The Failure of Netanyahu's 'Absolute Victory' That Is Harming the Israeli Military

Amid the ongoing war that has continued since 7 October 2023, an analysis from an Israeli perspective published by Nadav Eyal, a columnist for the daily Yedioth Ahronoth, via platform X, reveals the depth of the internal crisis currently afflicting Tel Aviv. The main focus is on the strategic confusion of Benjamin Netanyahu’s government and how the slogan of ‘absolute victory’ has transformed into a destructive illusion. This illusion is eroding Israel’s military doctrine, dragging the army into a vortex of vengeance, whilst ignoring political vision and bypassing the military history lessons that once formed the state’s foundation. In his writing, cited by Aljazeera on Sunday (22/6/2026), Eyal highlights the stark contrast between Netanyahu’s promise to end the war conclusively and the realistic views of Israel’s founders. According to him, the mainstream of Zionism never believed from the outset that absolute victory was achievable. Its leaders understood it was impossible given the numerical superiority of the Arab population. They realised that the sea remains the same sea, the Arabs remain the same Arabs, and that occupying the entire territory would never yield a decisive victory. For this reason, after the Six-Day War, the Levi Eshkol administration viewed the occupied territories as a kind of ‘deposit’ that could be used as a tool to achieve peace.