New finger on the trigger

Chief of Staff Gadi Eizenkot will have to face the challenges posed by a disintegrating Mideast.

By YOSSI MELMAN
Chief of Staff Gadi Eisenkot (photo credit: MOSHE MILNER / GPO)
Chief of Staff Gadi Eisenkot
(photo credit: MOSHE MILNER / GPO)
MID-FEBRUARY saw the changing of the guard at the helm of the Israel Defense Forces.
After four years as Chief of Staff and 35 years in uniform, Lt.-Gen. Benny Gantz stepped down and was replaced by Lt.-Gen.
Gadi Eizenkot, who will be the IDF’s 21st COS.
Before analyzing Gantz’s legacy and the challenges facing Eizenkot, it is significant to note that the IDF leadership is beginning to show signs of aging. Gantz entered office when he was 51 years old. Eizenkot is now 54 years old and when he finishes his four-year term, he will be close to 60. This is in sharp contrast to earlier generations.
The second COS Yigael Yadin was only 32 years old when he assumed office. The fourth COS, the legendary Moshe Dayan was 39 and the seventh COS Yitzhak Rabin was 42 years old, when each respectively took over the top IDF spot.
With life expectancy and quality of life on the ascent, today’s 60-year-olds can be compared to yesterday’s 50- or even 40-year-olds and with age come certain advantages: more experience, more expertise and professional skills, wider education and knowledge, and much more balanced judgment. But age also has its limits and weaknesses.
But still, the IDF by its structure and nature remains a young organization. Its conscripts are 18 to 21 years old. Mingling with young people requires vitality, original thinking and fresh energy. This is a must for a profession where the use of force stands at the core of the organization. More than a decade ago, when he was prime minister, Ehud Barak, also a former COS, talked about the need to revolutionize the IDF and turn it into an agile, lean, mean fighting machine. These are traits identified with young people. The opposite has happened.
The generation gap between young conscripts and young low-level officers and their aging senior commanders is changing the character of the IDF.
This change has been manifested in the last four wars: the Second Lebanese war of 2006 and the three Gaza operations – Cast Lead in 2008-2009, Pillar of Defense in 2012 and last summer’s Protective Edge. In all of them, the IDF showed a lack of imagination, and was reluctant to use Special Forces units and maximize its maneuverability. It relied instead on superior fire power provided by artillery and tanks and, above all, by the sophisticated air force. This strategy was sufficient to bring tranquility to northern Israel by deterring Lebanon’s militant Hezbollah movement, but has been less successful in the south against the Gaza-based Hamas.
The last two Gaza campaigns were conducted with Gantz heading the IDF. Gantz is a modest and down-to-earth fellow. Like King Saul he was called to the task unexpectedly, almost by default, when a previous front-runner was bumped from the race. This happened during a sordid period in which the IDF leadership at the time was besmirched, as then COS Gabi Ashkenazi was embroiled in a case of alleged forged documents and financial wrongdoings, which supposedly involved then-defense minister Ehud Barak.
Gantz is not a man of many words, but that did not stop him from saying at the start of his term that he intended to rid the army of the foul odor that permeated the office of the COS. And he did. He eradicated from the upper echelons of the IDF the spins, manipulations and politics, which ruled the day under his predecessor.
Gantz’s quiet and unobtrusive personality has also prevented him from revealing his real thoughts and opinions. Another outgoing COS would have been quick in his farewell interviews and background briefings to leak information, to throw fireworks into the volatile public discourse.
But Gantz has refused to comply with the norms of tempestuous politicians – such as Economy Minister Naftali Bennett and Foreign Minister Avigdor Liberman – who in their melees with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Moshe Ya’alon did not hesitate to criticize the IDF during Operation Protective Edge. “Good luck to them,” was the only bitter remark Gantz allowed himself to voice in an indirect and pointed jab at his critics in the cabinet during the war, particularly Bennett, who tried to take credit for the IDF’s success in destroying Hamas’s attack tunnels.
Gantz, who in the past raced in triathlons and today keeps fit with recreational short distance running mixed with walking, does not see himself as an innovator, just a man continuing the path of his predecessors. First and foremost, he sees himself as a soldier’s soldier.
About 50 years ago, the Armored Corps adopted the mantra that it is not the machine that is victorious – it is man. Under Gantz's watch – even with the organizational changes and the technological revolution – the IDF remained an organization dependent on the human edge, the quality of its soldiers and its commanders. Its power comes from its people, not from machines or technology. With this in mind, Gantz struggled (despite much criticism) to improve the salaries of his regular conscripts (with some degree of success) and of his career soldiers (with no success).
Gantz believes that during his term, the IDF has had operational successes in the Red Sea (disrupting Iranian efforts to smuggle weapons by sea to Hamas in Gaza) and in intelligence-gathering operations, most of which he cannot and does not want to reveal.
Nevertheless, there is something slightly disturbing about his attitude to certain failures that occurred during his term, including during the last round of conflict with Gaza, where he refused to admit any fault.
