Israeli army officials: We must not stop now

Israeli news website “Ynet” reports that Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert is more determined than ever before to continue and even escalate attacks.

While world public opinion against Israel dives, Israel is seeing results from it’s offensive but believes that the job is not yet done. “Haaretz”, an Israeli news site, quoted Ehud Olmert on Sunday vowing that the army would press on with its offensive against Hamas in Gaza, asserting that Israel was close to achieving its goals. The following report is from “Ynet” - a high level officer in the IDF said: “The Hamas has been dealt a meaningful blow, even over the last few days many losses have been inflicted both on their people and their infrastructure – a continuation from this point is necessary”. The government is determined to continue with the offensive as long as the army has targets as determined by the political echelon, and if a political arrangement that answers to Israeli interests is not obtained – with Hamas ceasing fire and the smuggling of weapons into Gaza via Egypt. The Israeli reserve forces that were called up last week have finished their training and are armed and waiting for their orders.

As the pressure goes up - Hamas is making mistakes According to Israeli security forces, the killing yesterday of Amir Mansi, the “mastermind of Hamas’s long-range rocket attacks on Israel” demonstrates that as the pressure exerted by the military continues, more negative processes in the Hamas occur, and as a result to that, senior Hamas officials find themselves directly in the line of fire. Mansi was “taken out” while trying himself to shoot a rocket on Israeli ground forces, after Hamas militants that were junior to him avoided performing the task. This kind of occurrence demonstrates that the Hamas is losing its grip - these are the kind of results that the army is looking for, and they are hinting that they will now launch an even bigger offensive, in the hopes of obtaining even more specific objectives. The Israeli army indicated that they have only used a small amount of the force that they have, and are ready to use more force if they find it necessary.

A non-declared objective? Israel has not stated the liberation of the Palestinians from the Hamas as an objective, but this may be what they are aiming for. While the Israeli government realizes that the price being paid by the people in Gaza is deplorable, internal pressure for a military reaction and the possibility of an acceptable outcome is most probably why they decided to move forward with an offensive. A new generation of terrorists is being born by this offensive, but killing off the current generation of leaders may outweigh negative effects of the offensive in the long run, as with them out of the way, a completely different playing field will be uncovered, at least for a short while. The clock is ticking Politicians from all over the world are trying to come up with a ceasefire agreement that both sides will accept. Israel may find itself forced to agree to something the moment the Hamas does, or even prior to that. That being the case, Israel is likely to step up the offensive more and more, as their time runs out. “Haaretz” reported that Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas criticized Hamas, saying the Palestinian people did not want to engage in "resistance" that will destroy them. He called for an international force to be deployed to Gaza immediately to protect its residents. Al Jazeera reported Abbas also, saying the Egyptian proposal is the only mechanism. It is very clear-cut and once it is accepted, the aggression should end. If any party does not accept it, regrettably it will be the one bearing the responsibility, and if Israel doesn't want to accept, it will take the responsibility of perpetuating a waterfall of blood.