Dan Senor's podcast, part 1 with Yoav Gallant:
https://youtu.be/aPEPztvsJGQ (or wherever you get your podcasts)
@ExGingi We've discussed this before upthread, but this is a very compelling argument from Yoav Gallant about attacking Hezbollah right away after Oct 7. (timestamped in the Youtube description at 36:50)
Admittedly, I don't consume Israeli news at all, even in English, beyond this podcast, this forum, and whatever is shared by a few close friends/relatives. I'm sure there is a counter argument from the Bibi side, but using hindsight it appears the Gallant plan would have been hugely successful. The effects are so incredibly far reaching beyond just the military success - shorter war = shortened reservist call up times = uplifted moral = economy gets rebuilt faster and on and on. We had almost a hundred thousand Israelis from the north living in hotels in Eilat for more than a year - kids not in school, parents losing jobs, etc etc. (I'm only mentioning things Gallant didn't mention himself)
This seems to be an absolutely massive missed opportunity by Bibi, compounding his Oct 7 failure, the worst by a prime minister since Golda Meir in '73, or maybe ever.
Waited to respond till I could sit down and type this normally.
I'm not on the anti-bibi-he-is-destroying-democracy-train, nor on the Bibi is moshiach train. And I 100% agree that people's reactions to Gallant's statements seem to be split right down the middle, based on which train you are on.
I haven't listened to this podcast, but he spoke about the same topics in an interview with Channel 12 last week.
With those disclaimers out of the way:
- His arguments are quite convincing. When the first report (WSJ?) went out early on that Gallant and Halevi were pro an attack on Hezbollah almost immediately, with Bibi against (facts) and that Bibi and Deri stalled till they could get Eisenkot and Gantz on board to help vote against it (speculation, but very likely), it basically boiled down to, do you trust the defense minister and chief of staff when they say we must attack right now, or the PM who says we don't? Seems pretty clear to me the military guys are to be trusted over the politicians.
- With that said, I disagree with your assertion that their stunning total demolishment of Hezbollah a year+ later proves they could have pulled off the same way that week. It seems the IDF was in total disarray, the reservists were showing up with plenty of passion and morale, but less organization. It makes sense to say they wouldn't have been able to pull it off then the same way as later (notwithstanding the already existing walkie talkie operation, in which Gallant's version sounds eminently more credible than Bibi's). You could easily ascribe their successes later on, as well as the lighting neutralization of Syria's entire arsenal, to plans drafted and prefected over that year and half, once the security chiefs were jolted out of their complacent stupor.
- Even if you disagree, at the very least it makes sense that
Bibi thought so. Having just been failed by the entire security apparatus, and having just been informed that there were zero plans in place to decimate Hamas or take out its leaders (seems in the very first call of that morning he asked that they activate every assassination plan for "Sinwar and down", which we clearly see they just didn't have), it makes sense he was like, guys, why you so sure that we can swiftly destroy Hezbollah? This is borne out by Gallant saying Bibi was extremely pessimistic about casualties on both fronts.
- Finally, I believe that if Israel went full force on Hezbollah that week, they would not have wanted to continue on Hamas later. The demand from Israeli society to "do something," as echoed by gallant in his interview (translated: "...what do we have an army for? If after they kill a thousand of our citizens and kidnap them and kill women and children and elderly people, we won’t carry it out?") would have been satisfied by the northern front, and Hamas would not have been crushed nearly as strongly.
So in short, there's ample room to believe that Bibi's cheshbonos were rooted in very real fears.
But I think I have to begrudgingly agree that on that one argument Gallant is correct, and his cheshbonos are proper, not influenced by anti bibi/anti charedi/pro leftist sentiments. Bibi was for sure aware of all the plans ready to go for Hezbollah, and it was American pressure or some bad reason that caused him to block it.
On a separate note, he is wrong 1) in his criticisms of Smotrich for sticking to his guns and threatening to leave over a "hostages for netzarim" deal, 2) in his taineh that Bibi was more responsible for sinking the previous deal attempt than Hamas (implying that Bibi is responsible for the hostages, not Hamas, ayin shom) 3) his assertion that Bibi has no day after plan and therefore the war was doomed from the start. You first take full military control, then you plan the day after. And he is not ready to say let's take it over fully
Tl;Dr: After some thought, I have to agree that Gallant seems pretty convincing in this argument, Bibi was just being his usual overly cautious self. Notwithstanding that Gallant has fallen prey to a lot of the wrongful ideas of the Israeli "center."
