Lonny's War Update- October 215, 2023

Day 215 (cont) of 132 of our hostages in Hamas captivity- There is nothing more important than getting them home! NOTHING!

“I’ve never met them,
But I miss them.
I’ve never met them,
but I think of them every second.
I’ve never met them,
but they are my family.
BRING THEM HOME NOW!!!”

There is no victory until all of the hostages are home!
‎אין נצחון עד שכל החטופים בבית

Red Alerts - Missile, Rocket, Drone (UAV - unmanned aerial vehicles), and Terror Attacks

*4:40pm- south-rockets Shlomit near the Gaza border

*6:30pm- south - rockets Kerem Shalom-this is after the crossing has been reopened for humanitarian aid trucks. It’s hard to understand Hamas’ motivation for continuing to shell this crossing other than their killing 4 of our soldiers this week. It could be to disrupt the movement of humanitarian aid and then claim that Israel is starving the civilian population.
*IDF Spokesperson: Launches identified from Rafah towards Kerem Shalom Crossing, soldier lightly injured. Following the alerts in Kerem Shalom throughout the day, several launches from the Rafah area towards the Kerem Shalom Crossing were identified. The launches did not cross into Israeli territory and fell inside the Strip. Additionally, following earlier alerts today in the Shlomit area, eight launches were identified crossing from the Rafah area towards the Kerem Shalom area. As a result of the launches, an IDF soldier was lightly injured. The soldier received initial medical treatment at the scene and did not require evacuation. Hamas continues to endanger the citizens of the Strip and carry out terrorist activities from civilian areas in an attempt to harm Israeli citizens and IDF forces. In addition, the organization continues to launch from populated areas in the Rafah region towards the Kerem Shalom Crossing in order to harm IDF forces and the functioning of the crossing.

Stories of Heroes of October 7

Stav lay in a drainage ditch after a terrorist shot her with 11 bullets: War heroes stories are told:

Stav Ben David fled from the murderers in Nova and waited for her rescuers with bullets in her leg. Moshe Vitzman was in the first ambulance that arrived in Sderot and saved dozens from hell while risking his life until he was injured. Staff Sergeant Ron Ben Ezra, a commander at Zikim Base, fought with her unit even after being wounded in the head. These are just some of the heroes who told the story of their bravery at the "People of the State" conference of Ynet and Yedioth Ahronoth. United Hatzalah volunteers received appreciation badges at the event.

Stav Ben David was on her way home from the Nova festival - and then everything went wrong, and she barely escaped with her life. "I didn't understand what happened at all. I had already left on my way home, and the Waze just confused us, so I went back towards the party again, and without really understanding what was happening, we just came across a vehicle with terrorists. A convoy of ten terrorists on motorcycles who opened fire on us towards the car," she recounted today (Wednesday) at the "People of the State" conference of Ynet and Yedioth Ahronoth. United Hatzalah volunteers received appreciation badges at the event.

"After we passed them miraculously, we went back right to the festival grounds, and I was already in my own bubble, so I don't remember too many things I saw, just what I experienced myself. I was already hit by a bullet in my right leg in the car, and then I kept running with it, because of the adrenaline all the pain disappeared. I kept running with it for a few hours, and then I hid inside a ditch."

"You ran for several hours with a bullet in your leg?" "You don't feel anything in that moment. I got to the road, which is right next to the party, I didn't go too far away. There I hid under the road in a drainage ditch. There a terrorist caught me, and fired another 11 bullets at me. I lay there for another two hours with the whole wound, without a phone battery and without anything. I didn't see too much, but I felt a lot."

"What went through your mind during those hours when you were lying alone?" "At first I was in touch with my parents, before the phone died, and they told me that a relative of ours was on his way to me with a team. When my phone died I just sat and waited for someone to get to my location. After two hours I started hearing voices in Hebrew, I heard a lot of soldiers running there, and I just yelled to them "Save me", and they came to me. Only when I got to the hospital did I start to feel the pain and the smells. The smell of gunpowder smoke, the blood flowing from me."

