On Saturday morning the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) launched a massive military attack on Hamas personnel and infrastructure in its equivalent to America's "shock and awe" (PDF) campaign. After weeks of warnings for Hamas to stop its incessant rocket fire, which included a plea from Prime Minister Ehud Olmert himself on Arab satellite television, the Israeli cabinet approved the commencement of an attack. The results were staggering: in a matter of minutes, dozens of targets were nearly simultaneously struck. In the first day of fighting hundreds of Palestinians -- nearly all of them Hamas fighters -- were killed, including a number of senior Hamas leaders. Thanks to an Israeli misinformation campaign Hamas had not expected Israel to launch a daytime raid -- especially not on the Jewish Sabbath -- and thus the Islamist group was caught off guard.
In the two years since the 2006 Israel-Lebanon War, Hamas has been attempting to incorporate the successes of its ally Hezbollah. In the lull of the ceasefire over the past six months, and with Iranian and Syrian support, Hamas had amassed a large stockpile of rockets and mortars. The Izz ad din al-Qassam Brigade, Hamas' military arm, had been boosting its defensive capabilities and using the heavily populated Palestinian civilian territory to its advantage, calculating that one wrong move on the part of Israel would bring international pressure to bear on Israel to stop its counteroffensive before its objectives were met. Yet it appears Hamas has overstretched its hand and alienated much of the Arab world by aligning itself with Iran and Syria, as well as by seeking unrealistic demands for a renewed ceasefire. This has left the important Egyptian mediators frustrated with the group's "arrogance" and led to relatively little protest from Arab governments.
While many have spoken about the lessons Hamas has learned from Hezbollah over the years, it appears the Israeli political and military establishment has learned one or two of its own. When the 2006 war began, for instance, Olmert vowed to fight on until Israel's two kidnapped soldiers were released, the katyusha rockets being fired from Lebanon were stopped, and Hezbollah was pushed back from the Israeli-Lebanese border. These unrealistic goals were never achieved, and his comments made it all too easy for Hezbollah to claim victory when the fighting ceased.