JINSAPost Archives - JINSA

To Squeeze Iran, Washington Must Go After Halkbank

Jonah Brody — Thu, 15 Oct 2026 13:39:24 +0000

When U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent launched Operation Economic Outcast against Iran, he promised to target its “enablers” and “sever every economic lifeline that sustains this tyrannical regime until Tehran stands alone.” Washington has since sanctioned everything from foreign banks to Iranian airlines. Yet it has spared one of the most prominent institutions ever accused of helping Iran evade U.S. sanctions: Turkey’s state-owned Halkbank. This Iranian lifeline, too, must be severed.

In one of the biggest sanctions-evasion cases ever, U.S. prosecutors charged in 2019 that, between 2012 and 2016, Halkbank violated U.S. sanctions by transferring roughly $20 billion in Iranian oil proceeds into gold and cash while disguising the transactions as legitimate food trade. Washington spent years prosecuting Halkbank, only to settle the case through a deferred prosecution agreement in March and drop it in June without the bank paying a fine or admitting to any wrongdoing.

Halkbank’s reprieve, according to Justice Department filings, was tied to Turkey’s help in brokering the October 2025 ceasefire in Gaza. With this trade, Washington told Ankara that it can buy immunity from U.S. sanctions enforcement and signaled to Tehran that Turkish banks remain a safe channel for its money.

Turkey and Iran got the message. A financial architecture like the one that enabled Halkbank’s sanctions evasion once again operates from Turkey.

On September 4, the Treasury said Istanbul-based Golden Global Yatirim Bankasi was established to enable Iran’s rahbar network—the front companies Iran’s sanctioned banks use to move money abroad—to transfer oil revenues from China to Turkey, where exchangers could convert them into cash and gold and move them to Iran. That is the route Halkbank was accused of running a decade earlier.

And, soon, Halkbank itself could restart funneling money to Iran. Turkey’s 25-year gas contract with Iran expired in July, but the pipeline network in eastern Anatolia was built around Iranian supply and Iranian gas met nearly 13 percent of Turkish consumption. Neither government has said whether the contract’s automatic five-year extension was triggered. But if it was, Halkbank, which historically processed Turkey’s payments for Iranian energy, could again be handling Iranian revenue.

Despite this exposure of its financial institutions to Iranian sanctions evasion, Ankara has acted only when Washington applies pressure. On September 18, Turkish regulators revoked the operating license of Bank Mellat’s Istanbul branch, an Iranian state lender under U.S. sanctions that Turkey had allowed to operate for years. Two days earlier, regulators placed nearly all shareholder rights at Golden Global under state control, roughly two weeks after the U.S. designation. When the Treasury went after Iran’s aviation sector, Ankara halted Mahan Air flights and Turkey’s flag carrier Turkish Airlines suspended flights to Iran. Yet, none of these steps touched Halkbank or the exchange houses that convert Iranian revenue into gold, and Iranian trade still moves through Turkish intermediaries and informal networks.

Washington, too, so far, seems uninterested in Halkbank, or Turkey’s, possible role in aiding Iran, even after Economic Outcast began. After the Golden Global designation, U.S. Ambassador to Turkey Tom Barrack stressed that the action was no indictment of Ankara, saying “the health of the Turkish financial system is not in question.” That reassurance clashes with the Treasury’s warning that foreign institutions facilitating Iranian sanctions evasion risk losing access to the U.S. financial system. A warning that loses force if it stops at institutions with clout in Washington.

Washington should apply pressure most forcefully on Halkbank to close the channel Iran has used before for its energy revenue and show Ankara that political influence no longer buys exemption from U.S. law. After all, American pressure has worked in Ankara before. In 2018, sanctions on two Turkish ministers and higher steel and aluminum tariffs secured the release of detained American pastor Andrew Brunson that October.

First, the Treasury should require Halkbank, as a condition of its access to U.S. correspondent banks, to accept a U.S.-selected monitor with access to any accounts held for Iranian entities, a safeguard the deferred prosecution agreement left to a reviewer of Halkbank’s own choosing.

