How long can Biden spend American taxpayer money?
Just how long Israel can maintain the scale and intensity of its ground campaign is also a constraining factor in what level of victory it will ultimately achieve. Mobilisation on this scale is a strain on the Israeli economy and at some point a decision will have to be made to reduce its forces in Gaza.
Israel’s tactical victory though, doesn’t necessarily convert into strategic success. It has largely lost the information campaign, as the indiscriminate savagery unleashed by Hamas on October 7 recedes into the background, replaced by imagery from a devastated Gaza. Incidents like the one in which Israeli soldiers shot and killed three half-naked Israeli hostages, reportedly escaping under a white flag, add to suspicions about the degree to which the Israeli military discriminate between targets of necessity and targets of choice.
olddogthoughts 