Robert D. Kaplan
October 7, nearly a year ago, changed Israeli calculations in ways that are still being revealed. The very bestiality of the event, with its torture, murder, mass rapes, and the like, was an expression of both Palestinian blood hatred and Iranian grand strategy. Soon after the event, the leader of Hezbollah in Lebanon, Hassan Nasrallah, described October 7 as “great,” “blessed,” “heroic,” and “courageous,” even as his Shiite group rained down missiles on northern Israel, forcing 60,000 civilians to flee south.
Repelling such a war of annihilation is not pretty, especially for a democracy governed by the consent of the governed, which is therefore charged by its citizenry with protecting their physical and material well-being. Indeed, democracy entails obligations that are not always benign. This naturally leads to adjustments in the military rules of engagement. Remember, there is a profound difference between imagining the worst that your enemy might do to you and then palpably experiencing it. October 7 left nothing to the imagination. It would have been both immoral and irresponsible if Israeli military thinking had not evolved as a consequence.
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