October 6, 2025, 7:00 AM View Comments ()

The Oct. 7, 2023, terrorist attacks on Israel were a strategic shock of historic proportions. As with other cataclysmic events like 9/11, they generated immediate lessons on the dangers of terrorism, the challenges facing intelligence services, and the costs of complacency. Israeli leaders, reeling from the trauma, launched wide-ranging operations not only in Gaza but also against targets in Iran, Lebanon, Syria, the West Bank, and Yemen. For many Israelis, Oct. 7 seemed to confirm hard truths about the nature of their enemies and the perfidiousness of supposed friends. Yet in practice, these lessons were only partially correct—and in several cases dangerously incomplete.

Lesson One: You Can’t Accommodate Terrorists and Their Supporters

Not accommodating terrorists seems like an obvious lesson, but when you live in the Middle East, where governments like Iran and Syria have supported terrorism and groups like Hamas and Hezbollah controlled territory, working with extremist groups and their supporters seems like a necessary evil. Before Oct. 7, Israel relied on a mix of coercion and inducements to manage Hamas, convinced that material incentives and pressure had created a pragmatic governing partner in Gaza. In Lebanon, Israel focused mostly on deterrence to counter Hezbollah, using the threat of punishment to dissuade the group from launching attacks. Oct. 7 shattered the assumption that you could manage terrorists, reinforcing Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s refusal to negotiate with Hamas and driving all-out campaigns against Hezbollah, Iran, and military targets in Syria.

Yet bad actors are not necessarily irrational. They have their own internal politics, strategic priorities, and vulnerabilities. Hezbollah’s calibrated post-Oct. 7 strikes and Iran’s often limited responses revealed caution as much as hostility. Even the Syrian government—led by a former al Qaeda figure—is signaling that reconstruction and regime consolidation, not war with Israel, remain its overriding priorities. Treating adversaries as monolithic and unchanging risks missing opportunities for leverage.

Lesson Two: Deterrence Means Destroying Capabilities

A second conclusion has been that deterrence requires destroying adversary capabilities outright. Netanyahu has emphasized “the destruction of Hamas’s military and governing capabilities” and “ensuring that Gaza no longer poses a threat to Israel.” Because Hamas achieved devastating results with relatively modest capabilities, the logic runs, all hostile groups must be reduced to impotence.

But the feasibility of total destruction of all of Israel’s foes is limited. Eradicating an opponent with a social base requires occupation, attrition, and political replacement—costly even in Gaza and impossible at scale in Lebanon, Syria, or Yemen. Israel is left oscillating between deterrence (effective only when adversaries retain something to lose) and regime replacement (undermined when Israeli actions weaken moderates more than extremists). In practice, the destruction of power without the creation of alternatives risks a vacuum that adversaries will inevitably exploit.

Lesson Three: Arab States Will Rein in Hamas

Before Oct. 7, Israel worked closely with Qatar to bring economic aid to Gaza, believing that support from Doha would be a carrot to moderate Hamas, complementing Israel’s stick. Egypt also used its control of the border to put economic pressure on Hamas, helping bring about cease-fires during past conflicts. Post-Oct. 7, however, Israelis largely blamed Doha for financing Hamas and Cairo for enabling its military infrastructure. More broadly, Israel, as the September airstrike on Hamas officials in Qatar indicates, has dismissed Gulf state diplomacy—ignoring efforts to broker cease-fires and sidelining Arab initiatives to strengthen the Palestinian Authority (PA) as an alternative to Hamas.

This approach underestimates the strategic value of Arab partnerships. While Arab states have limited leverage over Hamas, they remain central to any durable stabilization of Gaza and to Israel’s broader strategic goals in Iran, Lebanon, and other parts of the Middle East. Treating them as irrelevant narrows Israel’s diplomatic options at precisely the moment when outside support is essential.

