I was told last night that I (quote): “I have to talk about national security issues, about which I have a lot to say, and I better focus on areas that are valuable to me.” And that came from the character, who then informed me that he knew the subject much better than I did, although without providing any evidence of it.

I can't help but express my gratitude to the senior expert for this advice. How it should be very easy to ascertain — everyone, given one attempt to do so — has spent only about 50% of their professional lives studying the Arab-Israeli conflict. Thus I cannot fail to conclude that the sender or

a) cannot understand what he is reading; or

b) too stupid to at least try to find out.

Naive optimist and idealist that I am, I would prefer option a) because there is help for problems such as impaired comprehension of what has been read.

Unfortunately, in case b) and after about 14,000 (reported) years, humanity still has no cure or active remedies for dullness. Indeed, it remains both a progressive and degenerative disorder.

But do not take heed. I like this advice, very much! So here's the next update on this conflict.

First: Substack has a limit on the size of emails. Thus, when I was preparing my assessment of events yesterday, I exhausted the limit without even reaching the analysis of the strategy. Not surprisingly, this has led to many related questions. Please be patient: I will come back to this as soon as I can.

Or if you can't wait. Well, there is only one thing to say for now: the spokesman for the IDF, Brigadier General Danny Hagari, said there was no indication that Iran was involved in the matter.

And, as far as I can tell, despite all the “consultations” reported by the American and German media: without Iran, there is no Russian involvement.

Thus, one can only advise to ignore the associated hysteria — no matter how widespread it is and which characters abuse related fake news for what purpose.

After about 48 hours of this battle, I think the most important realization is that the initial reports of the number of terrorists, both Hamas (ed. - Islamic Resistance Movement) and ISIS (ed. - Palestinian Islamic Jihad), sent over the fence separating Israel The Gazans were greatly underestimated. Indeed, after talking to someone who might know yesterday, I had the impression that even the “updated” figure of about 1,000 from the Hamas Nukhba force is still an underestimate. It is possible that 300 people participated in the “first wave” of attacks; perhaps up to 1,000 had signed up by October 7. However, I have the impression that the total in the meantime reaches “well over 1000”. In addition, at least 11 different bases of the IDF and about 20 Israeli municipalities were attacked.

The reason for the constant increase in numbers is the fact that numerous gaps in the fence remain open and 48 hours is a very long time in such situations, and the Central Intelligence Agency is still far from blocking all “entrances”. This means that both Hamas and ISIS have plenty of time to throw additional reinforcements through the fence.

Therefore, as of the morning, battles were raging on most of the fence:

• from the beaches of the Mediterranean to the north of the Gaza Strip,
• up to Ashkelon,
• and Kiryat Ghat (10 km northeast of Gaza),
• to Sderot in the east (only a completely destroyed police station turned out to be guarded; Brigadier General Roman Hofmann was wounded there; another Hamas group entered the city)
• then down to Kfar Aza (where fighting also continues this morning).

Further south, Nahal Oz and Beeri were still under Palestinian control as of yesterday, despite several Israeli counterattacks and the constant presence of Israeli UAVs and attack helicopters: they were apparently unable to close any of the breaches.

Reims was recovered by the Tsar yesterday morning, which is why so many bodies of civilians killed by terrorists in an attack on a music festival (at least 261) have been found. The IDF appears to have regained its base at Reims, about a kilometer to the south.

As far as I can tell, the situation is “least clear” in the area from En Habsor down to Keren Shalom and then along the road to Ofakim, about 20 km east of the Gaza Strip: all three places seem to have suffered a lot of fighting with scattered terrorist groups yesterday and during last night. In the area of Kerem Shalom, a unit of the Israel Defense Army special forces, Shayyet 13, managed to capture the commander of the Hamas Southern Brigade, Mohammed Abu Gal.

Last night at around 22:00 Hamas launched a third wave of cross-border attacks. It seems that the main target was Kissufim checkpoint (closed since August 2005).

Indeed, despite claims that “all settlements” are “under Israeli control” and that checkpoints have been set up on the roads, even some of the places that were initially considered “protected” remain “hot” — because either Hamas or ISIS has managed to deploy new terrorist groups there. This is especially true for Kfar Aza, Sderot, Ofakim and En Habsor. Several groups of Hamas and ISIS terrorists still roam the countryside.

That is why yesterday the Israeli government ordered the evacuation of all settlements around the Gaza Strip, which in turn led to huge columns of cars moving along the roads in the northern direction.

Meanwhile, the Israel Defense Army's mobilization is growing, with up to 300,000 armed personnel, and numerous columns of various Israeli units converge in the direction of the Gaza Strip.

As for casualties, prisoners of war and hostages.

As of yesterday morning, Israeli officials reported 400 killed Hamas and ISIS terrorists. I did not find newer figures, but many photos of captured or killed, such as:

The Israeli official puts the death toll among Israelis at “over 700,” with some “warnings” that it is likely to (very strongly) exceed 800. More than 300 wounded are in critical condition.

• Hamas said it was holding about 100 “Israelis” - where it actually means “Israeli and foreign nationals whom Hamas considers to be Israelis or does not report anything else about them.” Either way: it's “100".

In addition, the IDJ said it was holding “30 Israelis” — where it also appears to be a mix of Israeli and foreign nationals.

One way or another: a total of 130 prisoners of war and hostages.

• One of the POWs turned out to be not what Hamas claimed to be: Hamas reportedly claimed yesterday to have captured General Nimrod Aloni, but he turned out to have participated in several Southern Command conferences, yesterday and today. So the person Hamas is holding is someone else.

Nevertheless, Hamas has already offered an exchange of prisoners of war and hostages, but also reported that four hostages were killed in an Israeli bombing last night along with those who captured them.

Regarding the “air-to-missile campaign”: I'm still trying to catch the relevant reports and think that in the end they will better explain it along with the “strategy” — because it's very closely related (and this is in relation to the parties).

For now, one can only conclude that Israel is massively bombing the Gaza Strip (indeed, some say there is a “carpet bombing”). Especially the area of Bayt Lakhya is almost constantly subjected to air strikes. This morning, Israelis provoked a massacre by storming a crowded street in Jabalia (a refugee camp), killing more than 50 people.

Shortly before, Gaza authorities reported more than 510 killed and 2,750 wounded.

In turn, Hamas and ISIS attack Israel at every opportunity: Lod/Ben Gurion airport was closed for several hours this morning, and Ashkelon and Ashdod were hit, indicating that the Israeli Air Force has not yet resumed its coverage with surface-to-air missiles. It is known that one rocket hit Highway 1 between Tel Aviv and Jerusalem.

The text is published with the permission of the author. First published by link.