This is what Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's logic looks like as Israel prepares to add tens of thousands of reserves to the battlefield of Gaza.
“We are not over the war,” Netanyahu declared on Sunday as his security minister signed an expansion of the battle. “We will carry out this operation with a unified army, with strong troops and deep resolved soldiers.”
However, it is not clear how these additional fighters will change the dynamics seen fundamentally in hundreds of thousands of soldiers smacking Hamas fighters, Gaza residents captured in the middle, but destroying Israeli militant groups and achieving Israeli goals of liberating all humans.
And it remains unclear whether Israeli forces will return to Gaza before President Trump arrives in the Middle East next week for meetings in Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates. The two reserves who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not allowed to comment on news media said they had received call-up orders since June.
Since the collapse of the two-month ceasefire in March, Israel has blocked food, medicine and other humanitarian aid from reaching Gaza. And the Israeli Air Force is already renewing the fierce artillery fires of the enclave.
Now, the government is poised to expand its ground attacks with the goal of re-entering the city in Gaza and forcing Hamas to submit to its demands that Hamas be abandoned Israeli weapons forever.
The question is whether such a return to a fight is a roadmap to the end of hostilities, or merely a reinforcement of a fatal conflict with the aggravated consequences of Palestinian and Israeli hostages still being held by Hamas.
Tamil Heyman, who served as Israeli military chief intelligence for four years, said his attempts to put pressure on Hamas with overwhelming force was “exhausted” more than a year after the war.
“It's extremely difficult to eliminate Hamas as a terrorist organization through military force alone,” said Heyman, executive director of the National Security Institute, a think tank in Tel Aviv. He said it would be better for Israel to end the war with Hamas. Hamas has been significantly weakened and could be suppressed after the battle is over.
The Israeli military has not provided details on how to deploy the reserves. But two Israeli officials who requested anonymity to comment on the military programme say several brigades will be involved in some parts of Gaza, seeking so-called operational advantages.
The Trump administration called for a new ceasefire, but Hamas called for the end of the war and the withdrawal of Israeli forces from Gaza.
The Israeli soldiers' call was also a message to Netanyahu's Hardline supporters, some of which were disappointed that the military had not completed its challenge to eradicate Hamas. Promising a more intense phase of war could be good domestic politics for him.
Israeli officials say they believe it was the power and strength of the military campaign in Gaza last year that pushed Hamas to release some of its hostages and pressured them to accept a ceasefire in January.
Hours after the Hamas terrorist attack on October 7, 2023, he killed 1,200 people in Israel, 251 were held hostages, Netanyahu ordered the mobilization of 360,000 reserves and added about 170,000 soldiers to the country's permanent troops.
In the battles since then, more than 50,000 Palestinians have died, according to the Gaza Health Ministry, which has not distinguished civilians from military deaths. Approximately 130 hostages have been released, and Israeli forces have recovered at least 40 bodies. According to the Israeli government, around 24 hostages are thought to be still alive.
When Israel and Hamas agreed to the January ceasefire agreement, Netanyahu said they should go “the painful blow that our heroic fighter has landed in Hamas.”
“This is exactly how the conditions were created for the turning point of that position and the release of our hostages,” he said in a national speech.
However, other voices like Israeli opposition leader Yair Lapid have expressed serious questions about the strategy. “I fear that the strength of the battle will determine the fate of the hostages,” Rapid told Israel Army Radio. “What is the goal? Why do they call the reserves? Extend normal services and extend everything without defining everything to goals. That's not how you win the war.”
In a statement Monday, an organization representing hostage families urged the government not to spread the war.
“The expansion of military operations puts all hostages at a serious risk,” the family said. “We beg decision makers. We prioritize hostages. Secure deals. We will take them home before it's too late.”
Aaron Boxerman and Nathan Audenheimer contributed reports from Jerusalem.
