Israel’s attack on Gaza on Friday was weeks in the making, a deliberate act to gain legitimacy with its public, say Palestinian observers, as Israel braces for new elections in November.
On Friday, Israel launched missiles throughout the besieged Palestinian enclave, killing 10 people, including a five-year-old girl, a 23-year-old woman, as well as Taysir al-Jabari, a commander of Islamic Jihad’s military wing.
Islamic Jihad claimed that it launched more than 100 rockets at Israel in retaliation to the air raids. The violence raised fears that Israel would launch another war against Gaza 15 months after a conflict that lasted a month and which saw the deaths of more than 260 people.
“Everyone is nervous, there is no appetite for war,” said Tamer Qarmout from the Doha Institute of Graduate Studies, who hails from Gaza and has family there.
“Gaza has witnessed four or five major conflicts over the last 15 years. We’re still talking about the reconstruction of the Gaza Strip. Gaza has never really recovered, it just lives from conflict to conflict,” he told Al Jazeera.
Israel’s deadly attacks came after Israeli forces arrested Bassam al-Saadi, a senior member of the armed group, earlier in the week. Al-Saadi was captured during an Israeli raid on Jenin in West Bank. During that raid, a teenager was also killed.
‘Shock and awe’
Prior to the assassination, Israel tightened its grip over the coastal enclave. It had been 15 years under a brutal blockade and shut down all border crossings.
Israel also closed roads around Gaza earlier this week and sent reinforcements to the border as it braced for a response after al-Saadi’s arrest.
Friday’s attack came on the heels of previous assaults, including drone strikes on the Gaza Strip, leading some observers to suggest the current escalation is a calculated move. The West Bank has seen an increase in Israeli strikes by soldiers and settlers as well, as well, arrests of Palestinians, and home demolitions.
“Israel is arming its settlers in the West Bank to shoot and kill Palestinians and not to [do so]under the command chain of the military. So what we’re seeing right now is an intensification of Israel’s military strategy of ‘shock and awe’,” said Mariam Barghouti, a Ramallah-based researcher.
“Let’s also keep in mind that Israeli elections are coming this November, and there’s this trend of Israeli leaders to use Gaza as a weapon to rally the Israeli settler population.”
‘It’s a contest’
Israel appeared intent on escalating the situation when Prime Minister Yair Lapid said on Thursday that Israel “will not shy away from using force to restore normal life in the south of the country, and we will not stop the policy of arresting terrorist operatives in Israel”.
Nour Odeh (a former Palestinian Authority government spokesperson and a political analyst) suggested that the latest attack could be politically motivated.
“Gaza is traumatised. It has not yet recovered. Jihad and Hamas were doing everything they could to keep people calm and allow them to breathe. No one was seeking an escalation – except Lapid,” said Odeh.
“It’s a contest to show who’s more powerful. Lapid wants to prove he has what it takes, even though he has no military background,” she added.
‘Gazans will pay’
Analysts said there are intersecting electoral influences fueling Israel’s decision to start what could possibly be another war.
As is the case almost every summer, the current governing coalition in Israel is meaning to look hawkish in the lead-up to another election cycle in which the Likud Party – headed by former Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu – is poised for a return.
It also happened at the same time that the United States is gearing-up for midterm election. With some minor legislative victories by the Democrats, the Biden government will be less hesitant to tell Israel to cease its aggressions or hold it accountable for war crimes, such as the Friday killing of the young girl.
“Israel is using Gazans as sacrificial pawns in their ongoing struggle for power and are acting with impunity because they know nobody can or will hold them accountable,” said Tariq Kenney-Shawa, a US-based policy fellow at Al Shabaka – The Palestinian Policy Network, an independent, nonprofit think-tank.
“The fact that zero rockets were fired from Gaza prior to Israel’s unilateral decision to start a massacre, despite the tightening of the blockade, and the assassination of PIJ [Palestinian Islamic Jihad]It is evidence of the weakness of Israeli security concern, says its leaders
“Israel appears bent on striking PIJ hard, so PIJ will have to respond as they have already indicated. This is going to escalate again and Gazans will pay.”
Gideon Levy, an Israeli commentator and writer for the Israeli newspaper Haaretz, told Al Jazeera that bombing Gaza has become a way for Israeli politicians to show their “strength” ahead of voting.
“I’m very suspicious that it has to do with the elections. Any prime minister has to prove himself, particularly if he is from the centre left in Israel. And we have a new prime minister, and he wants to show that he’s macho like all the former prime ministers. All those are very poor excuses to go for another round in Gaza,” Levy said.
Israeli journalist Gideon Levy says politics are likely behind Israel’s latest air strikes on the Gaza Strip and Hamas’ involvement will determine if the conflict escalates further ⤵️ pic.twitter.com/4QOZtXbq2Y
— Al Jazeera English (@AJEnglish) August 6, 2022
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