Under the cover of the ceasefire—the first stage of President Trump’s 20-point plan to end the war—Hamas is running down the clock, tightening its grip on the half of the Gaza Strip over which it was allowed to remain in control, and rebuilding its military infrastructure. It is difficult to imagine Hamas voluntarily disarming or relinquishing control. Despite the broad international consensus that Hamas must be removed from Gaza, the United States has not yet found any countries willing to deploy forces in the Strip to implement that consensus—precisely because such forces would inevitably face armed resistance. The conclusion today, as in the past, is that only the IDF can carry out this mission.

Israel must once again be prepared to “do the dirty work” for the civilized world, as German Chancellor Merz put it, and finish off what remains of Hamas’s evil in Gaza. The desired end-state is ships removing the remnants of Hamas’s military wing to another location—Turkey, Algeria, or Qatar. That is the proper conclusion to this war, recalling the 1982 expulsion of 14,000 PLO terrorists from Lebanon to Tunisia. Without Hamas’s expulsion—a decisive victory—Israel will find it difficult to claim victory in the war that began on October 7, 2023.

The War Is Not Yet Over

After two years of fighting Hamas in Gaza, pushing Hezbollah back from Israel’s northern border and significantly weakening it, dealing a devastating blow to the Syrian army, and destroying Iran’s key nuclear facilities, Israel still cannot claim victory. Those who express satisfaction with the war’s results thus far and believe it can be ended now suffer from strategic myopia. This is not a boxing match that can be won on points. The war began in Gaza, and Gaza is where victory will be decided. Israel must win by a knockout.

So far, Israel’s balance sheet in the war against Hamas is mixed. The immediate threat Hamas posed has been eliminated. Nearly all the hostages have returned home. Hamas no longer controls the border area, and its rocket-production and launch infrastructure has been destroyed. It has lost most of the territory it once ruled and roughly 20,000 fighters. Many thousands more have been wounded. The massive displacement of Gaza’s population—mostly to designated humanitarian zones—was accompanied by extensive destruction, as nearly every home contained a tunnel shaft.

Urban combat in Gaza and complex underground fighting prolonged the war. The Biden administration’s interventions in the conduct of the war and its withholding of weapons from Israel also delayed its conclusion, as did the ceasefires Israel was forced to accept for hostage releases.

All this enables Hamas to claim victory. The “resistance” (muqawama), embodied by Hamas, has survived nearly two full years of attacks from the most powerful military in the Middle East. Hamas still controls nearly half the Strip. It has won the propaganda war, successfully spreading the falsehoods that Israel is starving Gaza’s population and even committing genocide. It has achieved diplomatic gains that have deepened Israel’s international isolation. Its greatest strategic achievement has been igniting a multi-front war against Israel—a historic goal of the Palestinian national movement.

At this stage, Israel cannot claim victory while Hamas remains in Gaza. Moreover, the “mediators,” Turkey and Qatar, prefer that Hamas remain because of their shared Muslim Brotherhood ideology. Even Egypt, which considers the Muslim Brotherhood an existential threat, has an interest in a weakened Hamas in Gaza that remains a nuisance for Israel.

Israel must therefore seek American backing to resume fighting in order to implement the Trump Plan. It must prepare a swift and determined frontal offensive to seize the entire Gaza Strip before international intervention halts the fighting, and to achieve a clear victory. Israel is well aware of the “political clock”—the limited window to achieve military objectives before the United Nations or the United States demand a ceasefire. Yitzhak Rabin, who served as prime minister and defense minister, admitted that he ordered rapid military actions, at the cost of soldiers’ lives, to get ahead of this “political clock.” A slow, patient siege of Gaza City is no substitute for victory. The world has no patience for long wars.

The True Picture of Victory

Victory is necessary for three arenas: the Palestinian arena, the regional Middle Eastern arena, and the global arena.

Hamas’s October 7 assault was not just another round of violence. It sought to destroy the Jewish state by setting ablaze the “Ring of Fire” put in place by Iran. The appropriate response must be decisive defeat. Israel must demonstrate determination, a willingness to absorb casualties, and readiness to endure pain in the prolonged conflict with the Palestinians.

