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Israel is pursuing a strategy of what it calls “de-escalation through escalation” as it ramps up attacks on the Iran-backed terrorist organization Hezbollah in Lebanon. This is a risky strategy, and one that we sadly expect will make peace less likely in a region that desperately needs it.
To state the hopefully obvious, we are not military strategists. It certainly is much easier to debate the impacts and strategic imperatives of a conflict from a safe distance than it is to actually live and lead through that conflict. We won’t pretend otherwise.
Neither, however, should Israeli officials pretend that escalating the sprawling conflicts around them will somehow resolve those conflicts. Attempting to de-escalate through escalation is not only counterintuitive at its core, it seems to us, it also runs counter to the immediate and long-term safety of Israelis.
The world has witnessed how escalation in Gaza has failed to secure the release of hostages, with tragic outcomes for innocent Israelis and Palestinians. Negotiation has secured the release of far more Israeli hostages held by Hamas than military action has, and it is past time that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his Cabinet recognize and act on this reality. The hostages and their families deserve nothing less.
What’s more, by killing thousands of innocent Palestinian and Lebanese civilians in pursuit of Hamas and Hezbollah terrorists, Israel is giving those groups what they want: a weakening of Israel’s standing in the world, and a new wave of radicalized fighters. From our perspective, Israel is not made safer when it helps perpetuate another generation of hatred and violence, even if done in the name of self-defense.
Yes, these are groups that want to destroy Israel. And, yes, they locate their operations and munitions within civilian populations by design, ruthlessly placing their own organizational goals ahead of the safety of those they claim to represent. Those realities, however, do not require Israel to take the bait — with disastrous consequences for the innocent people caught in the crossfire.
So as Israel continues to ramp up its air attacks on Hezbollah, and as Israeli leaders deny orchestrating the sophisticated exploding pager attacks that they surely carried out, the U.S. must continue to urge caution at every possible turn. Diplomacy remains the best path to securing the release of remaining hostages and allowing those displaced to return to their homes. It is also the only course toward the long-dormant but needed two-state solution that would benefit both Palestinians and Israelis.
“One of the key messages was that we want to keep a path open to a diplomatic resolution and therefore don’t want the Israelis to take steps that will close such a path,” a U.S. official told Axios recently.
The Biden administration must do everything it can to advance this message with our Israeli allies. Bombs and exploding pagers might draw applause from hardliners in Netanyahu’s Cabinet and some U.S. politicians, but they are likely to be an impediment to long-term resolution. Rather than developing new ways to kill people, leaders should be pursuing new ways to bring hostages home and secure a peace between enemies. The situation demands innovative diplomacy, not innovative destruction. It is not easy, but it remains necessary.
