Meanwhile on the International front....

Warning here about the images to follow.

Where Was the Israeli Military?

A Times investigation found that troops were disorganized, out of position and relied on social media to choose targets. Behind the failure: Israel had no battle plan for a massive Hamas invasion.

 

The Ruined Landscape of Gaza After Nearly Three Months of Bombing

The war in the Gaza Strip is generating destruction comparable in scale to the most devastating urban warfare in the modern record.

By mid-December, Israel had dropped 29,000 bombs, munitions and shells on the strip. Nearly 70% of Gaza’s 439,000 homes and about half of its buildings have been damaged or destroyed. The bombing has damaged Byzantine churches and ancient mosques, factories and apartment buildings, shopping malls and luxury hotels, theaters and schools. Much of the water, electrical, communications and healthcare infrastructure that made Gaza function is beyond repair.

Most of the strip’s 36 hospitals are shut down, and only eight are accepting patients. Citrus trees, olive groves and greenhouses have been obliterated. More than two-thirds of its schools are damaged.

 

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2023/12/30/israel-hamas-war-gaza-news-palestine/

As Israel’s military campaign in Gaza intensifies, Secretary of State Antony Blinken has approved a $147.5 million arms sale to Israel through an emergency authority that bypasses the standard congressional review process. In a Friday announcement, the State Department said the proposed sale of 155-mm artillery shells and related equipment is consistent with the U.S. commitment to Israel’s security and efforts to help it “develop and maintain a strong and ready self-defense capability.” UNRWA, the U.N. agency for Palestinian refugees, said Friday that IDF soldiers fired on a U.N. aid convoy returning from a delivery in northern Gaza, an incident U.N. humanitarian chief Martin Griffiths condemned as “unlawful.”

 

I mean, part of the reason they're called "surprise attacks" is because you don't know exactly when they're coming. And even if you have a plan to repel it, the attacker will always have the advantage for a certain amount of time until the defender gets their wits about them. See Pearl Harbor, Barbarossa, Kasserine Pass, the Battle of the Bulge, Tet, etc.
The other thing all of those attacks have in common? In the end, they were all utter military disasters for the attacker that shattered its effectiveness as a fighting force. Militarily, this one appears to be heading the same way for Hamas. It's just too hardcore to admit it yet — or, more likely, it doesn't care.

 

Hamas is getting exactly what it wants. In 15 to 18 years their numbers will be double thanks to Bibi's ham-fisted attacks on Gaza civilians. Can't exactly blame them.

 

Their numbers didn't exactly appear to be declining, nor their attitude toward Jews softening, with the various other approaches Israel tried.

 

As Gaza death toll mounts, Israelis look in vain for any sign of victory

Israeli planes bombed refugee camps in Gaza on Saturday as its troops expanded ground operations and tens of thousands of Palestinians fled their homes, setting the stage for a new year as bloody and destructive as the last three months of 2023.

The threat of wider escalation also looms large over the region, as skirmishes on the northern boundary with Lebanon intensify, and Israeli officials have hinted that the “diplomatic hourglass” is running out to reach a negotiated solution.

For now there seems little hope of even a temporary break in attacks, even after Egypt hosted leaders for talks last week and pushed plans for a staged break in the war.

A senior Hamas official told AP on Saturday the militant group is firm in its position that there will be no hostage releases without a permanent ceasefire. Israel will not accept ending a war its leaders describe as existential and “without limit”.

 

Middle East is sliding closer to the edge of a wider regional conflict | Julian Borger

The Middle East has been slipping towards the precipice of a regional war ever since the Hamas attack on Israel on 7 October and the ferocious Israeli response in Gaza. The past week has shown how the cliff edge keeping it from that abyss could quickly crumble away.

Within hours of the outbreak of the Gaza war, the Hezbollah Shia militia in Lebanon began to fire on northern Israeli towns and villages in solidarity with Palestinians, triggering Israeli air strikes in response, and Houthi forces in Yemen attacked ships in the Red Sea with real or perceived Israeli connections.

The US moved two aircraft carriers and their accompanying strike groups to the region as American bases in Syria and Iraq came under repeated attacks from Iran-affiliated groups, drawing swift retaliation from Washington.

 

U.S. Helicopters Sink 3 Houthi Boats in Red Sea, Pentagon Says

American military helicopters came under fire from Iranian-backed Houthi fighters in the Red Sea on Sunday morning and shot back, sinking three Houthi boats and killing those aboard, U.S. Central Command said.

The episode occurred after a commercial container ship was attacked by Houthi fighters in small boats and issued a distress call, prompting U.S. Navy helicopters to respond, the military said.

 

Another warning here:

Israel’s ‘Black Sabbath’: Murder, Sexual Violence and Torture on Oct. 7