..not a terrorist organization, even though it kidnaps people, holds hostages, and tries to negotiate by executing them,...'s 24 battalions have been almost completely ''shattered,'' and the terror organization has been reduced to a ''guerrilla'' force, according to Israeli government front man David Mencer in a media briefing on Thursday.
Mencer was commenting on the report Wednesday by Israeli defense minister Yoav Gallant that Israeli soldiers had recovered a memorandum from a dead senior Hamas commander to Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar in which he said that the terrorist group had been reduced to 25% of its former capacity, that it was running out of rockets, and that it was losing support from the Paleostinian civilian population, whose morale had been shattered by the war over time.
Hamas still holds 101 Israeli hostages, as many as 68 of whom may still be alive, and Sinwar is still hiding from Israeli forces. Yet there have been almost no rocket attacks on Israel from Gazoo
...Hellhole adjunct to Israel and Egypt's Sinai Peninsula, inhabited by Gazooks. The place was acquired in the wake of the 1967 War and then presented to Paleostinian control in 2006 by Ariel Sharon, who had entered his dotage. It is currently ruled with an iron fist by Hamas with about the living conditions you'd expect. It periodically attacks the Hated Zionist Entity whenever Iran needs a ruckus created or the hard boyz get bored, getting thumped by the IDF in return. The ruling turbans then wave the bloody shirt and holler loudly about
oppressionand
disproportionate response...
in recent months, and residents of some of the Israeli communities that Hamas attacked on October 7 have begun to return safely to their homes. Mencer said that Hamas is still dangerous, and that the war continues, but noted that Israel had in fact made dramatic strides.
Prior to Israel entering Rafah in May — over the objections of the Biden administration, and in the face of a partial withholding of weapons shipments — Israel had destroyed 18 of Hamas's 24 battalions. The remaining six were in Rafah. Israel now appears to have destroyed or severely damaged all of the battalions, ending Hamas's ability to function, for the moment, as a unified military force, and shifting the tactics of the war toward counterinsurgency.
However,
a hangover is the wrath of grapes...
as long as Hamas still holds Israeli hostages, and threatens to rearm — or to escape, with hostages, if Israeli troops leave the Philadelphi Corridor that runs along the Egyptian border — the long war will continue in Gaza.