The attack on Israel this week has been the deadliest the country has seen since in fifty years. The coordinated, sophisticated and brutal assault perpetrated by the Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ) terrorist groups has killed over a thousand Israelis, with hundreds more taken captive and sent to the Gaza Strip as leverage to free Palestinian fighters detained in Israeli jails. Netenyahu is preparing a deadly land assault on the Strip, which will no doubt see the death toll spiraling further. The world has once again fixed its gaze onto the Middle East.
America has led the international community in responding to the carnage. It didn’t take long for President Joe Biden to phone Netanyahu to express condolences and offer aid and support. This support will be martial: Biden administration officials have briefed Congress about a pending military assistance package to Israel, while the Pentagon on October 8 announced the deployment of a carrier strike group to the Eastern Mediterranean.
The war in Gaza, of course, comes as the war in Ukraine continues unabated. The United States will now be tasked with arming two partners, Israel and Ukraine, at a time when both are arguably dealing with bloody and taxing conflicts. That the two conflicts are arguably different in nature – assuming Israel launches a ground invasion of Gaza, it won’t be dealing with the kinds of formidable trench lines and minefields Ukrainians forces are up against – doesn’t mean the US defense industrial complex won’t be further strained. Indeed, it’s almost a certainty.
Previous Israeli military operations against Hamas and PIJ in Gaza were largely fought in the air. In 2021, during the last major engagement between Israel and Hamas, Israel’s favorite weapons of choice were the F-16, F-15 and F-35. The objective of that specific campaign, in addition to those waged in 2008-2009, 2012 and 2014, was to pummel Hamas’s terrorist infrastructure, kill the organisation’s senior and mid-level commanders and restore a sense of deterrence in the region.
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