One year after the daring and surprise October 7, 2023, attack on Israel by Hamas, resulting in Israel’s year-long (and counting) retaliation, a pertinent question to ask is: Who won? This question is ironical because until the Hamas attack, the almost universal consensus was that Israel was impregnable. With the unreserved backing of the United States government, Israel has an un-matched military in the sub-region and has a much feared and almost omniscient intelligence agency, Mossad.
All that changed on Oct. 7, 2023, when Hamas launched a daring attack, it called Operation Al-Aqsa Flood, on Israel. By the time the Israeli military neutralized the Hamas invasion, some 1,139 people were killed (including 373 members of Israel’s security forces, and 14 killed by the IDF), and 254 taken hostage, and carried back to the Gaza Strip by Hamas.
Israel’s indiscriminate, and blindly vengeful attacks to on the Gaza Strip has not helped it, but Hamas. Israel has not only failed, so far, to achieve its twin objectives of eliminating Hamas and freeing hostages held by Hamas, Hamas has achieved strategic victories it could only have dreamed of before October 7, 2024.
First, the Hamas’s Operation Al-Aqsa Flood shredded the myth that Israel is an impregnable military power. Just as the $806 billion US defense budget of 2001 did not defend the US against the 9/11 Al Qaeda attack, Israel’s $24 billion annual budget on military spending in 2023, along with 634,500 active duty and reserve troops did not protect it from the rag-tag army of 6,000 Hamas fighters who attacked it on October 7, 2023.
Israel’s response to the Oct. 7 attack by Hamas has been condemned by many governments, human rights and international organizations, as well as individuals and religious groups. South Africa, for example, dragged Israel to the International Court of Justice (ICJ), accusing it of Genocide and other crimes against humanity. In May 2024, the ICJ ordered Israel to immediately cease its military operations against Rafah in Gaza, and in May 2024 the ICC Prosecutor requested that the ICC issue warrants for the arrest of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, and three Hamas officials (including Ismail Haniyeh, the head of the Hamas Political Bureau) for “war crimes and crimes against humanity.”
Hamas’ Al-Aqsa Flood has resulted in deep divisions in the Israeli political and religious fabric. Despite the fact that a War Cabinet was formed to prosecute the response to the Hamas attack, there soon emerged significant splits, leading to its dissolution in June 2024. Meanwhile, the rift between Israel’s secular and ultra-orthodox communities about conscripting members of the ultra-orthodox community (who have traditionally been exempt from military service) has widened. In addition, hundreds of thousands of Israelis have, since November 2023, held demonstrations almost daily against Netanyahu, calling for a hostage deal with Hamas.
Israel’s war on Hamas has also stopped the US-brokered Abraham Accords which brought four Arab countries to normalize relations with Israel dead in its tracks. Many Palestinians felt that the Abraham Accords ignored their aspirations for statehood, and now, and Saudi Arabia, which was to be the prize signatory to the Accords, has made it clear that it would not sign it in the absence of a clear path to Palestinian statehood.
Israel’s response to the October 7 Hamas has brought about huge shifts in the US political landscape. Thus, there has been a significant reduction in public support for Israel’s war on Gaza, especially among young people, although the President Biden administration has been blind to this shift. Furthermore, pro-Israeli groups such as the American-Israeli Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), now face significant opposition from progressive groups, something that would have been unheard of before Hamas’ October 7 attack on Israel.
Hamas has succeeded in internationalizing their conflict with Israel. About 2 weeks after the Hamas’ October 7 attack, US forces intercepted three missiles launched presumably toward Israel by the Houthis in Yemen. The Houthis vowed to stop shipping through the Bab-el-Mandeb Strait, through which transits 30% of global containerized trade. And they did. Israel’s Eilat Port announced plans to lay off workers by March, and was bankrupt by July, 2024 because the Houthi threat denied the port of any traffic. The Houthis continue to declare their firm support of Hamas and commitment to fighting until Israel ends its war on Hamas.
In the same vein, Hezbollah, a key member of the Iran-backed Axis of Resistance against US and Israel, declared their support for Hamas, and on October 8, 2023, fired rockets into Israel. Israel turned its attention to Hezbollah on September17, 2024 with booby-trapped Hezbollah pagers and walkie-talkies blowing up in Lebanon and Syria, killing 25 (including a child) and injuring 600. Israel followed up with massive aerial bombardments of Hezbollah assets and leaders, killing Sheikh Hassan Nasrallah, the Hezbollah leader on September 27. Hezbollah, although badly shaken, vowed to continue support Gaza and Palestine, and defend Lebanon and its “honorable people.”
Israel widened the theater of its war against Hamas on July 31, 2024, when it killed Ismail Haniyeh, the Hamas political leader, while he was in Iran. Haniyeh was considered a moderate and led the Hamas team negotiating an end to Israel’s war on Gaza. On October 1, 2024, Iran retaliated for this and other assassinations by Israel of Iranian officials by firing about 180 missiles into Israel. As expected, Israel has vowed that it will make Iran pay a high price for its missile attack. Iran said it is ready for Israel’s expected counterattack and will accordingly reply to it when – if indeed – it happens. The Iran-Israel conflict could quickly spiral out of control if Israel attacks Iran’s oil facilities and Iran, in retaliation, attacks the oil facilities of Gulf Arab countries (e.g. Saudi Arabia and Qatar). One can only speculate pm the global impact of such a conflagration.
Support for the Palestinian cause in general, and for Hamas in particular has increased since the October 7. 2023 attack on Israel. Six months after the start of Israel’s invasion of the Gaza Strip, the 70% of Palestinians said they were satisfied with the roles played by Hamas in the war with Israel, although this proportion dropped to 57% by June 2024.
In contrast, Israel is now a pariah nation, and has lost support around the world, including in the US, whose government still provides it with military support, and diplomatic cover. Israel’s net favorability declined significantly in 42 out of 43 countries, with some countries (e.g. South Africa, China, Brazil, and many other Latin American countries) going from viewing Israel positively to negatively between September and December, 2023. Israel’s isolation was further demonstrated recently, at the 79th UN General Assembly, when delegates of many countries walked out on Prime Minister Netanyahu as he began his address.
Although only one country recognized the State of Palestine in 2014, 2015, 2018, and 2019, nine countries did so in the four months between April and June 2024, in response to Israel’s brutal attacks on Gaza. The State of Palestine is now recognized as a sovereign State by 146 (or just over 75%) of the 193 UN Member States.
As a result of the ICJ advisory opinion which declared that Israel’s continued occupation of Palestinian territories is “unlawful,” the UN General Assembly in September 2024 voted overwhelming to adopt a resolution demanding an immediate end to Israel’s” unlawful presence” in the Occupied Palestinian Territory. Although non-binding, the UNGA resolution is testimony to the extent to which the conscience of the humanity has been pricked by Israel’s brutal assault on Gaza over the past year. In the same vein, almost 90 European, Arab and Islamic countries backed an initiative to support to the creation of a Palestinian state and strengthen its institutions.
Hamas has demonstrated that it can stand up to and cannot be crushed by the worst of Israeli and Zionist extremism and violence. Despite 17 years of Israel’s blockade of Gaza, Hamas managed to build a formidable infrastructure and fighting machine. One year into Israel’s genocidal retaliation against Hamas in which almost 42,000 people (including 11,355 children, and 6,297 women) in Gaza were killed, 96,794 injured, 85% of schools were hit or damaged, 53% of hospitals have been rendered out of service (and the remaining only partially functional), all universities were damaged or destroyed, 90% of population have been internally displaced, and 902 families in Gaza have been wiped out, Hamas is still standing and holding hostages.