"150 people dead on the ground, an incomprehensible number" (Lonny's note-the total number killed at the Nova Music Festival was 264)

Moshe Vitzman, a United Hatzalah medic, was in the first ambulance that also arrived in Sderot and at the Nova party on October 7, and was himself injured by shrapnel from a Qassam rocket that fell meters from him in Sderot. He described the difficult scenes: "I was dispatched with the ambulance towards Sderot. The first casualty I had was Lt. Col. Gorpman, who was already appointed as the military secretary of the prime minister. I evacuated him to the hospital, and then when I entered Sderot I saw the scenes, with almost twenty dead in a minibus at the entrance. (Lonny's note- this was a bus of retirees on a day trip in the south) I started taking out casualties from inside Sderot towards the Netivot Junction. In the first few minutes I had situations with even six injured in the ambulance while I was alone. I evacuated them towards the Netivot Junction to the hospitals. And at this stage I spoke with the United Hatzalah dispatch and told them to bring all the ambulances they could to the Helatz Junction. A civilian vehicle with casualties arrived and reported about the party, and I immediately went there."

"And all this time you're also not fully understanding that the battle is still raging, meaning there are terrorists in the area." "I arrive at the Nova party around 2 pm, and the scenes I saw there are scenes that are very difficult to describe. I saw people there burned, tied up, naked girls. I can tell you that I passed over 150 dead there. It's a number that's incomprehensible. I've been volunteering with United Hatzalah for 14 years. Those are numbers that can't be grasped. From there I went on to Be'eri, and I was there until Sunday evening, where in those 24 hours almost 80 wounded soldiers passed through me there. I set up a medical station there together with the battalion medical officer of the brigade. Soldiers who went in to fight from the inside, and five minutes later we're getting them in conditions of wounded and everything. I had 12 United Hatzalah ambulances that I was managing, we loaded up the wounded for evacuation to hospitals, some directly to hospitals, some to helicopters of Unit 669, some to United Hatzalah's helicopter. And that's how it continued, as we treated the wounded, until I was injured on October 12."

"How were you injured?" "There was a red alert in Sderot, and in those seconds I lay down on the floor. In Sderot there are between 8 and 12 seconds, some say 15, but the last time we checked it was between 8 and 12. I lay down on the floor, and a rocket fell about a meter and a half from me. Shrapnel in my left foot, I have shrapnel in my right knee, hearing loss. I went through three surgeries, I was hospitalized now until the eve of Passover at the Reut Rehabilitation Hospital, the treatment there is significant. But it's a struggle, a difficult struggle with everything. There's also the mental aspect, also the physical. You need, as they say, to start learning to walk again, and that's difficult."

The company commander who kept fighting even after being wounded:

Staff Sergeant Ron Ben Ezra, a company commander at the Zikim Base of the Home Front Command, was at the Zikim Base during those hours and described what it looked like from her arena: "I'm a recruits commander, for the August 2023 cycle, meaning they've been in the system for two months. Like everyone else, air raid sirens, thinking it's just artillery, then hearing shots after about 15 minutes. My company commander, the late Adir Avodi, gives an order that saved dozens of recruits here by switching out the recruits in the positions. I run to one of the positions, meet two other staff members there, and we just wait, wait for the enemy. At some point I identify two terrorists, we open fire on them, grenades are thrown at us. On the second grenade that I'm about to return fire, I stick my head out, and I take a bullet to the helmet. Because of the short range, the bullet penetrates the helmet, wounding me in the head. I immediately say 'I'm hit, I'm hit.'

"My deputy commander, the late Yanai Kaminka, comes and replaces me at the position. (Lonny's note: Yanai is the son of a friend of ours from our community of Tsur Hadassah. He was the commander of new recruits and he was killed fighting to save their lives. All but one of the recruits survived.). I go back and receive initial medical treatment, and then I just brief the girls, the recruits in the fortified position, that there are terrorists on the fence, we're in the midst of a war, there are wounded. I showed them the helmet, my wound, and that this is the moment, this is what we enlisted for. I continue in the battle, and at some point I also speak with my father. He's a staff sergeant in the Paratroopers. He arrives, sees his wounded daughter, it seems to me that at that point it was actually a respite for me that there's someone I trust who knows what he's doing and is with me. I continue like that in the battle for another three hours. In the end I'm evacuated to the hospital, receive medical treatment." In that battle, six staff members and a recruit were killed, who fought with all their might, but despite the trauma and pain, Staff Sergeant Ben Ezra continued her officers' course. "In this battle not only the commanders took part, the recruits also assisted in evacuating the wounded, and we also have a recruit who was killed,