Second, the Treasury’s Financial Crimes Enforcement Network should publicly state that any Iranian payment routed through Halkbank outside a transparent, U.S.-monitored channel will trigger a Section 311 finding—which can bar U.S. banks from maintaining correspondent accounts for the targeted institution—as it has already proposed for Banque Misr’s United Arab Emirates branches. More broadly, Washington should hold the Turkish state responsible for the conduct of the banks it owns and the exchange houses it regulates.

Economic Outcast rests on the premise that no foreign institution can safely facilitate Iran’s access to international finance. That premise holds only if it applies to the largest state banks of an American ally, which just so happens to have been one of Iran’s largest economic lifelines. That lifeline must be severed.

Blaise Misztal is the Vice President for Policy at the Jewish Institute for National Security of America (JINSA).

Jonah Brody is a policy analyst at JINSA.

Read the original piece in RealClearWorld.

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JINSA President Dr. Michael Makovsky on the Houthi Quandary (Fox News)

Yoni Tobin — Mon, 12 Oct 2026 19:23:07 +0000

On October 12, JINSA President and CEO Michael Makovsky, PhD, spoke to Fox News about the latest Houthi attacks, including the group’s October 10 drone and missile strike on Riyadh’s international airport. That attack was the deadliest on Saudi soil since 2015 and killed a U.S. citizen. Dr. Makovsky noted that Iran is the Houthis’ main funder and arms supplier, a role which enables Houthi aggression. He observed that the Houthi slogan is “God is the greatest. Death to America. Death to Israel. A curse upon the Jews. Victory to Islam,” and commented, “It’s not exactly a Disney slogan.”

Noting that Saudi Arabia made a strategic mistake by alienating its key allies in recent months, Dr. Makovsky discussed the way forward, including the possibility of an international counter-Houthi coalition. He also argued that the Iranian and Yemeni fronts cannot be separated: “The more we can weaken the regime in Tehran … the more that’s going to weaken the Houthis.”

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Iran ‘Blew the Hell Out of Bahrain’ — And Trump’s Gulf Strategy With It

Jonah Brody — Mon, 12 Oct 2026 17:36:40 +0000

“They blew the hell out of Bahrain.” That was acting Navy Secretary Hung Cao’s assessment last month of the damage Iranian missiles have done to Naval Support Activity Bahrain — the base inside the Persian Gulf that served for decades as the headquarters of the U.S. Fifth Fleet. He wasn’t exaggerating. Two weeks earlier, the Navy’s top admiral, Daryl Caudle, told sailors evacuated from NSA-Bahrain that “We’re not getting back in there anytime soon.”

An important debate has begun about the future of NSA-Bahrain and other U.S. bases damaged by Iranian missiles. Should they be rebuilt, downsized, or abandoned due to their vulnerability? Before answering, however, U.S. officials must first confront a difficult new reality highlighted by the war: The decision about whether the Navy returns to the Gulf is no longer Washington’s alone to make. With its newfound ability to impede access to the Strait of Hormuz, Iran now has a vote and every incentive to use it.

Driving the U.S. military out of the Gulf has long been a core Iranian objective. Before Feb. 28, that objective ran up against the reality of America’s unchallenged naval dominance. But the Fifth Fleet’s wartime withdrawal outside the Gulf, NSA-Bahrain’s devastation, and Iran’s unprecedented success contesting Hormuz have thrown America’s maritime primacy into doubt. Iran is now determined to transform the Fifth Fleet’s presence from a fixed feature of the region’s geography into a negotiated outcome.

Iran previewed its playbook in last June’s memorandum of understanding that was supposed to end the war. That deal committed Iran to restoring safe passage in Hormuz, but only for “commercial vessels.” Not a word about restoring free movement for U.S. warships in the Gulf. It was a stunning omission, especially given the Navy’s historical role as guarantor of the free flow of oil through Hormuz.

