“There is truly no bottom to the barrel of terrorism”
IN“Grim Lessons from Phase One of the Israel-Hamas Hostage Deal,” the Hoover Institute’s Peter Berkowitz discusses a new book by Eyal Tsir-Cohen, a former member of Israel’s negotiating team with Hamas: The Untold Story: How We Lost in the Negotiations Despite the Military Victory in Gaza. Among the key mistakes made by Israeli planners, according to Tsir-Cohen, was the assumption that as the fighting intensified, a rift would develop between Hamas and the general Gazan population.
That never happened to any great degree, and for one simple reason: Israeli planners and negotiators failed “to appreciate how thoroughly Hamas jihadi spirit is woven into the fabric of Palestinian society and how tightly bound it is to Gazans’ identity.” Referring to Hamas’s ability to recruit new young Gazans to replace Hamas fighters killed by Israel, Tsir-Cohen concluded, “There is truly no bottom to the barrel of terrorism.”
Frankly, it is a bit surprising that any Israeli would be surprised by the depths of the hatred directed at us. Just read the words (from Palestinian Media Watch) of one of the October 7 terrorists, as he called his parents in an ecstatic, almost drug-induced, state to describe the murder of ten Jews with his own hands:
Terrorist son: Hi, Dad, I’m talking to you from [Kibbutz] Mefalsim, open my WhatsApp and see all the killed people. Look how many I killed with my own hands! Your son killed Jews!
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