Despite being wounded, he continued driving to attack the terrorists:

Staff Sergeant Reuven Ben Peresh, a fighter in the Yo'av Unit, received a call from the Chief of Staff that morning that there was an infiltration into Israeli territory and immediately jumped to defend civilians: "You take a pistol, when I only have 15 bullets, and fly to the area to join my team in order to arm ourselves with long rifles and all our equipment. Already on the way I meet a civilian at the Zikim Junction at 7 in the morning who is already bleeding and apparently took gunfire, and he tells me there are more terrorists ahead. I leave him wounded there and continue driving very quickly to the Shar HaNegev Junction. That's the point where I'm supposed to meet my force as well, and when I get to the Sderot Junction I identify a significant number of mutilated bodies on the floor, and I keep driving. From very fast driving I start driving very slowly so as not to run over bodies, because there were also bodies of terrorists there.

"I drive very slowly, and just before the Shar HaNegev Junction I'm ambushed from a very short range, a range of six, seven meters, by ten terrorists. I open fire first from the car window at them. The first one falls. They of course open very deadly fire on me. I take a first bullet to the hand, which takes away my ability to continue shooting with the pistol. I try to duck my head and take another bullet to the hand. And then I take a very significant bullet that just blows up the tibia of my leg, and I understand I no longer have the ability to continue fighting. Of course from a very short range they continue shooting at me. I floor the gas on the car, and a lot of faith and the car keeps driving." Despite the car he was driving taking dozens of bullets, and Ben Peresh himself being shot three times, he continues driving, until the car stops: "I stop after five kilometers in an area where I see a number of civilians trying to help bodies on the floor, bodies, civilians, and I yell at them to come help me. I try to get out of the car, and the truck that I had fought with apparently chased after me. From the dust cloud I continued driving, and it chased me for a few kilometers, and then it started its massacre in the village of Yekhini. From there I understand they're trying to kill me, I closed the door again, and continued driving for a few more kilometers until I stopped, because I was already in critical condition, and then two guys from Nova and a few more civilians there helped me, and they put me in one of the ambulances while I was fully conscious. They put me in the ambulance and took me to Soroka Hospital, and since then I've been in rehabilitation and surgeries."

Almost lost his leg but ran the Tel Aviv Marathon:

Reserve Second Lieutenant Alon Hindi, a paratrooper fighter, was wounded in one of the battles against terrorists in Khan Yunis: "After ten days of war, where we also had a number of fighters injured in the battalion, and a few were also killed, on December 16 was actually the day I was wounded. There was a large explosive device that detonated on us. I felt my hand detaching from my body. I ran back to the force from where the explosion was, which was in totally open ground. When I arrived they immediately treated me, a doctor named Naftali from the battalion saved my life, because my hand was really on the verge of amputation. From there it was straight to the helicopter to the hospital. There were 15 of us wounded, including five in critical condition, and one killed, named Shilo Zaltzman. In addition, a week after that we had another incident where two more close friends were killed, Shai Tarmun, whose shirt I'm wearing, and Alex Shpitz. I arrived at the hospital and was defined as in very serious condition. I went into surgery that lasted 14 hours. After 11 hours the doctors came out to my parents and wife, and told them they managed to save the hand. The entire back muscle and bone had been completely blown apart, they needed to graft muscle from my back into my hand. And they thought the leg couldn't be saved, because my main artery was torn and they couldn't fix it. My mom told the doctor - you'll go back in, you'll operate again, and you'll succeed. He went back in, and after another four hours he came out and said the leg was saved. Thanks mom."

Despite his injury, Hindi doesn't give up on himself and recently ran the Tel Aviv Marathon: "A lot of wounded from the war and also from the Nova attack at the Sheba Rehabilitation Center, and we came and did our own race, and it was moving on levels, because each person did it in memory of someone."

