The Israel Defense Forces insist, unofficially: “This week it won’t happen that we enter Gaza”. In fact, the Chief of the General Staff Herzi Halevi harangued the contingents deployed “at the gates of the Strip” late on Sunday. “Now we have to enter In Gaza, it is our responsibility – he urged them – to take the points where Hamas is; hit them hard, destroy every post, every command, every militiaman, every infrastructure. In a word, win.”

The first reason why this ‘imminent’ incursion, scheduled for this past weekend, has not yet taken place, would be – according to Israeli commanders to the American press – the bad weather conditions: these last few days, your pilots and drones they would not have been able to give him good air coverage (essential) for the operation. You shouldn’t be helping harsh bombing campaign which, to clear the ground for the soldiers, sends huge clouds of smoke, dust, debris into the sky…

A campaign that, in addition, would also go with a certain delaygiven the difficulty of eliminating the tens of thousands of Hamas militiamen entrenched in bunkers, arsenals and underground tunnels that they have all over Gaza. Everything, to clear the way and facilitate what will be “an invasion like we have not seen so far this century”in the words of Jesús Núñez Villaverde, co-director of the Institute for Conflict Studies and Humanitarian Action, for Al Rojo Vivo.

Like most experts, he agrees that this entry will occur because Israel has no choice and Israeli analysts themselves predict that it will be longvery long: apparently, some commanders of the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) estimate – ask – up to a year and a half to be able to go house to house looking for Hamas militiamen and commanders.

Internal and external pressures

In any case, it will be “an operation very hard both in human costs as destruction,” adds Núnez. And that is, politically, a great risk for Netanyahu’s troubled government: “Israeli society, even in time of war, is very reluctant to suffer a large number of casualties,” explains Yago Rodríguez, from ‘The Political Room’ in ARV.

Domestic pressure which is joined by that which comes even from its strongest allies, such as the United States. Joe Biden has declared to ‘CBS’ that “It would be a mistake for Israel to reoccupy Gaza; a big mistake, I think.” “Hamas and the extremists do not represent the entire Palestinian people,” the Democratic president has insisted.

The American president thus qualifies his support for Israeli defense; Like practically the entire international community, he is not interested in the conflict spreading in a region that, in itself, is already a tinderbox. A strong Israeli incursion into Gaza would unleash the wrath of Hezbollahand other militias, supports Hamas, and from Lebanon the fighting could expand to other areas, including Israel itself. “Both and others have to measure a lot, and that’s what’s happening,” explains Jesús Núñez.

Other analysts, such as Ignacio Cembrero, add that the neighboring countries – starting with Egypt – do not want to assume the catastrophe of another. mass exodus of Palestinian refugees.

It also delays the operation that the IDF does not yet know where are the hostages held by Hamas. At the very least, they fear, they would be used as human shields..