Why Israel’s attempt to wipe out Hamas will not succeed

After three weeks of airstrikes, Israel has begun its ground invasion of the Gaza Strip. The goal, in the words of the defence minister, Yoav Gallant, is to ‘wipe them [Hamas] off the face of the Earth’. But without a long-term political vision, this objective is unachievable. Even if Israel deals a powerful blow against Hamas, the country risks becoming trapped in a long and costly war that will cause a dangerous blowback across the Middle East. 

For now, Israel is concentrating on northern Gaza – which it sees as Hamas’s beating heart. This will be a bloody fight and the street-to-street combat could last for months. As Israeli forces move deeper into the Strip, they will face a determined and well-armed adversary who will use the urban landscape to its advantage. 

According to one source close to the leadership, Hamas’s military wing, the Izz al-Din al-Qassam Brigades, which appears to have orchestrated the 7 October attack on Israel, has been preparing for this moment for five years.