Awarding United Hatzalah Volunteer Badges

More than 7,000 volunteers operate in United Hatzalah. Men and women who rush to the aid of the sick and wounded, without any compensation other than the satisfaction of lending a hand and saving lives. On the conference stage, United Hatzalah appreciation badges were awarded to volunteers.

Hostage Updates .

Protests for the return of the captives: Many protesters demonstrated this evening (Wednesday) outside the Kirya compound in Tel Aviv and outside the home of Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, calling on the government to advance and approve a deal for the release of the captives. The protesters, who called on more citizens to join them, made clear: "A deal needs to be approved - now."
Many demonstrators protested outside the Kirya in Tel Aviv, where a cabinet meeting on the talks for a prisoner exchange deal was taking place. "We will set the country on fire," cried Rauma Kadam, who lost six family members in Hamas' surprise attack on Black Saturday. "There will be no Memorial Day and no Independence Day - we are living a day of destruction, the Ninth of Av."
Families of hostages and other protesters announced they will demonstrate every day outside the home of a different cabinet minister. Today the protesters arrived at Defense Minister Gallant's home and spoke with his wife, Claudine. "The Defense Minister's wife told us: 'If I were in your position - I don't think I would do anything else,'" recounted Shir Siegal, daughter of hostage Keith. "We heard about the Defense Minister's commitment to returning the hostages, we heard he took responsibility and we wanted to come here to tell him how meaningful that is."
Ella Ben Ami, daughter of Ohad who is held hostage by Hamas, explained: "We are here, all the young people from the hostage' families, preparing to spend the night outside the Defense Minister's home. We intend to visit every cabinet member and ensure we have backing for the prisoner exchange deal. We need them home now." link

Gaza Fighting

The power of a tank which took out a target that was being used to attack our troops.

Israeli tanks rolled into the southern Gaza Strip early Tuesday, capturing the Palestinian side of the Rafah Crossing on the Egypt border, in what the military called a “pinpoint operation” against the Hamas terror group.
The ground incursion in the eastern part of the city of Rafah came after Jerusalem said a truce offer from Hamas the previous day did not meet its demands, and announced that it had okayed moving ahead with the long-threatened offensive.
An Israeli official told The Times of Israel that it was a “limited operation” aimed at pressuring Hamas to accept a deal. It was not the broad Rafah offensive that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu repeatedly promised Israel would carry out, CNN reported, citing a source familiar with Israel’s plan.
The Israel Defense Forces said its 401st Armored Brigade captured the Gazan side of Rafah Crossing on Tuesday morning, apparently with little resistance. Israeli flags were raised by troops at the border crossing, footage showed. The crossing, located some 3 kilometers (1.8 miles) from the Israeli border, was captured amid a “pinpoint operation” against Hamas in “limited areas of eastern Rafah,” the IDF said. It is located along the so-called Philadelphi Corridor, separating Egypt and Gaza. As of Tuesday morning, Israel controlled all of the known overground crossings with Gaza.
An Egyptian official and Hamas’s Al-Aqsa TV said early Tuesday that Israeli officials informed the Egyptians that the troops would withdraw after completing the operation. No timeline was given. The IDF said it had “intelligence information that terrorists were using the crossing area for terror purposes.” On Sunday, rockets were fired by Hamas from near the crossing toward the Kerem Shalom area in southern Israel, killing four soldiers and wounding others.
The Rafah crossing with Egypt was now disconnected from Gaza’s main north-south road, Salah a-Din. Part of the road in eastern Rafah was separately captured by the Givati Infantry Brigade in the overnight operation, the IDF said.
The IDF said some 20 gunmen were killed and troops located three “significant” tunnel shafts. It remains unclear if Hamas still has tunnels running from the Rafah area into Egypt’s Sinai desert, which it had previously used to smuggle in weapons and supplies.
The Egyptian military over the past decade cracked down on the smuggling tunnels and destroyed hundreds of them, saying they were used to funnel weapons to jihadist groups in Sinai. Also amid the overnight offensive, an explosive-laden car driving toward an IDF tank was struck and destroyed, the military said. No soldiers were wounded in the operation as of Tuesday morning.
Meanwhile, the IDF said more than 50 Hamas sites in Rafah were struck by the air force overnight. Another 50 sites had been hit in the area late Monday, according to the military.
Palestinians reported heavy airstrikes in the east of the city overnight, killing at least 27 people. Israel has carried out airstrikes in Rafah with some regularity in recent months, even as it has held off on sending in troops amid vociferous international opposition to military operations in the city, where over a million Palestinians are thought to be sheltering, most of them displaced from other parts of the Strip.
After capturing the crossing, troops on Tuesday were searching the area for Hamas infrastructure and preparing for additional missions.
Leaked footage showed Israeli military vehicles driving along the Egypt-Gaza border, also known as the Philadelphi Corridor, in the eastern part of Rafah, near the captured crossing.
The clip showed an APC with two massive flags — one Israeli and the other of the 401st Armored Brigade, the unit that captured the Gazan side of the Rafah Crossing. The IDF had not captured the entire Philadelphi Corridor, which runs for 14 kilometers (8.7 miles) all along the Gaza-Egypt border, as Netanyahu had vowed Israel would.
Israel has contended it must have control over the corridor to prevent weapons smuggling to Hamas.
Egypt on Tuesday warned that the Israeli operation in Rafah threatened ceasefire efforts, according to the country’s foreign ministry.
Also on Tuesday morning, Hamas fired several rockets and mortars from the city at the Kerem Shalom area, the site of Sunday’s deadly attack and just across the border from eastern Rafah. There was no damage or injuries, the IDF said.
Before launching the overnight operation, the IDF said it carried out “coordination with the international organizations operating in the area, with a request to move towards the humanitarian area, as part of the effort to evacuate the population that has been taking place.”
On Monday morning, Israel issued evacuation orders for some 100,000 Gazans in parts of eastern Rafah, who were told to evacuate to a designated “humanitarian zone” near Khan Younis, north of Rafah. link
IDF and Shin Bet eliminated the commander of Hamas' naval force in Gaza City:In the past day, an Israeli Air Force aircraft eliminated the terrorist Ahmed Ali, the commander of Hamas' naval force in Gaza City. During the war, Ali advanced offensive activities towards Israeli territory and additional attacks against IDF forces operating in the Gaza Strip area. In recent weeks, he worked to advance attacks against IDF forces operating in the central Gaza Strip corridor.

