I do believe they achieved the immediate tactical, operational and even strategic ends that they were set up to.

But in the longer term, I think they made a number of strategic mistakes which could lead to their very own demise.

How on earth could they think that which could lead to their very own demise.

How on earth can they, could they think that they would be able to negotiate with Israel,

the release of hundreds of Palestinian terrorists from Israeli prisons when you have kidnapped toddlers?

They have united a very divided or very otherwise divided Israeli society. Hey, welcome back to the Modern War Institute podcast.

I'm John Embell, editorial director at MWI, and this is a special bonus episode.

With a deadly, large-scale Hamas attacks against Israel recently and what appears to be a likely

ground offensive into Gaza by Israeli forces, there is of course a great deal to discuss.

At MWI, we've published a number of articles about this moment in the long-running conflict

between Israel and Hamas, and we've released episodes

across our various podcasts, dissecting particular elements of it. But what we haven't yet

focused on is Hamas's strategy. What was the group hoping to achieve by conducting the attacks?

And with an exceptionally forceful response from Israel looking likely, what are the group's

objectives now? To examine those

questions, I'm joined on this episode by Dr. McKelley-Gropi, a lecturer in the Defense Studies

Department at King's College London. His insights and his perspective make for a really

interesting discussion. But before we get to that discussion, a couple notes. First, if you're

not yet subscribed to the MWI podcast, you can find it on your

favorite podcast app so you don't miss an episode. And second, as always, what you hear in this

episode are the views of the participants and don't represent those of West Point, the Army,

or any other agency of the U.S. government. All right, here's my conversation with Dr.

...