The Israelis are planning a massive new incursion into Gaza. They intend to herd the civilians into a small space in the southern part of the strip, take control of aid distribution, and annihilate everyone and everything else outside the protected area. It sounds a lot like the plan I proposed about a year ago, except that my suggestion regarding the generous treatment of civilians doesn’t appear to be one of its features.
What does this mean? It is certainly motivated in part by Bibi’s continuing desire to keep the extreme right happy and himself in power. It may well foreshadow an indefinite occupation and an effort to annex large chunks of Gaza. What it undoubtedly means is that Bibi has lost hope that Trump will attack Iran in the near future. There is no way he would put this much effort into Gaza with an Iran war on the horizon.