Northern Israel - Lebanon/Hizbollah

A building belonging to Hezbollah’s elite Radwan force in southern Lebanon’s Jabal Rezlane was struck by fighter jets earlier today, the military says. Fighter jets hit additional buildings belonging to Hezbollah in Khiam, Odaisseh, Blida, Maroun al-Ras and Ayta ash-Shab, the IDF adds.
Gallant on the Northern Border: "The Mission is Not Complete - We Could Have a Hot Summer" Defense Minister Yoav Gallant conducted a situational assessment in the Galilee Formation near the northern border, together with the Division Commander Brigadier General Shai Kalpher and the division's staff officers. "A defensive battle is always complex," Gallant told the fighters. "It's a battle where you're constantly anticipating the enemy's responses as well, and you're operating actively." According to him, the entire division is executing the battle excellently - and pushing Hezbollah away from the border.
"In order to safely return the residents, you need either a diplomatic process or an operational process, and it is the military's duty to prepare for the operational process, which also serves as an anchor for another process," he explained. "I am determined to return the residents to their homes safely and rebuild what has been destroyed."

"The mission is not complete," Gallant continued. "War comes with a price, it will be heavy for Israel and catastrophic for Hezbollah and Lebanon, and we aim to reach a state without going to war. We have significant fire arrays. Now we need to prepare for what's next, and this summer could be a hot one."

West Bank

The terrorist who carried out the bomb attack attached to a Palestinian flag near Binyamin was arrested: A few days ago, Israel Security Agency (Shin Bet) and IDF forces arrested Mohammed Atallah Abu Aliya, 22, on suspicion of being involved in the bomb attack that was planted under a Palestinian flag near Binyamin more than two weeks ago. During his interrogation, he linked himself to the production of the bomb and carrying out the attack. The investigation is ongoing. In that attack, a 28-year-old man was lightly injured after trying to move the flag from the spot - and the bomb exploded.

