While the IDF prepares for a final assault on Gaza City, former defense officials tell JNS that only a military takeover of Hamas’s last stronghold can achieve a decisive victory.
Yaakov Lappin
(JNS)
As the IDF masses troops on the outskirts of Gaza City, Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Eyal Zamir declared on Tuesday that the military will not stop until it achieves a “decisive victory.” Meanwhile, a fierce debate is raging within Israel over the necessity of a final, large-scale ground assault on Hamas’s last major stronghold.
The IDF has been conducting preliminary operations on the ground and calling up reservists. On Tuesday, Zamir visited newly mobilized reservists from the IDF Technological and Logistics Directorate, telling them, “We are going to increase and enhance the strikes of our operation, and that is why we called you. The IDF does not offer anything less than a decisive victory. We will not stop the war until we defeat this enemy.”
While some fear the risk of a high price in soldiers’ lives and to the 20 living Israeli hostages held by Hamas in its tunnels and starved, former senior defense officials have told JNS that a full military takeover of the remaining Hamas-controlled territory is a necessary precondition for achieving Israel’s war aims and paving the path for a decisive long-term victory over Hamas.
The officials have argued that the very nature of fighting a jihadist terror organization, for which mere survival constitutes a victory, necessitates a strategy that goes beyond attrition to the full dismantling of its governing and military capabilities. Only by seizing the ground, they argued, can Israel properly remove the threat, create the conditions for a new reality in Gaza, and generate the leverage needed to secure the return of the hostages.
Maj. Gen. (Res.) Uzi Dayan, who has served as Israel’s national security advisor, head of the IDF Planning Branch, head of IDF Central Command, and deputy IDF chief of staff, told JNS that applying conventional military logic to a conflict with a terror group like Hamas is a fundamental error.
“In a classic war, if I destroy a large part of the army and threaten the capital city, the war is pretty much over. But in terrorism, there is a very problematic anomaly or asymmetry,” Dayan said. “For us to remove the threat of Hamas, we need to completely dismantle it—its mechanisms, its terrorists, its leadership—and kick them out of their territory.”
He added, “It’s like Germany in 1945. Whereas for Hamas to win, or at least not to lose in its own eyes, it is enough for it to survive. Let’s say we kill more terrorists and so on, and Gaza is in ruins, and then on the end-of-war date, Hamas pops its head out of the rubble and fires one more rocket into the sea off Tel Aviv—from its perspective, it has won.”
Therefore, Dayan argued, the fight against Hamas requires a multi-stage process that begins with seizing the ground. “The fighting must indeed take control of all the territory. First, to take control of what are called strategic areas—dominant areas, junctions, important buildings, for example, for communications, and over the main valves of food, water, electricity, medicine, and so on,” he explained.
“Once you have done that, you have reached a point of decision. The war is not over yet, but it is clear that it has been decided. There are still terrorists running around with Kalashnikovs and RPGs, and then you enter a longer process where you need to start cleaning the infrastructure and dismantling the mechanisms of Hamas’s control.”
In Gaza, achieving this point is a prerequisite for any stable “day after,” Dayan stated, stressing that this military takeover must happen quickly, before Trump’s visit, to avoid a scenario in which the U.S. president makes transactional deals such as those proposed to Ukraine.
Regarding the hostages still being held in Gaza, Dayan acknowledged the increased risk posed to them by a ground operation but argued that it is the only path that offers a real chance of their return.
“Yes, it endangers the hostages, but the hostages are in danger anyway. And anyone who thinks we will succeed in bringing back the hostages only by saying [to Hamas], ‘Tell us what you want and we will give it to you,’ is mistaken,” he stated.
Dayan advocated for a “hostages first” approach, where Israel would be willing to implement short pauses in the fighting for an immediate exchange. He said that as the IDF conquers more territory, it gets physically closer to the hostages and to Gazans who may have intelligence on their whereabouts.
The internal debate over this strategy, he assessed, stems from a lack of experience with this type of warfare and the powerful influence of modern media. Unlike in past wars, where internal disputes were usually kept behind closed doors, today, both technologically and in other ways, the data are often out in the open.
This internal debate was on full display during a stormy Security Cabinet meeting on Aug. 31, according to a report in Mako. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu reportedly told ministers that U.S. President Donald Trump was pressing Israel to complete its victory in the war, quoting Trump as saying, “Leave the partial deals and go in with full force and finish this.”
At the same meeting, IDF Deputy Chief of Staff, Maj. Gen. Tamir Yadai argued that only when Hamas suffers an “unbearable” blow will it surrender, and that this could only be achieved through a full occupation “with all the prices that entail.”
In contrast, Zamir, while not opposing the operation, expressed support for a partial hostage deal that was on the table.
Brig. Gen. (res.) Dedy Simhi, former chief of staff of the IDF Home Front Command, told JNS that the IDF’s previous hesitation to conquer all of Gaza was a direct result of the hostage crisis.
“The main constraint was the issue of the hostages,” Simhi said. “The IDF did not maneuver and did not attack, neither with fire nor with ground forces, in areas where it thought there were living or dead hostages. The moment the number of hostages decreased from 250 to 20, those areas shrank. Hamas is less willing to release hostages, and there is no choice but to apply pressure and manage the risks differently.”
He added, “I think the chance of bringing back hostages is much greater if we increase the military pressure. It is true that increasing military pressure also increases the risk to the hostages, but leaving them there without military pressure also increases the risk. There is no choice; it is a choice between bad and worse.”
Simhi provided a tactical assessment of the task ahead, noting that of the approximately 40 square kilometers that make up Gaza City, about half are already under IDF control.
“What remains is to take control of 20 square kilometers (7.7 square miles) of Gaza City. It is a complex military event, but not impossible. With proper planning and proper work, unfortunately, it will likely cost us in prices, but this is what remains,” he said.
He argued that a full takeover of the remaining areas of Hamas control in Gaza City and the central Gaza camps is the essential prerequisite for establishing a new reality.
“After the conquest of Gaza City and a few more central camps, all of Gaza will be in our hands. Then, in my opinion, we need to establish outposts in all these places and start to formulate the ‘day after’ plan,” perhaps involving forces of various Arab coalitions.
“As long as we do not conquer Gaza, these coalitions will not want to come. After we conquer it, you will see that many more people will want to come,” he concluded.
Image: IDF soldiers operating in the Gaza Strip, August 1, 2025. Credit: IDF.
