Netanyahu calls for total victory over Hamas in Congress speech - opinion

‘Victory.” Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu used the word 10 times in his speech to a joint session of Congress last week. He did not use the word as a vague platitude, he described exactly what he meant. 

“The war in Gaza could end tomorrow if Hamas surrenders, disarms, and returns all the hostages. But if they don’t, Israel will fight until we destroy Hamas’s military capabilities and its rule in Gaza, and bring all our hostages home. That’s what total victory means, and we will settle for nothing less.”

Netanyahu then laid out his “day after” plan for what he called “a demilitarized and deradicalized Gaza.” He drew the historical analogy to Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan, two radical, genocidal societies that, in the wake of their defeat in World War II, underwent a transformation of the kind Netanyahu intends for Gaza.

While the prime minister invoked the examples of Japan and Germany to make the case that deradicalization of a society gripped by a genocidal ideology is possible, he neither explained how it was accomplished in those two examples, nor how it is meant to happen in Gaza. He said only that deradicalization and demilitarization “were applied to Germany and Japan after World War II,” and that “following our victory, with the help of regional partners, the demilitarization and deradicalization of Gaza can also lead to a future of security prosperity and peace.”

Which brings us back to the primary theme of the speech: Victory. In his discussion of the need for “total victory” and for a program of deradicalization for Gaza, Netanyahu failed to point out the critical causal relationship between the two concepts.

On January 24, 1943, in Casablanca, president Franklin Roosevelt announced what has been called the most controversial and consequential strategic decision of WWII: “Peace can come to the world only by the total elimination of German, Japanese, and Italian war power...[which] means the unconditional surrender of Germany, Italy, and Japan.”

From that point forward, American policy dictated that unconditional surrender of the enemy would be the only acceptable end to the war. Truman later reiterated the belief that only by destroying the Nazi and Imperial Japanese regimes, by defeating them to the point of surrender, would the political cultures of these two radicalized nations be reformed. Roosevelt and Truman were, of course, proven correct. Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan stand as the two primary examples that military victory and surrender are the way genocidal ideologies are uprooted, and delegitimized in the eyes of a radicalized population. 

Psalm 83 is read at the funeral of every IDF soldier who falls in combat. It is a psalm about war, and the closing verses are a prayer to God for victory over our enemies.

“Fill their faces with shame, that they may seek Your name, O Lord. Let them be ashamed and dismayed forever; Yes, let them be put to shame and perish, that they may know that You, whose name alone is the Lord, are the Most High over all the earth.”

Shame to our enemies

The emphasis is clear. The Psalmist repeatedly asks God not only to defeat the enemies of Israel but also to cause them shame. Why? Isn’t it enough to merely weaken our enemies so they no longer pose a threat? What interest do we have in our enemies feeling shame? Simply put, if our enemies are ashamed, it means that they recognize the evil of their ways, that they know they were wrong. Unequivocal defeat to the point of unconditional surrender has a profound psychological effect on a population. Seeing their leaders bow in defeat to their enemy causes people to rethink the worldview that led them to war. 

And there is the problem. 

As the prime minister repeatedly spoke of victory, it occurred to me that for most of the Western world, he may as well have been speaking a foreign language. While Germany and Japan were deradicalized by their defeat, none of the wars the West has engaged in since then have ended in victory. 

The Western response to military conflict since World War II has either been to manage the conflict for years with no clear strategic plan for victory or work to deescalate and quickly reach ceasefire arrangements, even if they leave bad actors standing, capable of regrouping to fight another day. 

The loss of appetite for victory that has taken over the thinking of the West is both dangerous and immoral. Dangerous because it allows for the perpetuation of every conflict, kicking the can down the road to be dealt with, again and again. Immoral because ending a war against an evil enemy before achieving total victory denies the opportunity for positive societal change that only utter defeat can bring. This is what makes wars worth fighting and why we pray for the defeat and shame of our enemies.

This war is an opportunity for real change, for a more peaceful and more prosperous future for Israel and her neighbors. 

That future depends on total victory.

The writer is executive director of Israel365action.com and co-host of the Shoulder to Shoulder podcast.