Executive Summary
The brutal terrorist attack carried out by Hamas on October 7 requires not only concrete lessons and adjustments in Israel’s military force-building and border defense postures, but also an update to Israel’s overall strategic concept, and to its ability to explain that concept to the international community. The purpose of this article is to outline the key principles Israel must adopt for itself, and learn to communicate effectively abroad.
Updating Israel’s Existing Security Doctrine
Israel’s existing security doctrine, as formulated by the Meridor Committee and approved by Defense Minister Shaul Mofaz in 2006, consists of four pillars: early warning, deterrence, defense, and decisive victory. It is fair to say that on October 7 Israel failed in the first three pillars; as for the fourth, decisive victory, the verdict is still unknown. Clearly, Israel must ensure that such a failure never recurs, but that alone is insufficient. There is now a clear need for an additional, first-in-sequence pillar: “prevention of enemy build-up.”
For decades, Israel was willing to act militarily to prevent the build-up of an enemy only when the threat involved nuclear weapons. This was the rationale behind Israel’s strikes on Iraq’s nuclear program (1981) and Syria’s reactor (2007). Israel refrained, however, from military action to stop conventional rearmament by its adversaries, a reasonable policy as long as those adversaries were states such as Syria or Egypt. The traditional four pillars of Israel’s security doctrine were sufficient both to maintain long periods of calm and to guarantee eventual victory when wars occurred. In the cases of Egypt and Jordan, this doctrine even proved robust enough to help produce peace treaties with Israel.
But adopting the same “containment approach” toward sub-state enemies such as Hamas in Gaza and Hizbullah in Lebanon proved to be a grave mistake. In both arenas, monstrous adversaries arose. Moreover, the stronger they became militarily, the greater their willingness to go to war against Israel. Traditional deterrence factors that work against states, such as the need for international legitimacy, are far less effective against these new types of enemies.
The years 2005–2006 mark Israel’s abandonment of the principle of preventing enemy military build-up. Until the 2005 disengagement, Hamas in Gaza possessed mostly light weapons, mortars, and short-range rockets. After the Second Lebanon War, Hizbullah was severely weakened. Had Israel then applied the principle of force-build-up prevention, it would be in a far stronger position today.
The only arena in which Israel de facto implemented this principle was in Syria, not against the Syrian army itself, but against Iranian arms transfers to Hizbullah and the establishment of Iranian-backed Shiite militias modeled after Hizbullah. This campaign, the “Campaign Between the Wars” (MABAM), proved partially effective.
The implementation of the “prevention of build-up” principle could and should be applied, after the conclusion of Operation Iron Swords, to both Gaza and Hizbullah.
The Importance of Territorial Depth
Throughout history, terrain has remained the most crucial factor in any military assessment. Hizbullah poses a significant threat to Israel not only because of its strength but primarily because of its proximity, enabling it to fire anti-tank missiles directly into Israeli towns. Hypothetically, if Hizbullah possessed the same capabilities but were located 1,000 kilometers away, it would constitute a far lesser threat, even though distant adversaries such as Iran or the Houthis in Yemen still pose serious challenges.
Classical defensive doctrine dictates organizing territory into three zones:
- Security zone (forward area)
- Holding zone (main defensive belt)
- Civilian rear
When attacked, the enemy may penetrate certain parts of the security zone, an area designed to “absorb” incursions. The main defensive battle takes place in the holding zone, which, if it holds, prevents any invasion of the civilian rear, the most sensitive area.
When the IDF withdrew from Lebanon (2000) and from Gaza (2005), it effectively gave up its ability to deploy according to this accepted model. All three layers – the security zone, the holding zone, and the civilian rear – collapsed geographically into a narrow strip, in places less than a kilometer deep. The assumption that Israel could adequately defend itself without territorial depth, relying instead on intelligence, barriers, and technology, collapsed on October 7.
Israel therefore needs, along both the Gaza and Lebanon borders, and equally in the seam zone adjacent to the West Bank, to create minimum defensive depth, which must include at least some kind of security zone.
Two possible configurations exist:
- The more limited version is the establishment of a security perimeter—a strip beyond the border where no enemy military presence, overt or disguised, is allowed. This is a constrained solution, but it has the advantage of avoiding permanent Israeli presence inside enemy territory.
- The broader version involves establishing a security zone inside enemy territory. Such a zone both pushes the enemy back and provides early warning in case of invasion. In Lebanon’s case, it offers a further, critical advantage, control of commanding terrain, preventing the enemy from using those high points to fire small arms or anti-tank missiles into Israel.
State Responsibility and Strategic Clarity
An equally vital strategic recalibration concerns how Israel defines its enemy. This definition shapes both Israel’s declared policy and its military responses to attacks from neighboring states and entities.
In recent conflicts, the Second Lebanon War and the current Gaza war, Israel adopted the narrative that the enemy is the sub-state terrorist organization that attacked it (Hizbullah in Lebanon, Hamas in Gaza). Accordingly, Israel fought those organizations and their military infrastructures while trying to avoid, as much as possible, damage to the civilian areas in which they operate, including infrastructure, logistics, and the “noncombatant” population.