Every war has two equations. The first concerns the ability to inflict pain. Israel clearly has the upper hand here. The second, no less important, concerns the ability to absorb pain. To date, the Palestinians have demonstrated a higher tolerance for suffering; suffering and victimhood have become part of their collective identity. Repeated military defeats have not altered the Palestinians’ fundamental opposition to the existence of the Jewish state. What is more, they—like Israel’s other enemies—believe that Israeli society is weak, giving them hope that Israel will collapse under the weight of the conflict. The best-known expression of this perception is that of the “spiderweb.” The political fractures caused by the judicial reform, along with the national obsession over the hostages, reinforce the image of a divided and fragile society. Israel must demonstrate national resilience and prove this image false by staying committed to toppling Hamas.

Victory—the expulsion of Hamas—is also essential for “the day after.” There is no “day after” if Hamas remains as an armed presence in Gaza. At present, there is no force willing to maintain law and order while that is the case.

Regionally, Hamas must be defeated because it is a branch of the Muslim Brotherhood—an extremist Islamist, anti-Western, and anti-Israel movement. Hamas is the only Brotherhood affiliate that established an autonomous entity on territory bordering Israel. The Gaza Strip is the historical invasion route into the Land of Israel from the south and a springboard for Israel’s destruction.

A Blow to the Red-Green Alliance

Defeating Hamas also strengthens regional stability and Israel’s peace agreements. Every regime that has a peace agreement with Israel—Egypt, Jordan, the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, and Morocco—despises Hamas. All of these states, as well as Saudi Arabia, view the Muslim Brotherhood and its financial patron Qatar as a threat to their regimes and a destabilizing force in the region.

Hamas’s defeat will also strip Qatar of its role as mediator and weaken it. Its media network, Al Jazeera, is a powerful amplifier of Muslim Brotherhood messaging across the region and around the world. Al Jazeera broadcasts anti-Israel and anti-Western content.

A victory over Hamas will also strike at the emerging radical Sunni axis. As Israel has weakened the Iran-led Shiite axis, Turkey under Erdoğan has sought to fill the gap. Erdoğan represents a Turkish version of the Muslim Brotherhood. Turkey is a powerful state with a military footprint across the Middle East. It has hegemonic ambitions driven by Islamist and neo-Ottoman impulses, and it enjoys Qatar’s financial backing. The Turkey-Qatar axis could become even more dangerous than Iran’s Shiite crescent.

Hamas’s defeat would also prevent the emergence of an Islamic “lake” in the eastern Mediterranean. Hamas-controlled Gaza, with its Mediterranean coastline, was supported by Turkey—a regional maritime power with a military presence in Cyprus, Libya, and Syria. Turkey is also expanding its involvement in Lebanon, another Mediterranean state. Even Egypt, also on the Mediterranean, could join this “Islamic lake” if the Muslim Brotherhood, the strongest political force in the country, returns to power.

Defeating Hamas is also essential from a global perspective. It will reduce the appeal of extremist Muslim organizations outside the Middle East that support Hamas’s agenda. Cells of extremist Muslims operate in Europe, South and Southeast Asia, Latin America, and North America.

Extremist Muslims—Sunni and Shiite alike—are modern barbarians committed to the destruction of the West. Islamist elements in the West cooperate with the radical left as part of the Red-Green Alliance. Ending the war in Gaza with an Israeli victory would deal a blow to the Alliance’s threat to Israel and to Western civilization.

An Israeli victory over Hamas will also encourage conservatives and supporters of national identity throughout the free world—many of whom see Israel as a Western outpost in a violent neighborhood. The Red-Green Alliance shares an anti-national worldview, which is one reason for its support for Hamas.

Finally, history is written by the victors. Israel therefore has no choice but to fight with determination, even at a high cost, to secure victory. The task that began on October 7 must be completed.

This article originally appeared in N12.

JISS Policy Papers are published through the generosity of the Greg Rosshandler Family.