Though the MOU quickly collapsed, Iran had nevertheless established a deeply problematic precedent: that commercial shipping and U.S. naval access are separable questions. It will almost certainly demand maintaining that separation in any future arrangement to end the war. And it will bank on influential forces eager to restore commerce through Hormuz — energy markets, U.S. allies, and Americans demanding lower gas prices — to pressure the Trump administration to also accept the tankers vs warships distinction.

How would the United States respond to an Iranian offer to reopen Hormuz so long as the U.S. Navy remains out? Acceptance would be seen as a devastating defeat that forced the world’s most formidable maritime power to retreat from waters it dominated for decades.

But insisting on the reestablishment of the prewar status quo, with American destroyers plying the Gulf within eyeshot of Iran, carries its own substantial risks. It’s one thing if it can be secured through the administration’s current effort to strangle Iran economically via a naval blockade and sanctions. It’s quite another if it can only be won by the Navy fighting its way back into the Gulf and imposing its will on an Iranian leadership that not only appears determined to resist but remains capable of doing so.

The Navy effectively left the Gulf at the war’s start and hasn’t been back since, precisely because the risks of getting within range of Iranian missiles have been deemed prohibitively high. The job the U.S. military has recently done to loosen Iran’s chokehold on Hormuz and get more oil out has been extraordinary, but far from a classic naval “escort” mission.

Instead, the operational burden has fallen to aerial and unmanned assets — fighter jets, autonomous vehicles, helicopters, anti-missile systems — to establish a protective dome over commercial ships as they surreptitiously sail through Hormuz at night, absent a naval convoy. The heart of the Navy, its capital ships, has been left enforcing the blockade from hundreds of miles outside Hormuz, maintaining a cautious distance from threatening Iranian fire.

Between abandonment and the status quo ante, there may be a third option that reconceives what a naval headquarters entails and is better suited to 21st-century warfare. Rather than large ships manned by thousands of sailors, maybe it means a new and newly hardened command and control center at NSA-Bahrain that oversees offensive, defensive, and intelligence operations conducted by thousands of cheap drones operating above, on, and beneath the Gulf’s waters.

Hormuz’s future has become a key benchmark by which the U.S. war against Iran will be judged. But it’s imperative that U.S. officials understand the full magnitude of what’s at stake. The issue is not simply whether one of the global economy’s most vital chokepoints will be open to free commerce. It will also be whether the most powerful navy on Earth can again operate effectively in waters where it ruled supreme for decades. The answer, whatever it is, will echo far beyond the Gulf.

John Hannah worked in the George H.W. Bush, Bill Clinton, and George W. Bush administrations, including as national security advisor to former vice president Dick Cheney. He is a senior fellow at the Jewish Institute for National Security of America (JINSA).

Rena Gabber is a research associate at JINSA.

Read the original piece in Washington Examiner.

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Israel’s Dangerous Dependence: The U.S., Iran, and a New MOU

Yoni Tobin — Mon, 12 Oct 2026 15:15:49 +0000

Four times since 2024, Iran has launched massive missile barrages against Israel. Four times, the U.S. military surged capabilities to defend Israel. And four times, the U.S.-Israeli effort performed superbly, keeping casualties and damage low. That’s the good news.

The bad news is that this pattern of America riding to Israel’s rescue is not sustainable. Israel would be delusional to assume it is. Instead, what’s needed is an urgent effort to make Israel’s defenses as self-reliant as possible.

The trajectory of growing dependence is clear. In April 2024, Iran launched its first-ever direct attack on Israel, firing around 120 ballistic missiles. U.S. ships deployed near Israel used advanced SM-3 interceptors to knock down six while Israeli defenses handled the rest. Fewer than 10 missiles penetrated. No Israelis died.

In October 2024, Iran attacked again, launching 200 missiles. Once more, U.S. SM-3s destroyed six, with Israel targeting the remainder. While neutralizing a high percentage, with no Israelis killed, the number of missiles that penetrated was at least four times higher than in April.

