockets are domestically produced in Gaza. Rocket science is ironically enough, not that complicated when your objectives are fairly modest and you have an experience base on which to build. The Katyusha design has been produced in Gaza for years, so they have the production off to a fine art. Other arms as well as raw materials for the rockets come from Arab and Israeli smuggling gangs in Sinai. Iranian interest is present but is less than is generally imagined. Hezbollah and Syria are their main vassals. Hamas has traditionally been an Israeli vassal for use against the PLO / Fatah as part of a divide and rule strategy. Israel is not going to crush Hamas now, just engage in theatrics and make a point. Crushing Hamas would be completely counter productive.

The Tzahal counts more than 12,800 rockets that militants have launched from Gaza since 2001. 2008 is the worst year to date for such barrages, with 3278 missile launches. Obviously the Israel Gaza Conflict never ended. It simply suspended itself, like the sitzkrieg at the start of the Second World War.

It’s a show, not a war. We are going through the motions, and will do so again. In terms of destruction and suffering it is a war, but there is no military objective and no victory. It is just a deadly act of political theatre. Sit back, bring the popcorn and appreciate the special effects.

Now sitzkrieg has become blitzkrieg. And the Tzahal has answered swiftly. And no wonder: Israel’s leaders know they stand alone.

No they don’t. As long as they are useful and fill the right pockets with goodies, the US will continue to indulge their theatrical temper tantrums like bad parents do with spoilt kids.

Mahmoud Ahmadinejad of Iran threatens to annihilate Israel in every speech he makes.

That’s not new. Most Iranian presidents of the post-79 era have made similar overtones. No one really cares that much, and it’s common political knowledge than Iran is more interested in keeping Israel preoccupied than it is with “eliminating” them, to free up space in Lebanon and Syria for itself.

Barack Obama, (putative) President of the United States, is, if anything, sympathetic to the Iranians and HAMAS, not to the Israelis.

Er, no.

Prime Minister Hisham Qandil of Egypt plans to visit Gaza tomorrow. He and his boss, President Mohammed Mursi, belong to the Muslim Brotherhood. The problem: HAMAS is a Muslim Brotherhood affiliate, and always has been. Qandil might have the job, not to quieten the Israel Gaza Conflict, but to incite it. Now the world will find out whether Mursi and Qandil will act like responsible national leaders, or terrorists like those who “fragged” Anwar al-Sadat when he negotiated the Camp David Treaty.

Hamas is also a friend of Mossad and has been so semi-openly all along, as have the Egyptians since the 70s. There is no right and wrong and good and evil here. Everyone is playing the game and everyone knows very well that the enemy of my enemy is my friend. Fatah is a more real threat to Israeli hegemony over the West Bank than Hamas, and so has every reason to work with Hamas to destabalise Fatah / PLO. The Egyptians are ambiguous toward Hamas, but essentially are adopting a “better the devil you know” position and are crossing their fingers and hoping that Fatah will cut a deal to help keep the Arabs in Sinai in line, because the Egyptians sure as hell can’t do it themselves. (The Israelis are pretty much aware of that and are doubtless tacitly hoping them same thing – and you can bet good money that Hamas co-operation – at least nominally – toward that end are a big part of negotiations in Cairo)

Thus far, the Tzahal promises no more than the largest smash-and-grab raid of all time, to capture or destroy the stockpiles of missiles, weapons, and ammunition that HAMAS has. But that won’t settle the Israel Gaza Conflict.

No one wants to settle it. Why would they want that?

The IDF might have to take Gaza back, just as Yair Lapid half urged them to do, United Nations or no.

Unlikely in the long term. The ultimate aim is to leave Gaza pretty much as is, and focus on bantustan-ing the WB. Hamas and Israel are both pretty much on the same song sheet in the long term – unless Fatah pulls a rabbit out of the hat and surprises everyone, but at present it is more likely Fatah will get on board in return for a turning a blind eye to the tax pile in Ramallah and control of the WB Zone A.

Especially if Iranian Revolutionary Guardsmen now turn out to be standing side-by-side with HAMAS and other militants as they launch their missiles.

Doesn’t work like that in reality, not that anyone would really care.

The IDF has its own problem.

They have many, not least that the people shooting at them are actually being supported by their own government. C’est la vie.

They’re using American planes. Why? Because no other country will build planes for them, and the Americans do not want them building their own. (The Lavi affair is the case in point.) The IDF needs to take the lesson from 1 Samuel 13:19-23, about depending on foreign industries. Because they’ll soon find out whether the United States still wants to be their ally, when the time comes to get spare parts or, worse yet, replacements for the aircraft they’re about to lose.

Actually I disagree with Fegus here. The Russians have supplied equipment to Israel in the post-Soviet era (and Saudi Arabia), in both cases in return for not supplying it to Iran, interestingly enough. IAI also offers support services for Russian equipment to third parties. However there are many reasons the Israeli air force hasn’t shifted to Russian equipment.

1. Air forces have long term institutional cultures, and aircraft have long lifetimes and create a huge support network and bank of exeprtise – you don’t just change suppliers if you can possibly avoid it. It is hugely disruptive and would adversely effect performance for a long time. You don’t change suppliers unless there is a strong political imperative, and that just doesn’t exist.

2. The USA is only too happy to supply planes for for free through aid packages. Russia wants money for their planes.

3. As a vassal state, Israel has no real power to choose another provider without a yank on her chain. By and large vassals have to buy the kit of their suzerain.

As such, Israel neither wants to – nor can it – shift from dependency on US equipment for the majority of it’s military.

@Terry: Why the hell would Israel want to start a war with one of the only two countries in the region it has a solid peace deal with? And if we are to let the insanity slip, then why engage in an even more absurd proposal to attempt to draw a defensive line through some of the most mountainous terrain in the area, which is controlled by a populace with a centuries if not millenia long tradition of banditry and insurrection? And in return for what? The aim of Israel in taking Sinai was to deprive Egypt of it’s buffer zone by securing bridgeheads on the Suez isthmus, and to gain access to the oil and gas supplies of the western Sinai region and the Gulf of Suez.The eastern Sinai, by contrast, has no real interest to anyone not involved in people trafficking, gun running or drug smuggling.

It has insignificant natural resources, the topography from hell, and the local population operate as autonomous bandit polities, which renders the place is valueless territory from which only low level insurrection, terrorism and crime would be the only gain.

That’s something even Likud would think twice before ripping up a peace treaty for. It’s not even pointless, it’s doubly counter-productive, like punching yourself repeatedly and violently in the head in return for stealing dog mess your neighbors garden to put in yours.