Israel’s force must be supported
Israel's in a tough neighbourhood: refusing to use force simply sends a message of weakness.
Speaking last Monday at Israel’s embassy in Canberra at the commemoration of the Hamas attack on October 7, Senator Dave Sharma said we should “affirm the profound attachment of the people of Israel to life, to living and to go on living, despite everything. To survive. As the greatest act of defiance in the face of this most monstrous crime. The people of Israel live.”
Addressing a rally at Parliament House in Canberra the same day, co-founder of the Labor Friends of Israel, Mike Kelly, recalled the comments of Chaim Weizmann (first president of Israel), when he said in 1946, “Now, in the light of past and present events, the bitter truth must be spoken. We feared too little and we hoped too much. We underestimated the bestiality of the enemy; we overestimated the humanity, the wisdom, the sense of justice of our friends.”
These are messages that too many of our leaders have forgotten. Imagine it was 1942. There’d be frantic calls by Penny Wong for diplomatic conferences, de-escalation and ceasefires in Europe and the Pacific. After the bombing of Darwin our foreign ministry would no doubt issue a media release stating that “innocent Japanese civilians should not have to suffer because of Japan’s attack on Australia.”
The highly respected strategic analyst Walter Russel Mead recently pointed out that our foreign-policy elites desperately want to believe that successful foreign policy depends less on military strength and more on diplomacy, international law and attention to human rights. But he argued that this is all just a pleasant illusion and that “nowhere is the game of Let’s Pretend more assiduously practised than in the world of Western Middle East policy”.
We saw this approach in Wong’s recent UN speech. It’s a political mystery why she pursued a line that was simultaneously anti-Israel yet not pro-Hezbollah or pro-Hamas enough for the western Sydney electorates that hitherto have explained this government’s approach to our Middle East policy. One possible explanation here is that Israel’s recovery of its military mojo and deterrence reputation has happened so swiftly in the past three weeks that it’s severely shaken all Wong’s guidelines, leaving her floundering.
In almost every speech, tweet or commentary on Israel and the Middle East, our Prime Minister and Foreign Minister highlight how they fear greater violence, more casualties and an expanded war with more participants. These warnings and constant calls for restraint are understandable. But fundamentally they’re asking Israel not to use force in its own defence by defeating its foes.
But Israel’s in a tough neighbourhood: refusing to use force simply sends a message of weakness. Israel’s former ambassador to Australia Mark Sofer recently reminded us of the limits of diplomacy. Iran has just fired nearly 200 ballistic missiles at Israel. “What do you negotiate about? They are dedicated 100 per cent to the destruction of the state of Israel, so what are we supposed to discuss? The speed of our destruction? The method of our destruction?” he asked.
Many Israeli analysts point out that the containment policy conducted for years by Israel in Gaza failed: Israel didn’t do enough to deter Hamas, giving the terrorist group time to build up its forces and its confidence. Now Israel has decided to escalate the use of force to eliminate the threat from Hezbollah, the group that’s been the jewel in the crown of Iran’s “Axis of Resistance” against Israel and the US.
Israel has been right to reject as illusionary the idea of a diplomatic solution to stop Hezbollah’s war of attrition against them. You can’t win a war playing defence. In this context, the UN role that Wong constantly looks to for peaceful solutions has been farcical. UNIFIL, the UN force in southern Lebanon, was established to separate the two sides by keeping Hezbollah away from the joint border. But UNIFIL has been utterly ineffective and the UN troops have never done their job. UNIFIL has been an utter 18-year long failure. As opposed to the mission spelled out under UN Security Council Resolution 1701 they have presided over a vast expansion of Hezbollah capability. Right now with an actual war going on, the reasonable thing to do would be to remove them from danger.
Israel has now shown that it’s ready to escalate in Lebanon and willing to sustain pain and suffering to achieve victory.
The Albanese government has too often missed the point that it’s the Iranian cycle of continuous aggression that maintains their assault on Israel through their proxies daily. It’s only by demonstrating that it’s willing to retaliate that Israel judges that there’ll be any prospect that its enemies will exercise restraint. Israel knows that its willingness to use force, not diplomacy, is the only way to ensure its own security.
The Israeli government is wise not to have listened to our advice on ceasefires, de-escalation and to just seek goodwill. Israel knows that if it did that, it would just invite more aggression from its enemies. Compare Israel to Ukraine, which is struggling to fight effectively given the constraints placed upon it by the West. Wisely, Israel knows that it must take the fight to its enemies.
Empty words won’t cut it when it comes to Israel’s self-defence. When it comes to the war in Gaza and defeating Hezbollah, we should support Israel standing firm on the battlefield.
Anthony Bergin is a senior fellow at Strategic Analysis Australia.
A version of this article appeared in The Australian.
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