Reports indicated that Israel’s stockpile of long-range Arrow interceptors had been heavily stressed, requiring rationing that prioritized populated areas over military bases.

Recognizing its growing vulnerability, Israel requested Washington supplement its naval assets with an emergency deployment of the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) system.

Despite having only eight in America’s arsenal, president Joe Biden quickly approved the request. Then, prior to last year’s 12 Day War against Iran, President Donald Trump dispatched a second THAAD – leaving a quarter of America’s entire inventory defending Israel.

All of it was needed. During the 12 Day War, the U.S. fired up to 150 THAAD interceptors – 25% of its total stockpile – as well as 80 SM-3s.

The numbers were even worse during this year’s Iran war, with over 200 THAADs and 100 SM-3s expended protecting Israel. In both wars, the United States fired significantly more high-end interceptors over Israel than Israel fired itself. Reports again indicated Israel’s Arrow stockpile was in extremis.

The trend line should alarm defense planners. The issue isn’t whether the US-Israeli effort was successful. During the two wars, interception rates against 1200 Iranian missiles approached 90%. Fewer than 60 Israelis died.

The real question is whether the model can be sustained and whether Israel can count on Washington being there the next time, or the time after that. The honest answer is probably not, for two reasons.

The first is capacity. The U.S. is a global power. Every THAAD or SM-3 fired over Israel is one less available to defend U.S. forces in a conflagration with China that would make Iran look like a minor skirmish. Reports suggest that about 80% of America’s THAAD missiles are gone.

Even with a crash program to boost production, getting back to prewar levels could take three years or longer. Math, physics, and geopolitics are conspiring to make it impossible to sustain recent levels of U.S. support for Israel’s defense.

The second reason is political. U.S. public support for Israel is in free fall. While a bipartisan phenomenon, it’s gone mainstream among Democrats. Large numbers of the party’s elected officials now regularly vote against military support for Israel.

Can Israel perform brilliantly alone?

It’s easy to imagine that opposition extending to future deployments of scarce U.S. military assets – especially when portrayed as draining America’s own readiness. No one should assume that a future president from either party will do what Biden or Trump did repeatedly since 2024.

That’s why it’s critical that good use be made of the last two years of Trump’s presidency to increase Israel’s self-sufficiency. An existing Memorandum of Understanding on defense cooperation runs through 2028 and commits Washington to provide Israel $3.8 billion in annual military assistance, including $500 million for missile defense.

If possible, a huge chunk of that money should be reprogrammed to increase the anti-missile component by three or four times – with Israel matching every dollar.

The same principle should apply to the post-2028 MOU currently being negotiated. Wisely, Israel has said this will be the last MOU seeking U.S. financial support. However many years it covers, and whatever aid amount it includes, the balance should shift decisively to shoring up Israel’s ability to defend itself, by itself.

Getting congressional approval for more assistance will be difficult under any circumstances. But a clear prioritization of defensive over offensive weapons should help – especially if framed as reducing risk to America’s own readiness, conditioned on Israeli matching funds, and the aid zeros out at a certain date.

Israel’s defenses have performed brilliantly. The question is whether they can be made to perform brilliantly alone. The time to answer is now, when the will still exists in the White House to make progress before it’s too late.

Rena Gabber is a research associate at JINSA.

Read the original piece in The Jerusalem Post.

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Aiming at Israel, Europe Is Hitting Its Own Defenses in a Circular Firing Squad

Yoni Tobin — Thu, 08 Oct 2026 21:51:19 +0000

Europe’s governments have stepped into a ring and leveled their weapons inward, treating Israel as the sole target in the center. The trouble is that the circle is not empty ground — it is a shared defense line.

Several European countries face concrete threats from Russia and Iran, yet Denmark, France, and Norway have lately moved to impede the military readiness of the country supplying them advanced defense technology.