This narrative aligns with international preferences, particularly those of the United States, which will likely continue pressuring Israel to maintain it. Yet, this narrative is fundamentally flawed and disconnected from reality. History shows that the gravest strategic errors often stem from adopting a false narrative.
Hizbullah, while a terrorist organization, is also a major political party with substantial representation in the Lebanese parliament. It is the principal, legitimate representative of Lebanon’s Shiite population. Moreover, Lebanon’s so-called “moderate” factions rely on Hizbullah’s superior military power, granting it broad authority over national security. Hizbullah effectively decides whether the border with Israel remains calm or ignites. Consequently, it makes no sense to separate Hizbullah from the State of Lebanon in the context of its conflict with Israel. Israel is therefore justified in holding Lebanon as a whole responsible for security along its northern frontier.
Similarly, the link between Gaza and Hamas is absolute. Since the 2005 disengagement and Hamas’s electoral victory, Gaza has become a fully-fledged state-like entity with its own foreign policy, well-armed military, and centralized governance. Hamas arose as an authentic, legitimate movement elected from within the Gazan population. After winning power, it seized all state institutions – military, civil, educational, medical, and administrative – creating complete unity between the State of Gaza, its population, and the Hamas ideology, enjoying the population’s broad support. Thus, it is more accurate to view the current war as a conflict between the State of Israel and the quasi-State of Gaza, with all that this implies.
Beyond narrative correction, it is vital to recognize that a democratic state acting under international law cannot win an asymmetric war against a sub-state organization operating from within another state’s territory, supported by that state’s population but bearing no national or international responsibility. A state cannot prevail in a war where the enemy attacks its civilian rear while the state is expected to avoid harming the quality of life of the enemy’s population.
In wars between states, the range of legitimate and effective tools is far broader, including economic, diplomatic, and civilian pressure, than in conflicts against terror organizations. For example, Hizbullah does not fear another military clash with the IDF aimed at eliminating its missile launchers, but it, and the world, does fear the destruction of Lebanese infrastructure including in Beirut.
The conclusion, therefore, is that Israel must make it clear now, to the international community, that any hostile action against Israel originating from a territory not under Israeli control, including Gaza or any other state, will be treated as an act of aggression by that state itself, which will bear full responsibility.
Security Implications for Judea and Samaria
For 31 years, the “two-state solution” has been at the center of debate over the Israeli–Palestinian conflict. Naturally, Israel has raised security concerns and demands, which its counterparts, the Palestinians and the United States, typically answer by promising that any Palestinian state would be largely demilitarized and far weaker than Israel, implying there would be nothing to fear.
Unfortunately, there is much to fear, and three points are especially critical:
- Regional Environment
Israel and any future Palestinian state would not exist in a peaceful, pastoral setting. Theoretically, if the land between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean could be relocated to Western Europe or Canada, the security challenges would be manageable. In reality, Israel is surrounded, within a few thousand kilometers in every direction, by actual or potential enemies. If Israel were to withdraw to the 1967 lines (with minor adjustments), the distance from Tulkarm to Netanya would be 15 kilometers, but from Tulkarm eastward for 5,000 kilometers lies a continuum of hostile or potentially hostile states and forces. - Lack of Strategic Depth
As emphasized, there can be no adequate compensation for a severe shortage of territory, particularly territorial depth. If Israel were ever to agree to a Palestinian state roughly within the 1967 framework, the enemy could fire Kornet anti-tank missiles, with an effective range of 10 kilometers, at every major road, critical site, and urban center in Israel’s heartland. Unlike past demilitarization agreements, when the main threats were tanks and artillery, difficult to smuggle and conceal, it would be virtually impossible to prevent smuggling of anti-tank and anti-aircraft missiles into a Palestinian state. Given the short distances and topography, such weapons could easily paralyze Israel, and no agreement or international guarantee could prevent it. Moreover, if the IDF withdrew from most or all of Judea and Samaria, thousands of armed Palestinians in Tulkarm or Qalqilya could, on a Saturday morning, breach the fence, cross Route 6, and massacre civilians in Kfar Saba and other nearby towns. - The Jordan Valley Factor
One might assume the Palestinian state could be isolated if the IDF retained control of the Jordan Valley along the Jordan River. Effective control, however, would require at least 10 kilometers of depth on average, since without minimal depth and control of the first ridgeline west of the Valley, Israeli presence would be a liability rather than an asset. This means roughly 800 square kilometers—about 12% of the West Bank—would need to remain under Israeli sovereignty, not counting a western security belt adjacent to Israel proper. It is doubtful any Arab or Palestinian party would accept this, since such a configuration would render their state a landlocked enclave surrounded by Israel on all sides. Moreover, maintaining control of the Jordan Valley would require Israel to keep at least one corridor from west to east, such as the Jerusalem–Ma’ale Adumim–northern Dead Sea axis, connecting Israel to the Valley. Thus, the Palestinian state would not only shrink in size and become an enclave, but it would also be geographically split into at least two separate parts.
Conclusion
The events of October 7 prove that agreements, or even deterrence alone, are insufficient when dealing with non-state enemies. A Palestinian entity created under a “two-state solution” might formally be a state, but it is naïve, and dangerous, to assume that Hamas or other jihadist groups would not seize control, just as they did in Gaza. When that happens, no agreement would be respected.
