Israel has few weeks to defeat Hamas as public opinion sours: Ehud Barak

Former Prime Minister Ehud Barak said Israel has only weeks left to destroy Palestinian militant group Hamas completely as global public opinion – most importantly in the US – rapidly turned against the Israeli attacks on Gaza amid the rising death toll of Palestinians, Politico reported on Tuesday.

Barak, former prime minister and chief of the Israel Defense Forces, said: “The rhetoric of US officials has shifted in recent days with a mounting chorus of calls for a humanitarian pause in the fighting.” He added that the “sympathy” toward Israel against the backdrop of Hamas’ October 7 deadly attack was now “diminishing”.

“You can see the window is closing. It’s clear we are heading towards friction with the Americans about the offensive. America cannot dictate to Israel what to do. But we cannot ignore them,” Barak said referring to the recent ground offensive launched by Israel’s military targeting Hamas in the Gaza Strip.

Barak said: “We will have to come to terms with the American demands within the next two or three weeks, probably less.”

US President Joe Biden has stressed in a call on Monday with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu the importance of “the imperative to protect Palestinian civilians and reduce civilian harm in the course of military operations.” The two leaders also discussed the “possibility of tactical pauses to provide civilians with opportunities to safely depart from areas of ongoing fighting, to ensure assistance is reaching civilians in need, and to enable potential hostage releases.”

The call comes against the backdrop of the death toll of Palestinians rising above 10,000 casualties, two thirds of which were women, children and elderly, according to the health ministry affiliated with the Palestinian Authority.

UN Secretary-General António Guterres called on Monday for an immediate humanitarian ceasefire, describing the conflict playing out in Gaza as a “crisis of humanity”.

Guterres said: “Ground operations by the Israel Defense Forces and continued bombardment are hitting civilians, hospitals, refugee camps, mosques, churches and UN facilities — including shelters. No one is safe. At the same time, Hamas and other militants use civilians as human shields and continue to launch rockets indiscriminately towards Israel.”

The UN chief added: “The unfolding catastrophe makes the need for a humanitarian ceasefire more urgent with every passing hour. The parties to the conflict — and indeed, the international community — face an immediate and fundamental responsibility: to stop the inhuman collective suffering and dramatically expand humanitarian aid to Gaza.”

Ehud Barak told Politico it would take months or even a year to eradicate Hamas – the main declared goal of Netanyahu’s war cabinet; however, “Western support [is] weakening because of the civilian death toll in Gaza and fears of Israel’s campaign sparking a much broader and even more catastrophic war in the region.”

He also pointed to Western nations’ anxiety over their nationals being among the hostages held by Hamas. “Listen to the public tone — and behind doors it is a little bit more explicit. We are losing public opinion in Europe and in a week or two we’ll start to lose governments in Europe. And after another week the friction with the Americans will emerge to the surface.”

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken concluded a tour of the Middle East that included a flurry of meeting with regional leaders about the Israel-Hamas war. He said on Monday: “We know the deep concern here for the terrible toll that Gaza is taking on Palestinians – on men, women, and children in Gaza, innocent civilians – a concern that we share and that we’re working on every single day. We’ve engaged the Israelis on steps that they can take to minimize civilian casualties.”

Barak said he didn’t think Israel’s war cabinet would be able to “fend off the Biden administration and Europeans for much longer.”

Beyond the war, Barak said that a multinational Arab force could have to take control of Gaza after the military campaign, to help usher in a return of Mahmoud Abbas’ Palestinian Authority to take over from Hamas.

“It is far from being inconceivable that backed by the Arab League and United Nations Security Council, a multinational Arab force could be mustered, with some symbolic units from non-Arab countries included. They could stay there for three to six months to help the Palestinian Authority to take over properly,” he said.

However, he stressed that even with that change of the political order in Gaza, the return to diplomacy aimed at creating a Palestinian state “was a very remote prospect”.