Norwegian officials worry that Russian gray-zone activity near Svalbard could trigger a NATO-Russia confrontation. In late September, Danish intelligence flagged the growing risk of limited Russian military action against NATO states, citing Russia’s aggressive naval behavior in the Baltic Sea. Iran and its proxies have recently plotted attacks on Danish, French, and Norwegian targets. During the recent Iran war, Tehran also demonstrated that its long-range missiles could reach much of Western Europe.

Instead of reinforcing their defenses, the three governments have restricted Israeli port access and withheld components from the German shipyards that build Israel’s warships. Norway and Denmark barred Israel’s INS Drakon submarine, even while it sailed under a German flag, from conducting trials in their territorial waters, forcing a detour of thousands of miles and causing months of delay. France has joined them in refusing certain defense components for the German yards constructing Israeli submarines and Saar corvettes. Germany has built all four of Israel’s Saar-6 corvettes and all six of its active submarines.

Political incentives help explain these choices. Israel is a fault line in the French presidential cycle, and around 10 percent of the French population are Muslims. France’s government formally recognized a nonexistent Palestine last year. Denmark’s fragile governing coalition has taken heat for defense ties with Jerusalem, and approximately 5 percent of Denmark’s population is Muslim. The measures may be symbolic, but their effect is not.

The circular-firing-squad problem is straightforward. The same governments still buy, or plan to buy, combat-proven Israeli systems to protect their own forces. Norway, which also recognizes a Palestinian state, this year began receiving Leopard 2A8 tanks fitted with Israeli firm Rafael’s Trophy active protection system — the only such system with a sustained combat record against anti-tank missiles. Without it, Norwegian armor would be more exposed to the Russian threat Oslo itself describes as growing. Norway is also acquiring British Type 26 frigates whose electronic warfare suites draw on Israeli technology.

Denmark purchased Israeli rocket artillery and has shown interest in Israel’s Barak-MX air defenses and in frigates carrying Israeli systems, precisely to counter Russian naval and aerial pressure. The shared stock is broader still: interceptor and sensor families, and parts pools that feed multiple NATO inventories.

In a circular firing squad, the danger is not only that you miss the person you meant to punish. It is that a slight misfire — in this case, a restriction that travels through the common pipeline of components and technology — could hit your ally. Europe depends on the same line it is starting to cut. Should Israel answer with reciprocal limits, the buyers would lose access to systems they have already judged necessary. Even without reciprocity, delays to Israel’s submarine and surface fleet weaken a navy that helps secure the Mediterranean sea lanes necessary for European energy imports.

For the United States, the friction is worse than ordinary disagreement between allies. NATO partners are actively complicating the readiness of Israel, a country with Major Non-NATO Ally status and which the current administration has called a model ally. A visible circular firing squad inside the broader US alliance structure undercuts domestic support for those partnerships and signals to Russia and Iran that Western defense cooperation can be fractured from within.

Washington should warn against further steps that degrade Israeli readiness and should be prepared to attach costs if the warnings are ignored. As Denmark’s foreign minister has framed his own government’s measures targeting Israel, the correction would be for Europe’s own good.

RADM Paul Becker, USN (ret.), is former Director of Intelligence (J2) for the Joint Chiefs of Staff, a Jewish Institute for National Security of America’s (JINSA) Generals and Admirals Program participant, and a member of JINSA’s Board of Advisors.

Yoni Tobin is a senior policy analyst at JINSA.

Read the original piece in Algemeiner.

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Unmanned Warfare Has Now Expanded to the High Seas. Is the U.S. Ready?

Yoni Tobin — Thu, 08 Oct 2026 07:35:01 +0000

Drone warfare is expanding from the skies to the seas, and the United States must be ready. The Russia-Ukraine war, which has become synonymous with aerial drone warfare, has now featured the first naval battle in history between unmanned boats, according to the Ukrainian Navy. On September 14, a Ukrainian Sargan 300 drone boat fired at and sank a Russian unmanned surface vessel (USV) in the Black Sea — a significant milestone in warfare’s rapid evolution.

