To the Journal editor;

Audrey Kurth Cronin is a professor of security and technology and director of the Carnegie Mellon Institute for Strategy & Technology.

Her most recent article in Foreign Affair is an example of clear and unbiased thinking about how Israel should fight its current war with Hamas. It can be mind-numbing, and so far, I seriously doubt if anyone supporting either side has room to reconsider their biases. Ironically, so far, the only one who is not losing that battle is Hamas.

Irrespective of where you stand, the Israeli war in Gaza has been a strategic disaster for her. Worse yet, there is little evidence to suggest that the group’s ability to threaten Israel has been significantly compromised.

In some respects, Israel’s response has helped Hamas most demonstrably amongst Palestinians, and beyond the Middle East. I recall the students protests back in the late ’60s and early ’70s when I was in Madison, Wisconsin.

I mention this to remind us of how old that conflict is. I feel bewildered that the conflict is still alive and kicking vigorously.

Hamas meets all the criteria for being considered a terrorist organization. The group is composed of self-serving, violent extremists who prioritize armed struggle over effective governance and the welfare of Palestinians.

There is no question that eliminating Hamas would be good for Palestinians, Israel, the Middle East, and the United States. However, for Israel to defeat Hamas, it needs a better strategy, one informed by a deeper understanding of how terrorist groups generally end.

On the Israeli side there is the factor of Netanyahu. Benjamin Netanyahu’s determination to become prime minister for an unprecedented sixth term came with a price that no one actually predicted.

An alliance with a movement that he once shunned, but that had been brought into the political mainstream by Israel’s steady drift to the right.

Netanyahu, who is now on trial for bribery and other corruption charges, repeatedly failed in his attempts to form a coalition after most of the parties announced that they were no longer willing to join him.

He personally involved himself in negotiations to ally Itamar Ben-Gvir’s Jewish Power party and Bezalel Smotrich’s Religious Zionism Party, making them kingmakers for anyone trying to form a coalition government.

In November 2022, the bet paid off: With the now-critical support of the extreme right, Netanyahu returned to office. 

Overall, however, military repression has a poor track record as a form of counterterrorism. It is difficult and costly to sustain and tends to work best when members of a terrorist group can be separated from the general population, a condition that is hard to create in most places.

Repressive campaigns erode civil liberties and strain the fabric of the state. Scorched-earth tactics change the character of society and raise the question of what, precisely, the government is defending?

Cornin argues that the real trouble is not that Israel is relying on the wrong strategy but that it doesn’t have the right target.

In this view, it is Iran, and not Hamas, that is the heart of the problem, since the theocratic regime in Tehran supports, arms, and funds the terrorist group.

Now, I am tempted, again, to say, “What else is new?”