Alon Pinkas: ‘Israel has not defined’ the ‘overarching political objective’ for the invasion of Gaza

As Israel’s ground operation in Gaza intensifies, Anti-Defamation League CEO Jonathan Greenblatt, Lt. Gen. Steph Twitty, and Alon Pinkas, a former Israeli consul general in New York, join Andrea Mitchell to react to Richard Haass saying that the Israeli military campaign is “understandable” but not “smart” or “consistent with U.S. interests” in the region. “He’s absolutely right. The fundamental point in every war, in every military operation on such a scale, is to align it with a grand political object. Otherwise, it's just a military tit-for-tat,” Pinkas says. “In that respect, we need to better define — and I know for a fact that Israel has not defined — what that political objective, that overarching political objective is.” Greenblatt objects, saying “ I don't think we asked, you know, the Allied forces in the middle of World War Two, ‘What is your long term political objective, other than to destroy the Third Reich?’” He adds, “Hamas is not just a terror organization making Jews unsafe in Israel; it's an idea that Jews should be unsafe anywhere.”Oct. 30, 2023