21 October 2023 , 18:17
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This morning we saw the opening of the Rafah crossing from Gaza into Egypt, allowing aid trucks into the region for the first time since the conflict erupted on October 7.
This is extremely important progress - and if the first trucks go through without difficulty it’s to be hoped more will follow. But extracting British citizens who are still held captive by Hamas in Gaza will be very difficult.
There will be a lot of other countries in the Gulf with dual nationals incarcerated by Hamas, and the UK is less of a major player in the Middle East than the US. So it could take a long time.
The visits by Rishi Sunak and Joe Biden to Israel and the region this week were important - and I'm sure as Prime Minister, Keir Starmer's instinct would have been to go to the region. Joe Biden's visit was quite operational - offering strong moral support to the Israelis, while in private counselling caution and trying to unblock the delivery of aid to Gaza.
The situation for Israelis following the atrocities of October 7 is existential. It is a more acute situation for Israelis than even the Yom Kippur War in 1973 or the start of the Six-Day War in 1967.
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Palestinians search for bodies and survivors in the rubble of a residential building levelled in an airstrike (HAITHAM IMAD/EPA-EFE/REX/Shutterstock)But in my view, Hamas have completely miscalculated. Normally they try and calibrate their violence, in a horrible way. But they hadn't worked out at all what they were going to do - and they just let these maniacs loose in the Kibbutzim without thought of the effect this would have on the Israelis.
The Israeli Defence Force has some seasoned career soldiers, but there are tens of thousands more who are either conscripts or reserves, and not as well trained, particularly on issues of calibrating restraint. It's a deeply depressing situation. And combined with the violence against Palestinians in the West Bank it could very easily spin out of control.
The anger is so strong on both sides that people make very serious mistakes on both sides and overreact.