Politics

The Israel Defense Forces appeared Wednesday to minimize the seemingly unprecedented holdup of an arms shipment by a US administration concerned by the prospect of a major Israeli operation in the southern Gazan city of Rafah, saying the allies resolve any disagreements “behind closed doors.” Asked about the issue at a Tel Aviv conference hosted by the Yedioth Ahronoth newspaper, chief military spokesperson Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari described coordination between Israel and the United States as reaching “a scope without precedent, I think, in Israel’s history.” Pressed about the stalled delivery of heavy bombs, Hagari said, “We are responsible for the security interests of Israel and we pay attention to the US interests in the arena.”

A senior figure in the American weapons industry operating in Israel told Maariv: "There is no arms embargo. On the day they published that they had stopped the supply of weapons from the United States to Israel, shipments of weapons were unloaded at the Nevatim Air Base from U.S. Air Force planes."
**Head of Metula Council: "Most of the ministers need to be thrown into the garbage bin of Israel's history"**
**7 months after the outbreak of the war, and the criticism from heads of authorities in the south and north on the government's functioning is only increasing. "Morality is important, but our families are more," said the mayor of Ashkelon at the "People of the State" conference by Ynet and Yedioth Ahronoth. The mayor of Kiryat Bialik said that "an entire region is under Hezbollah's control," while the head of the Metula Council said "despite the prime minister - we will win." The mayor of Sderot: "Is Netanyahu to blame? Gantz and Eisenkot are ready to return Gazans to the northern Strip."**
Seven months after Hamas' terror attack on October 7, which changed the face of the state, four heads of authorities from the south and north today (Wednesday) spoke about the difficult coping since that black Saturday - and harshly criticized the government's functioning.
**"The Israeli government is powerless"**
The head of the Metula Local Council, David Azulai, said he cannot tell his residents to return to their homes while the town is still within range. "I won't take the risk, and I also don't think I'm the authority to say I can do that," he said. "For several months now we've been calling on our residents, and in general the Israeli government and the IDF, to prepare for September 1, and we didn't set that date for no reason. We must remember that it's been a year away from educational institutions. The community in Metula has completely dispersed, we have no control, and the meaning is that if we don't return on September 1 - the children will register at other educational institutions. Families are already finding jobs in other areas, they won't come back after two years out of the system." According to him, "Metula's main problem is the young people. And those without children are presumably also young and that's part of the issue. Therefore, we must return the residents by September 1. But it's far from feasible, because when I hear Prime Minister Netanyahu making miserable statements, and when I've been experiencing the powerlessness and disappearance of the Israeli government for seven months already, I simply can't understand how it will happen, and I don't understand where we're headed.
"Next week we mark Independence Day. Unfortunately, we will not celebrate Independence Day, we will mark Independence Day. In the end, we must remember that we have no other state, and I have no other home. This is my home and we will remain in Metula. As a right-winger, I say, despite the prime minister and despite the very bad government, we will win. We will be strong, Metula will grow and thrive with everything happening to it - but we need to start waking up. The government is disconnected. 38 ministers, maybe three of them are functioning. The rest need to be thrown into the garbage bin of the history of the State of Israel."
Azoulai nevertheless praised a few ministers who in his opinion are functioning properly: "I'm not politically affiliated with them, but Yitzhak Wasserlauf, the Minister for the Negev and Galilee, is doing holy work. Ben Gvir is not politically affiliated with me at all, but all the heads of the evacuated authorities receive two to three calls a day from him, assistance, support and mediations. Moshe Arbel from Shas, the Interior Minister, is doing holy work. The entire Interior Ministry staff helped us, otherwise we would have collapsed long ago. Also Eli Cohen, the Energy Minister, who personally helped Metula the day after, and Minister Idit Silman who has started working a bit now on environmental quality. Beyond that, simply no one else is functioning."
**"If we stop the war without changing the security reality - we did nothing"**
Sderot Mayor Alon Davidi also criticized the government. "We are working with the government, there are places where it's better and places where it's worse," he said. "The main thing is that we, the State of Israel, the Government of Israel and the citizens of the State of Israel, understand that whenever we postpone decisions - we are doing worse things. We must defeat Hamas, Islamic Jihad, Hezbollah. We must continue the war, we must also wage war in the north. Only this will restore safe lives for us. We have been in the city for several months now and 90% are in the city. It's difficult, I won't say it's not difficult. There are also the IDF bombardments and the rockets they continue firing at us, but this is our country, this is our city."
According to Davidi, "I have a lot to be angry at Netanyahu for, I publicly criticize him and also in private meetings. I also criticize Gantz and Gallant and others. No one should try to shift responsibility, they are all responsible there. They must wake up and understand. Just as now we don't only need to operate on the outskirts of Rafah and at the crossing - we need to conquer Rafah and control the Strip." Regarding the war's objectives, he said: "There are three goals. One goal is to return the captives, the second goal is to defeat Hamas, and the third goal is to change the security reality. If we stop this war without changing the security reality in the south and north, what will happen? Will the residents of Beeri return to live two meters away from those neighborhoods where people were murdered? Can we continue to develop? It pains me. Whoever wants to win must win the war. Winning the war means defeating Hamas and Hezbollah, and not just militarily. We must also find the civilian solutions and civil control there in some form. Without that, we will return to another October 7th, and it will be a different date and in a different place, and we will see more and more grieving families and great pain." Davidi added: "Today I issued an appeal to the Defense Minister and the Chief of Staff - 'Stop abandoning us'. Because they abandoned us. Did any of the former generals who are constantly interviewed in studios say 'I was wrong'? Hamas must be defeated, the Israeli leader who returns the Gazans to northern Gaza is crazy, because that would be the greatest humiliation. I meet with Gantz and Eisenkot and they say they are ready to do it, so what alternative do I have? To support someone who wants to end the war? I think the place that needs to do the most significant self-examination is the Defense Ministry and the IDF."
