The war in the Gaza has destroyed the myth of the power of the Israeli army

Palestinians gather at the site of Israeli strikes on houses in Jabalia refugee camp. (Photos: Reuters)

By Anthony Bell

Since October 7, 2023, the Israeli Army (IDF) has been conducting a ground operation in the Gaza Strip (Palestine) against the HAMAS group. As of January 8, 2024, Israel has over 1,200 civilians killed and over 5,000 wounded, while Palestine has over 23,200 killed and over 58,400 wounded. More than 7,700 Palestinians remain missing.

The Israeli publication “Yedioth Ahronot” states that the Israeli army has failed to achieve its war goals despite spending 60 billion dollars on the operation in the Gaza Strip.

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According to estimates by journalistic monitoring groups, which rely on video footage published on the Internet, the Israeli military lost 36 Merkava tanks, 64 armored personnel carriers, 29 armored vehicles and dozens of other equipment to HAMAS actions on January 8 (not counting the Lebanese Hezbollah group in the north). And this is despite Israel’s total air superiority, when airstrikes destroy entire blocks of city buildings.

The aggravation of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict led to Israel’s unilateral suspension of the fulfillment of its export obligations, and the vague prospects for resolving this conflict indicate the reluctance of Tel-Aviv as a supplier of military products, services for the maintenance and modernization of weapons and military equipment follow previously assumed obligations.

About 200 Merkava-2 and Merkava-3 tanks prepared by Israel in accordance with existing contracts for delivery abroad, by decision of the country’s leadership in October 2023, became part of the new IDF tank battalion for deployment in Gaza, and the execution of signed international contracts was “frozen” with reference to “force majeure”.

It should be noted that the myth about the high reliability of the Israeli high-tech air defense system “Iron Dome” was dispelled by HAMAS’ massive launch of primitive and inexpensive missiles. Israeli radar stations failed to cope with a large number of targets, the air defense missiles malfunctioned and fell, including on the residential sector, causing destruction and casualties. Until October 7, 2023, the Iron Dome was used to intercept a small number of attacking HAMAS rockets, was heavily promoted and was even exported to the United States. However, the results of this air defense system in repelling massive missile attacks were not as successful as indicated in the advertising brochures.

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Israel’s air defense, according to experts at the American Middle East Institute, is not optimized for detecting and suppressing slow-moving and low-flying objects, such as unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs).

During the fighting in Gaza, serious shortcomings were revealed in the Trophy active protection system of the Israeli state company Rafael, which is equipped with Merkava tanks and Namer armored personnel carriers. Triggering of Trophy near infantry leads to the defeat of personnel (the death of 11 Israeli soldiers was recorded). A routine shutdown of the system during the embarkation and disembarkation of soldiers increases the risk of destruction of equipment and detonation of ammunition.

Experts from the American publication “Foreign Policy” point out that the IDF’s statements about reducing “collateral losses” as a result of the use of advanced weapons developed by Israel in Gaza do not correspond to reality. And these are just the preliminary disappointing results of the IDF’s military operations in October-December 2023. It is quite possible that other Israeli military products exported may show the same low combat effectiveness.

The author is an independent military analyst.

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