Israel’s Victories Aren’t Bringing It Closer to Peace

Since the brutal Oct. 7 Hamas attacks in 2023, Israel has won a series of remarkable tactical victories against its enemies. If it continues to foreclose any pathway to peace with the Palestinians, though, it’s going to find itself without friends.

Israeli forces adopted an aggressive new posture after Oct. 7, aiming to eliminate threats they had previously sought to contain. Their assaults wiped out the top leadership of Hamas, Hezbollah and Iran, and contributed to the fall of Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad. In waves of strikes last June and this spring, the US and Israel buried Iranian nuclear facilities in rubble; destroyed hundreds of ballistic missiles and launchers; sunk most of the regular Iranian navy; and gravely damaged key industrial assets. Israel has seized swaths of Gaza, Syria and southern Lebanon as buffer zones against future attacks.