In its efforts to topple the Hamas-led Palestinian government, Israel has strengthened its enemy, writes Michael Jansen
Palestinians compare today's siege of Gaza with the 1982 "Battle of Beirut", the campaign waged against the Lebanese capital by former Israel premier Ariel Sharon.
Now, as then, Israel is pounding closely settled urban areas from land, sea and air, striking power plants and blocking supplies of food and fuel. Today Israel is besieging 1.4 million Palestinians in Gaza; in 1982, Israel besieged 500,000 civilians in west Beirut.
Israel began its latest offensive on June 28th although Hamas had observed a ceasefire for 18 months; 24 years ago Israel launched its campaign 10 months after Palestinian guerrillas committed to a truce on the Lebanese border. The casus belli in both cases were incidents involving Israeli citizens: Cpl Gilad Shalit, captured by a Palestinian commando unit on June 25th, and Israeli ambassador in London Shlomo Argov wounded by Palestinian dissidents on June 3rd, 1982.
Israel was waiting for a pretext to strike now as then. Both the Gaza and Beirut offensives should be considered battles in Israel's protracted war to subject the Palestinians to occupation and exile.
The fundamental difference between the two battles is that Israel is limiting its use of force in Gaza, while it used maximum force in Lebanon. That campaign transformed Israel's international image.
No longer was Israel seen as David fighting an Arab Goliath but it became a brutal Goliath fighting a Palestinian David.
Former prime minister Ariel Sharon's West Bank blitz in 2002 revived this unfavourable perception of Israel. Aware of the importance of image, the current prime minister Ehud Olmert is striving to keep the offensive low-key in order to avoid interference. "We can carry out our missions like James Bond and lose the support we have in the international community. In order to preserve this support we must act with patience and cool heads."
But in an initial hot-headed reaction to the capture of Cpl Shalit, Mr Olmert made a serious mistake. He ordered the bombing of Gaza's electricity plant which provides the Strip with 65 per cent of its power.
In one strike, Israel crippled water and sewage pumps, shut down the sewage-treatment plant and forced hospitals to rely on dodgy generators to run intensive care units and operating theatres.
Knocking out the plant harmed all Gaza's citizens and rallied them behind the fighters who are holding Cpl Shalit. The suffering inflicted by this strike has been compounded by Israel's closing of the goods crossing and the facility which provides fuel to Gaza, bringing it to the brink of a humanitarian disaster.
Belatedly, the international community has become engaged: the UN and EU complain about Israel's "disproportionate" use of force and insist that Israel allow essential supplies into the strip.
Israel has attempted to counter this mistake by waging a controlled, two- track campaign involving conventional and micro warfare.
On one hand, Israel is using traditional psychological warfare to break down Gaza's will to resist. Its tools are routine shelling and over-flights by helicopters, drones and warplanes breaking the sound barrier with shattering sonic booms. Israel also opens and closes crossings to create confusion and insecurity. Gazans expect that a major push is imminent when gates are shut.
On the other hand, Israel is employing its aircraft, Apache helicopters and drones in surgical strikes against ministries, institutions and fighters. It is also dispatching tanks, armoured bulldozers and personnel carriers into Gaza on short missions.
The main objective of the micro-operations is to whittle away, with deft strokes, Palestinian Authority and Hamas infrastructure and to create a zone on the edges of Gaza where fighters dare not go to fire rockets at Israeli towns. Mr Olmert says the "rolling operation" has no time-frame and has rejected negotiations with Hamas and the Palestinian Authority.
Israel is well equipped with both up-to-date conventional weaponry and the latest aircraft and high-tech devices to wage this campaign.
A missile fired at the Islamic University last week destroyed a small building used as an office by the student council without breaking windows in nearby buildings; a large bomb dropped by an aircraft on the interior ministry hollowed out the building. While guided devices may amaze, most of the shells and bombs used by Israel in psychological warfare are less accurate and often produce civilian deaths and collateral damage.
Israel's stated tactical objectives are securing the release of its soldier and ending the firing of rockets by Palestinian fighters. So far these objectives have not been attained.
Israel's unstated strategic objectives are also far from being achieved.
Israel wants to topple the Hamas- led Palestinian government but its operation has so far strengthened Hamas prime minister Ismail Haniyeh and weakened Fatah president Mahmoud Abbas, who fled Gaza for the safety of the West Bank instead of remaining with his people.
Israel also seeks to halt resistance activity, but by systematically targeting Palestinian infrastructure and impoverishing Gaza, Israel ensures angry young Gazans will become fighters.
Mr Olmert may think that subjugating Gaza will also destroy the will of West Bankers to resist his plan to impose a new border unilaterally and annex West Bank territory. Palestinians however regard Gaza and the West Bank as a single unit and are prepared to fight for both.
Writing in the Israeli daily Haaretz, Gideon Levy said the only way to end the war was to end the occupation. "With our own hands, we are now once again pushing the Palestinians into using the petty arms they have and, in response, we employ the entire enormous arsenal at our disposal."