He believes that he is leaving his successor with a strong army, prepared for future security challenges. Gantz, with typical integrity and honesty, admits that these future challenges cannot really be predicted.
INDEED ISRAEL has never found itself in a situation in which the future was so uncertain.
The Middle East, as the world has known it for a century, is not only changing, it is disintegrating.
Syria, Iraq, Libya and Yemen are already failed states. Egypt is in decline due its economic crisis and faces terrorist challenges by jihadist groups in the Sinai Peninsula and on the mainland aiming to destabilize and topple the government of President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi. The former head of Military Intelligence’s research department, Maj.-Gen.
Itai Brun, has defined the deteriorating reality as a “region in the making.”
Apart from transforming the army back into a more daring and flexible force, Eizenkot’s major task will be how to adapt the IDF to the changing reality of the Middle East and the new threats facing Israel.
Along the northern border, Hezbollah is still keeping its head down nearly nine years after the heavy blows inflicted on it by the IDF during the 2006 war. Also in the north and northeast, Israel is no longer threatened by regular armies. A decade ago Israeli strategists still talked about the threat of the “Eastern Front,” which consisted of the combined armies of Iraq and Syria. No more. Bashar Assad’s army is divided and bleeding to death in the killing fields of its civil war. The Iraqi military proved to be a joke after collapsing like a house of cards before the jihadi hordes of Islamic State.
Israel’s longest border with peace partner Jordan is quiet and Amman is Jerusalem’s best strategic ally in the region – cooperation is strong and has survived occasional upheavals related to the West Bank and the Palestinians, resulting from the occupation, lack of progress in peace negotiations, tension over the Temple Mount and attempts by Jewish extremists to pray there. In early February, Jordan returned its ambassador to Tel Aviv after a three-month leave of absence in protest of Israel’s actions in the territories.
In the south, after the last round of fighting, Hamas, which rules Gaza with an iron fist, has been left bankrupt and faces difficulties rehabilitating its military force. Hamas is also further isolated because Egypt perceives the Palestinian Islamic movement as a hostile entity.
The Egyptian government led by Sisi defines Hamas as a “terror group” and accuses it of supporting the Al-Qaida and ISIS-affiliated groups operating in Sinai, sowing terror and giving the Egyptian army a bloody nose.
Against this background, military ties, intelligence- sharing and cooperation between Israel and Egypt are unprecedented and better even than during the heyday of former president Hosni Mubarak. According to Egyptian reports, the Israel Air Force has in some rare cases even participated in joint attacks against terror groups in Sinai alongside the Egyptian army.
AS EIZENKOT enters his office on the 14th floor of the Kirya compound in Tel Aviv – Israel’s “Pentagon” – the inevitable conclusion is that Israel's strategic posture has never been better. This is the time to take calculated risks, to reform the military and to encourage the political echelon to be more generous in its dealing with the Palestinian Authority.
Eizenkot like his predecessor doesn’t have any political inclinations. He is purely a professional soldier. But like Gantz, he presumably knows that reaching an agreement – any agreement, interim or lasting – with the Palestinians is a must. Without it, the West Bank sooner or later will explode and the IDF once again will have to try to crush the violence as it did in the two previous intifadas of the 1980s and 2000s.
Eizenkot also is fully aware that the tranquility on Israel’s borders is temporary and elusive. Additional rounds with Hezbollah and Hamas are just a matter of time.
Hezbollah is making inroads on the Syrian side of the border, which is still controlled by the Al-Qaida-affiliated Nusra Front, as its seeks to be in a position to challenge Israel on two fronts – Lebanon and the Golan Heights – in the event of war.
As long as the economic situation in Gaza continues to be desperate, the danger of a new round with Hamas will persist.
Then, of course, there is Iran and its desire to obtain nuclear weapons, its support for Hezbollah and the possibility that it will renew ties with Hamas. For Eizenkot, just as for his predecessor, Iran will remain the No.
1 headache. During his tenure, one of two developments may occur. Either Iran will clinch a nuclear deal with the world powers, and perhaps even a wider comprehensive agreement with the US, or it will develop nuclear bombs.
Though the chances are slim and distant, one should not completely rule out that Eizenkot will be the COS who will have to send the Israel Air Force to bomb Iran.
Yet he is known to be cautious and not trigger-happy. He is a strong character and doesn’t bow to the whims of politicians. As a student of history he is an admirer of the writings of the late Yehoshafat Harkavi, a former general and chief of military intelligence who became a thinker and university professor, specializing in strategic and nuclear issues.
Harkavi was a political “dove” and a security “hawk.” Namely, he preached to seek and enhance peace, and agreements with Israel’s neighbors, but at the same time to be strong and always on alert. This thesis will most probably guide the new Chief of Staff. 
Yossi Melman is an Israeli security commentator and co-author of ‘Spies Against Armageddon.’ He blogs at www.israelspy.com and tweets at yossi_melman