**"Leaders need to make decisions - and they are not doing that"**
Ashkelon Mayor Tomer Glam said that what worries him most is the "mindset" of the leaders. "They think that in Ashkelon or other cities they can live in such a reality, where at any given moment missiles can be fired?" he wondered.
According to him, "I made the decision to cancel the Independence Day events. It's a bit more complicated than other cities because my city is very large, with 178,000 residents. No one can assure me that I'm bringing 20,000-25,000 residents to an outdoor event and there won't be some launch or other, and we'll pay an insane price. On the one hand, it's very difficult ethically to cancel the Independence Day events, but the complexity of holding them during the fighting, when we see that we have casualties of soldiers and people sacrificing their lives, then we are not really in a place to hold the event. But we also don't have the assurance for us today as citizens and for us as leaders that it won't happen again."
"If they don't eradicate it at the root, it won't end," Glam continued. "I don't see in any proper country such a thing, that they can launch whenever they want and however they want. I don't see in any proper country the illogical thing of evacuating residents, instead of going in against Hamas and whoever needs to be gone in against. Remove them from the country's borders, remove them as far as needed. Where is the logic that in the north they have been gone for almost a year? In Sderot it's been close to six months."
Glam said "We must not run away, we must fight. That's why we have an army. Our army needs to fight and strike them, with all that we say about being a moral army. Our morality is important, but our families are much more important than the families of Hamas and Jihad and Hezbollah or the criticism of the United States. Leaders need to make decisions, and when they don't do that - this is what happens. I wish Israel's leaders were like the heads of authorities, then the country would be run much better.
"Arabs understand Arabic and they understand force, and that's what needs to be done. We've been suffering from this for 20 years already. October 7 is one symptom of many of the instability of governance of the State of Israel. The lack of responsibility of those same leaders who topple governments for this or that position. It's a crying lack of responsibility. And we as leaders need to do everything to care for our residents and citizens, and make decisions. Ben-Gurion once said a strong statement - 'I don't give my people what they want, I give them what they need'. Our people need security and it's time there was security in the State of Israel."
**"There is no longer anywhere to evacuate residents to"**
Kiryat Bialik Mayor Eli Dukorski said that in his town they are waiting to see what will happen on the Lebanon front. "We are preparing for any scenario," he said. "It's clear to me that in our town we will not evacuate residents, there is also nowhere to evacuate them to anymore. Tel Aviv is full, everywhere is full. We want to be prepared. For years I have argued that in an emergency - the local authorities will find themselves alone." According to him, there is currently no emergency team in the city: "We had two emergency teams, but their Emergency Call-up orders were canceled and they were sent home, and today we are without emergency teams. They will be drafted if, God forbid, a war breaks out."
According to him, "We are in a place that will absorb a lot of missiles if an operation breaks out in the north. We've had quite a few, not too many, but we've had a number of incidents of aircraft being fired at in the area. But there are no government offices involved in this incident. For example, in terms of the education system - in most of the communities in the country, in the older schools there are no protected spaces. Where is the Ministry of Education supposed to get involved now? It should have gotten involved six months ago."
"We absorbed about 50 evacuees who were well integrated into the education system," said Dukorski. "Some of them have already come to me to explore the possibility of staying in our community. We have people from Shlomi and from other communities in the north, and we also had some from Sderot who came to Kiryat Bialik. And we welcomed them all and provided them with everything they needed to feel at home. Some of them even represent the city in education system competitions.
"It's very sad in my eyes that people are displaced in their own country, that they are refugees in their own country, that people have to evacuate communities at all. What is happening in the north cannot happen, that an entire region is abandoned and is in fact under Hezbollah's control. The Defense Minister said 'We will take them back to the Stone Age' - but unfortunately the Stone Age exists today in the north. The Stone Age was in the southern region. We need to change the record, stop defending, and be the initiating force." He added: "We are in a neighborhood that understands completely different rules. Unfortunately, at the level of government ministries, things have not trickled down. They talk about a scenario of the generation of concealment, we received lists from the Ministry of Health of ventilated patients and people connected to ventilators and so on. We checked the lists they sent, there is no correlation between the names we received and the people themselves. And the people we know in the community who are on ventilators do not appear on these lists. To this day they have not provided us with a generator or electricity connection, we took responsibility and did it ourselves to set up a generation office. The government ministries are not involved in the incident. It is the backbone sitting here that is saving the country.
"The most acute thing is not only to impose responsibility on us, but to give us the authority. Give us the resources, the tools, and we will provide the peace of mind for the IDF and the state to win." link