Lesson Four: All Palestinians Are Guilty

Images of Palestinian civilians in Gaza and the West Bank celebrating Oct. 7, coupled with reports of sexual violence and atrocities during the attacks, scarred Israelis. Nearly two-thirds of Israelis now endorse the view that there are “no innocent people” in Gaza, and Israeli operations have reflected this. More than 66,000 Gazans—most civilians—have died since the war began, while aggressive operations in the West Bank have displaced tens of thousands more.

Collapsing the moral distinction between Hamas and the broader Palestinian population will exact a longer-term strategic toll on Israel itself. This strategy carries severe reputational costs. Much of the world was sympathetic to Israel after Oct. 7. Two years later, Israel faces mounting international criticism. Israelis often shrug off world opinion, confident of American backing, but recent polling suggests a sharp decline in U.S. support for Israel, with younger Americans particularly critical. Over time, eroding American backing will weaken Israel’s diplomatic cover and security partnership.

Lesson Five: You Can’t Let the Terrorists Win

Israel’s global campaign against Hamas leaders and its devastation of Gaza are framed as signals that terrorism will never be rewarded. But in conflating Hamas with the PA, which governs parts of the West Bank, Israel undermines its own counterterrorism gains. The PA has assisted Israeli counterterrorism efforts in the West Bank for years, and losing its support—or reducing it to an irrelevance—will leave a void that would be hard for Israel to fill.

Netanyahu’s categorical rejection of a Palestinian state and consistent delegitimization of the PA eliminate the only plausible Palestinian partner for stabilizing Gaza and sustaining counterterrorism cooperation in the West Bank. By foreclosing diplomatic off-ramps, Israel risks fostering Hamas’s eventual return.

Lesson Six: The Israeli People Are Resilient

The Oct. 7 attacks galvanized Israeli society. Reservists mobilized rapidly, citizens rallied to support victims and soldiers, and prewar political divisions briefly receded. Netanyahu has invoked this resilience to justify the vision of Israel as a “super-Sparta,” prepared for prolonged isolation and economic self-sufficiency.

Israeli resilience is impressive, but it has limits. Constant reserve call-ups strain families and businesses, fueling resentment—particularly given the ultra-Orthodox exemption (which is slowly being ended) from service. And there is no end in sight—the latest Gaza operation involved the call-up of 60,000 reserves. As the United States discovered after 9/11, unity forged in trauma decays over time. At some point, even a resilient society reaches diminishing returns from war.

The Perils of Overlearning

The tragedy of Oct. 7 demanded a forceful response. But Israel risks overlearning the wrong lessons. By assuming adversaries are irrational and irredeemable, by equating deterrence with destruction, by dismissing Arab intermediaries, by collapsing distinctions between Hamas and the PA, by treating the Palestinian population as collectively guilty, and by counting indefinitely on social resilience, Israel is undermining its long-term security.

Reversing course will be difficult. No one expected Americans to have moved on from Sept. 11 within two years, and no one should expect Israel to move on from an even more shocking attack in that time frame. But the lingering trauma doesn’t justify foolish policies, and the Israeli government needs to move out of crisis mode. Better leadership would fall back more on traditional deterrence against Iran and Hezbollah and recognize—as the Trump administration and the Gulf states have—that the new government in Syria might be a force for regional stability, or at least not a source of terrorism. In both Gaza and the West Bank, Israel should be building up the PA, not undermining it.

Such sensible steps, however, seem a pipe dream. Ending the wars is probably against Netanyahu’s political self-interest—even as he has appeared to accept Trump’s 20-point peace plan—and Israel needs new leadership if it is to turn the corner. Mahmoud Abbas, the 89-year-old PA leader, is also the wrong man for a tumultuous time, and new Palestinian leadership might also present opportunities for progress.

The enduring danger is not that Israel will fail to act decisively but that it will act too simplistically—substituting punishment for strategy, tactics for politics, and vengeance for vision. True security requires distinguishing enemies from populations, partners from spoilers, and immediate retribution from durable solutions. Otherwise, Oct. 7 will be remembered not only as a day of loss but also as the starting point of Israel’s strategic decline.