With U.S. Weapons, Israel’s New Strategy Is Redefining Military Power In The Middle East

Dan Gouré

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The combination of Israeli intelligence and U.S.-built weapons systems has enabled the Israel Defense Force to conduct a new strategic campaign against its adversaries.

Just hours after winning the election, President-elect Donald J. Trump spoke with Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. As soon as the classified transition briefings start, Trump will see the clear evidence that Israel has reshaped the regional military balance by unleashing its precise, U.S.-built long-range striking power against Iran. On October 26, Israel’s U.S.-made combat fighters entered Iran’s airspace, struck targets, and returned unscathed. The air campaign was a complex and technological blow that has diminished Iran as a military power.

That marked a turnaround for Israel. A year ago, Hamas’ surprise attack on October 7, 2023 demonstrated how woefully unprepared Israel was, psychologically, even more than physically, to deal with a coalition of adversaries bent on its total destruction. Tragically, a combination of hubris, complacency and underinvestment in the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) and its supporting industrial base resulted in Hamas’ initial successful attack from Gaza. Successive governments and Israeli society took false comfort in the belief that their country’s enemies, both near and abroad, but Hamas, in particular, had neither the capacity nor the desire to disturb the status quo.

The IDF’s leadership was so invested in its sense of absolute superiority that it failed to maintain adequate defenses along the border with Gaza. An even greater sign of hubris was the IDF’s rejection of repeated warnings of an impending attack, some dating back more than a year before October 7. In the weeks leading up to the attack, the IDF’s Military Intelligence Directorate suppressed warnings from members of its border observation corps that Hamas was preparing for some sort of large-scale action. Even worse, the IDF had no plan for how to respond to a major terrorist attack on either its southern or northern borders.