Former IDF chief of staff Aviv Kochavi, who completed his term in January 2023, says in rare comments since October 7 that the military was more focused on the threat from Iran than from Gaza ahead of the Hamas onslaught. In comments recorded at an event in the US and aired on Channel 12 news, Kochavi says that “we understood perfectly what’s going on there [in Gaza], their underground facilities and the number of rockets, it did not come as a surprise.” But Kochavi, who has made few public comments since the start of the war, says that to the IDF “Iran was the top priority, we were preparing the military vis-à-vis Iran.” “We did not perceive the Gaza Strip and Hamas as an existential threat, the grand strategy was to focus on Iran and the northern arena, to prepare the military and to do whatever we can to pacify the other arenas, that is to say, Judea and Samaria [the West Bank] and the Gaza Strip… to sustain and contain the threats from the Gaza Strip via other methods and other means,” Kochavi says. There was, however, an attempt to eliminate Hamas chiefs Yahya Sinwar and Mohammed Deif, but “it’s hard, in a very densely populated, heavily built-up areas — it’s very hard, so we had been working for months in order to procure the operation but we couldn’t,” he says. Speaking about the current state of the war against Hamas in Gaza, Kochavi says, “I don’t think there is a way to bring back the hostages without halting for the time being the war.” Overall, he adds, “I don’t think we can achieve complete victory in months, forget it, it will take years.” -- His comments were on TV and there were a number of other comments of Kochavi's that were very important. He said he takes full responsibility for everything that happened in the IDF during his tenure. More from his interview: The former Chief of Staff was asked if the objectives of the fighting, toppling Hamas and releasing the captives, are contradictory goals. "Until a couple of months ago, the two goals were not contradictory," he replied. "Today, unfortunately, they are. Too late. I don't think there's a way to get the captives back without stopping the war for now."

Kohavi was asked how the political processes in Israel affected the military. "We know that it played a part in Sinwar's decision to attack the State of Israel," explained the former Chief of Staff. "But the head of Military Intelligence and the head of the Research Division wrote four letters to the Israeli government and the Prime Minister. They pointed out that the enemies are watching the situation in Israel and see it as an opportunity they have to take advantage of."
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