The Way Ahead for Israel

By Walter E. Block

According to the peace treaty now being implemented between Israel and Hamas, several hundred thousands of Palestinian terrorists will be released from their well-deserved captivity. They will be set free in Gaza and elsewhere in the Arab world. The overwhelming majority of them, if not all of them, are followers of the Sinwar brothers, one who was the mastermind of the October 7, 2033 atrocity, the other who is now in charge of this enclave. It is only a matter of time before a repetition of this barbarous date will take place.  This is inevitable given the “principles” of these degenerates.

What then for Israel? That country should then march forward under the banner of “Never Again.” It will be time, it will be past time, to take the gloves off, way off. It will be time, it will be past time, to stop fighting enemies with one hand tied behind the back. No. Check that: with one and three-quarters of a hand tied behind the back.

No more pussy-footing around. No more surgical strikes. No more slaps on the wrist. No more tit for tat. No more merely proportional responses. No more land for peace. No more leaflets. No more “pauses.” No more “lawn mowing.” No other military in the world, half as provoked as Israel recently was and will be, would do anything of the kind. Let Israel, finally, enter the world of other nations. It will be time, it will be past time, to get serious.

What, then, to do?

One course of action is to borrow a leaf from how the Americans treated the Japanese at the end of World War II. They did not physically enter that country until it was completely pulverized and all resistance was gone. Another is how the U.S. dealt with the Germans at around that time: the fire-bombing of Dresden. Both of these would be far too harsh. There are entirely too many innocent Gazans for that course of action to be justified (everyone under the age of twelve, for example).  To aim at civilians, as did the US army is to emulate Hamas. Just because they acted in an uncivilized manner, just because the US did so too, is no justification for Israel to act in so unseemly a manner.

No, a kinder, gentler response is required if Israel is to put a final stop to the depredations it has been suffering since 1948 as a country, and the Jews in the area long before that, such as Hebron in 1929.

Banishment.

Every Gazan must vacate the premises. No food, water, electricity, medicine, nothing of the sort should be allowed therein. Where should they go? On possibility is to Egypt, of course. Where else, Brooklyn? That country, to say the least, will not welcome these Palestinians with open arms. Too bad. Yes, Israel (and Egypt too) benefit from the recent relative peace between the two of them. But in any rational calculus, the only democracy in the Middle East would better safeguard itself with a war against Egypt, if need be, if it could rid itself of every last Palestinian from all too nearby Gaza.

And this time, in a possible war with Egypt, which would be over in six days or so if we can extrapolate from the past, if Israel ends up in control of the entire Sinai Peninsula, they should keep it. No more bowing down to the Eisenhower of the day. Happily the new US administration is nothing like the preceding one.

But it is exceedingly unlikely that this policy would lead to war. Particularly given that Israel, plus the Jews of the world, would make Egypt an “offer they couldn’t refuse” this time financially.

The same policy should be pursued with regard to the Palestinians now resident in Judea and Samaria (often mislabeled as the “West Bank.”) They, too, should be evicted and sent packing, off, perhaps, to Jordan and Lebanon. Those countries too might well not prove receptive to the present modest proposal. They should be dealt with in the same manner as Egypt.

This plan will be attacked as “ethnic cleansing.” Well, better to “cleanse” people who are responsible for the atrocities of October 7, 2023, a day that will forever live in infamy, than to be treated even once again, let alone from time to time as is the wont of these terrorists, in the manner accorded to the innocent Israelis murdered and raped by Hamas on that occasion. The Jews in Germany in the late 1930s and early 1940s would have been deliriously happy to have been “ethnically cleansed” and thus escaped the clutches of Hitler. There are worse fates than being “ethnically cleansed.” Where would the Gazans fare better: as outcasts in Egypt, for example, or being bombed to smithereens in situ? To ask this is to answer it.

What about the rockets that will be entering Israel courtesy of the Hezbollah in Lebanon? Let us have a little more territorial expansion with the Golan Heights as a precedent. Wipe those missile launchers off the map and then take over the territory from whence they came. Instead of trying to bribe monsters with land for peace, reverse the process: when they initiate violence, take over the land they used to do so and use it as a buffer zone. Let the Arabs know that they lose land, among other things, when they initiate war against a country that only wishes to be at peace.

What about Iran in this regard? That is my own particular favorite emigration end point for the Gazans. If there is any country sorely in need of regime change it is Persia. Given the wont of the Palestinians to try to overthrow the governments kind enough to take them in, this would be a “marriage” made in heaven.