Israel’s Security Envelope

Purely from a military standpoint, this confirms the view that it was a mistake for the IDF (not necessarily the Israeli civilians) to have been withdrawn from Gaza, and why the error should not be repeated in Judea and Samaria (the “West Bank”).

All of the occupied territories (whether you like that terminology or not) need to remain within Israel’s security envelope, with Israel’s security forces having complete freedom of movement and action.  This should apply irrespective of what the political arrangements end up being in these territories (the Golan, Gaza and Judea & Samaria).

Some are suggesting that there’s no reason to keep soldiers there in Afghanistan. The place, they say, is just not important enough somehow. If terrorists set up shop there, they argue, they could be taken care of from the air, with drone strikes and the like.

Dealing only with the latter part of the argument, the one about our aerial capabilities, Gaza is the answer those people should consider. Israel, a country with good intelligence capabilities and a decent fleet of assets in the Palestinian territories, is having a hard time inflicting said critical amount of pain on Hamas and others. How exactly would a bombing of Taliban-held Kandahar be handled? Would there be less civilian casualties? How good intelligence would one have there, on the ground, once all current allies are left behind?

[My] State Failure Blog: Critical mass - The Gaza experience