The recent failure of the Israeli military to repel the October 7th attack and its inability to achieve the war's objectives, alongside the loss of hundreds of soldiers and officers and facing sharp criticisms, poses a significant question: What army is Israel fighting with in the Gaza Strip? According to observers, analysts, and experts, Saturday, October 7, 2023, was no ordinary day for the Israeli army. The day began with the Qassam Brigades—the military wing of the Islamic Resistance Movement Hamas—gaining control of approximately 600 square kilometers of what is known as the "Gaza Envelope" following a sudden and overwhelming attack that resulted in 319 deaths, over two thousand injuries, and more than 130 Israeli soldiers and officers being captured during the battle. The fall of the "Gaza Division," which consists of three brigades and two elite units, was deemed one of the most significant losses for the Israeli military that day. Observers and experts considered this defeat as a loss of the army's "memory," "eyes," and everything related to the Gaza Strip during the hours-long attack. A report by Al Jazeera, prepared by Sohaib Al-Assa, documented the Israeli military's continued intensive aerial strikes on the Gaza Strip throughout the remainder of October. The army also persisted in amassing ground forces along the border of the Strip, aiming to fulfill Tel Aviv's goals of ending Hamas' presence and decimating it as well as recovering Israelis held in Gaza. In pursuit of these objectives, the ground war commenced on October 27th, three weeks after the Hamas attack. Over 100 days of combat, the Israeli army suffered the loss of more than 510 soldiers, with over 200 of these casualties occurring before the start of the ground offense. Military experts believe that, in light of these losses, the Israeli army appears to be bleeding both individually and collectively, with soldiers' fighting capacity eroded and the army as a whole unable to achieve its wartime objectives after more than three months. ## Palestinian Resistance Endures On the other side, the Palestinian resistance remains capable of confrontation from point-blank range, even from within the most heavily destroyed and bombarded areas, which the Israeli forces claimed to have controlled and from which they reported to have eradicated Hamas' military capabilities. Simultaneously, the Israeli military failed to recover any of the hostages it had held, and its official military narrative failed on several occasions. The most noted of these was the narrative surrounding the Al-Shifa Hospital, which the army depicted and which swiftly became a source of ridicule on social media platforms. After 100 days, the Israeli army finds itself facing a pileup of intelligence, security, operational, and media failures, despite repeated declarations of controlling Hamas sites, detonating what it describes as strategic tunnels, or killing leaders of the resistance. In presenting the Israeli Army's multiple failures, the news implicates both direct military confrontations as well as propaganda and intelligence shortcomings. The report paints a clear portrayal of a military struggling to manage its objectives and narrative in the face of resilient opposition. As time unfolds, questions about future strategies and adjustments within the Israeli military and government are expected to arise, given the highlighted deficiencies in the recent Gaza conflict.
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