Exclusive: Lt. Col. James Zumwalt likens Gaza to a patient suffering from a terminal disease
In the aftermath of the unprovoked and surprise Hamas raid into Israel on Oct. 7 that killed an estimated 1,400 civilians, including women and beheaded children, Israel activated 300,000 reservists, clearly preparing to undertake a ground invasion into Gaza. Israel suggests the only way such an offensive can be avoided at this point is if Hamas "surrenders unconditionally."
For Americans to better understand the impact the deaths of 1,400 citizens had on a far less-populated Israel and why an aggressive response is now warranted, its loss in numbers is comparable to the city of Albany, New York, losing approximately 45% of its population overnight – i.e. 45,000 people – in a single terrorist attack.
The Gaza Strip is effectively a patient who suffers from a potentially terminal disease and now is in need of immediate and aggressive treatment.
Gaza's disease is the cancer "Hamas." This terrorist group is so fully committed to Israel's destruction that it subordinates the welfare of the Palestinian people, whom it governs, to this sole objective, content to use them as expendables in the process. To prevent the cancer's spread, Israel is committed to an aggressive chemotherapy regime – to be administered in the form of a ground war.
No better example of the priorities Hamas places on its destruction of Israel over the welfare of its people was exhibited than in 2017 when it dismissed a very generous offer by Israel to turn the impoverished Gaza Strip into "the Singapore of the Middle East." Israeli Defense Minister Avigdor Lieberman appealed to the people of Gaza declaring, "The Gazans must understand that Israel, which withdrew from the Gaza Strip to the last millimeter, is not the source of their suffering – it is the Hamas leadership, which doesn't take their needs into consideration. … The moment Hamas gives up its tunnels and rockets, we'll be the first to invest."
Acceptance of this offer could have generated tens of thousands of new jobs for unemployed Palestinians. After World War II, the U.S. used an economic stimulus initiative to transition its enemies – Germany and Japan – into allies. By rejecting the offer, Hamas demonstrates its fear of a Palestinian-Israeli economic alliance occurring. Thus, Hamas is a permanent barrier to peace and economic prosperity in the region. As such, this clarifies how Israel needs to respond to the Oct. 7 massacre.
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Israel must now be as committed to the destruction of Hamas as Hamas is to Israel's destruction. A recent poll indicates a massive number of Israelis are already of this mindset. But a ground invasion of Gaza does pose a problem. To be totally effective, not even one cell of the Hamas cancer can survive the treatment. A surviving cell becomes a catalyst for Hamas to come roaring back, stronger than before. Thus, the reality emerges that additional treatment will be needed after the chemotherapy phase is completed.
The possible survival of a single Hamas cell mandates surgery performed by a team of Western democracies, truly interested in eliminating the cancer and restoring stability to the Middle East.
That team must work together effectively to economically isolate the source responsible for nourishing the cancer – Iran – the world's leading state sponsor of terrorism.
We are currently not heading in that direction. In 2019, President Donald Trump sought to cut Iranian oil exports to zero barrels/day, taking a major economic and political risk in the interests of our national security. Under Biden, exports are now up to 3 million barrels/day as he prioritizes his 2024 reelection over our national security while Iran banks a billion dollars a week in profit. That money funds Hamas to the tune of $100 million annually.
Every possible effort to do this must be undertaken by this surgical team, not only to ensure Middle East stability but global stability as well based on an Iranian sinister plan that targets Israel sooner and a naive West later. This initiative has taken on increased urgency as Hamas intentions are to employ chemical weapons against Israel in the future.
Sadly, the administration of Joe Biden has only encouraged Iran's willingness to support Hamas. So motivated has he been to resurrect former President Obama's nuclear agreement with Iran, he is committed to not intimidating the mullahs. While Obama placated the mullahs with his 2015 nuclear deal by including a number of secret "side deals," known and favorable to the Iranians but unknown to the U.S. Senate, Biden is not sharing negotiating details either.
Like Obama, Biden has been releasing billions of dollars in Iranian assets, doing all he can to appease the mullahs in seeking a new nuclear deal with them. (In 2018, it was revealed that Obama even tried secretly to help Tehran use U.S. banks to convert $5.7 billion in its assets after promising Congress the country would be denied access to the U.S. financial system – and then lied about doing it.)
Biden's foreign policy, like Obama's, has only emboldened Iran to become a regional bully. Viewed by the mullahs as a weak fish to be manipulated, Biden has allowed Iran to get closer to having a nuclear arsenal than ever before. Meanwhile Israel, always feeling it lacked the support of such a surgical team, put off taking more aggressive action against Iran that could have derailed its nuclear program earlier – a delay that may now be too late to undertake. To its credit, Israel has twice this month managed to hack into Iranian computers, shutting down nuclear projects operated by the IRGC.
Even in the wake of the Oct. 7 raid by Hamas, which both it and the mullahs admit involved Iranian planning and training, Biden defends Tehran, claiming we have no evidence yet of its participation. On Oct. 24, the fact that the White House did admit Iran is "actively facilitating" rocket and drone attacks by Shiite militias against bases housing American troops in Iraq and Syria should be sufficient to take action against Tehran. Biden probably will not act, fearing the subsequent rise in gas prices might sink his 2024 reelection bid.
While Biden went to Israel to demonstrate U.S. support for it, he undertook an effort to caution Israel about a ground invasion. Israeli officials said the level of U.S. influence exerted on the matter was more intense than any influence Washington ever applied previously. Biden's concern was that a ground war could draw in Hezbollah and Iran.
In discouraging Israel, Biden ignores a similar incident in our own history over a century ago involving an over-the-border raid that so infuriated Americans, we immediately undertook an aggressive response. The incident teaches us there are times when actions, triggered by a deep anger, prove better than words in removing a threat.
In January 1916, a Mexican terrorist of that day, Pancho Villa, kidnapped 18 Americans off a Mexican train, killing them all. A few months later, deciding not to limit his terrorism to just Mexico's borders, he crossed over into the U.S. with 1,500 men, attacking the town of Columbus, New Mexico. There, he killed 19 more Americans, leaving the town a burning inferno. Recognizing only an aggressive response would deter Villa, an enraged President Woodrow Wilson dispatched U.S. forces into Mexico to capture him. Despite this punitive raid into a bordering country that lasted several months and was unsuccessful in capturing Villa, it did succeed in preventing future incursions.
"The Thing That Couldn't Die" was a 1958 sci-fi movie about a monster destined to claim victims for generations to come. For future generations of Israelis, Hamas remains just such a monster unless the West bands together to economically isolate Tehran from feeding it.
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