A permanent ceasefire would be just another temporary truce

That is underlined by the seeming wavering support of Israel’s closest ally. US Vice President Kamala Harris has, on the one hand, backed Israel’s right of self-defence while on the other declaring that “too many innocent Palestinians have been killed”. Meanwhile, Defence Secretary Lloyd Austin has warned that Israel not only has a “moral responsibility” to avoid civilian casualties but also a strategic reason to avoid radicalising the civilian population and driving them into the arms of Hamas.

What Israel’s plan is for Gaza after rooting out Hamas remains worryingly unknown, given the risks an Israeli reoccupation could get bogged down in the same kind of breeding ground for terrorism that led to the insurgency in Iraq in the aftermath of the US invasion in 2003.

Yet as was the case with liberating Germany from Nazi rule in 1945, the military reality appears to be that there is no way Israel can achieve its war aim of destroying Hamas without inflicting collateral damage on one of the world’s most densely populated strips of land.

Unlike its terrorist foe, the democratic state of Israel does not deliberately target civilians; it warns ordinary Palestinians to move out of the line of fire.

The moral responsibility for the loss of innocent Palestinian lives lies with the Hamas leaders responsible for the horrifying incursion into southern Israel and for locating its tunnels and command network under civilian infrastructure.

Claims by street marchers and fellow travellers in the global “human rights” industry that the Israeli government – which is seeking to destroy the leadership of the Iranian-backed Islamist terrorist organisation whose charter is to wipe Israel off the map – is perpetrating genocide in Gaza is slanderous sloganising and worse.

Unlike its terrorist foe, the democratic state of Israel does not deliberately target civilians; it warns ordinary Palestinians to move out of the line of fire.

And yet the reality is every tragic civilian death caused by an Israeli bomb or shell is becoming a propaganda victory for Hamas. Hence, as hostilities resume in Gaza, Israel confronts an increasingly diabolical choice.

Fresh TV images of dead and wounded Palestinians amid the rubble of exploded buildings will risk fuelling the growing international calls for a “permanent ceasefire”.

However, that cry is a misnomer when it involves no credible way of bringing Hamas to justice or ending its rule in Gaza. Would a permanent ceasefire therefore just be another temporary truce when no one seriously expects Hamas to alter its charter and permanently lay down its rocket launchers used to kill, maim and terrorise Israeli civilians?

After the bloodletting of October 7 sparked the fresh chapter in the cycle of violence in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict – and despite the risk that resuming military operations could risk Israel’s security by sparking a wider conflict in the Middle East – any diminished hopes for a longed-for two-state solution now must surely rest, at a minimum, on a fresh political start in Gaza.

All true supporters of a genuine peace process – one that will deliver Palestinian statehood in Gaza and the West Bank and recognise the right of the Jewish homeland to exist – should hope that Israel can finish the job of protecting itself from Hamas as quickly as possible.

At the same time, global opinion is united in calling on the Israeli government to continue doing everything possible to minimise the loss of innocent life in Gaza.