Unmanned naval platforms are also starting to see combat beyond the battlefield laboratory of eastern Europe. During the Iran war, in July, three American one-way attack USVs struck an Iranian submarine and naval facility — the first-ever U.S. use of USVs to strike enemy targets. Just weeks prior, a USV rescued two U.S. Army pilots from nearby waters after an Iranian drone struck their helicopter.

Nor are recent U.S. unmanned successes confined to the Middle East. They have occurred right in America’s backyard. Reporting from Aug. 5 indicated that an American USV recently detected, tracked, and helped intercept a U.S.-bound narcotics shipment worth $81 million in the Caribbean Sea.

Now, accelerated U.S. efforts, not complacency, are needed to build on this recent tactical success. Greater strategic imagination is the first step. The Pentagon needs to think bigger about unmanned military platforms — but also smaller. Thinking smaller means complementing high-end platforms with inexpensive, expendable ones. Thinking bigger means integrating them into a single network with manned assets and human warfighters. Today, the U.S. military does neither at scale.

The American military’s recent success with autonomous platforms — as well as the unmanned advances of partners like Israel, Ukraine and Taiwan — offers three main lessons for generating the Pentagon’s next unmanned leap forward.

First, expendability has its own currency. Ukraine has achieved outsized battlefield effects with lower-end, expendable unmanned platforms — as have Iran and Russia. This is true for sea-based autonomous systems too. However, one-way attack USVs, like those American forces used against Iran, remain in short supply.

That shortfall stems from bureaucratic, not technological, reasons. The Pentagon applies the same rigid standards to unmanned, expendable platforms as to high-end, manned surface combatants. Yet overly rigorous testing and evaluation inhibits production at the pace which the battlefield demands.

Second, as the recent USV rescue of U.S. aviators from the Arabian Gulf demonstrates, unmanned platforms offer more than strike or surveillance functions. In fact, those lower-tech functions may have greater upside involving less rigorous testing and faster deployment timetables.

Take, for example, the since-axed UCLASS program to build carrier-based surveillance-and-strike drones. Due to a lengthy requirements list, the project became unsustainable. That is subtraction by addition. Now, the Navy is developing the MQ-25 Stingray, an unmanned aerial refueler — a simpler platform meeting a more fundamental need.

Unmanned platforms offer additional types of unconventional utility, like logistics resupply and forward basing. An Israeli firm is exploring turning commercial ships into camouflaged floating drone bases. Another has developed heavy-lift drones to move materiel to the battlefield. These concepts are relevant to a primary challenge America would face in a future Pacific war: contested logistics across a broad geographic area far from the homeland and near the enemy’s turf. Fortunately, unmanned systems could ease those logistical headaches by offering greater concealment, dispersal, and flexibility while preserving manpower.

Another potential evolution is now on the horizon: unmanned amphibious landings. A Ukrainian startup has a prototype for an autonomous amphibious vehicle, resembling a small truck. It can carry drones, travel underwater with a low radar profile, and drive onto enemy shores. The United States, by acquiring that capability, could facilitate a naval version of Operation Spiderweb, where Ukrainian drones hidden inside cargo trucks infiltrated Russia and neutralized strategic Russian bombers across the country.

Third, the Pentagon’s unmanned advances must be complementary, but currently are not. This is the “think bigger” half of the equation, and what makes the first two lessons pay off. Expendable autonomous mass, low-cost single-purpose platforms, and distributed unmanned hubs reach their potential only by working as a team. Recognizing this, Taiwan is seeking over 200,000 one-way attack drones and over 1,200 USVs, but also the systems architecture to link them together.

To prevail in a hypothetical Pacific war, American forces must have persistent adversary surveillance. Currently, that interconnectivity is lacking, impeding readiness. Surveillance drones cannot directly communicate with nearby submarines or USVs, nor fuse data into a common operating picture.

Linking autonomous platforms, manned assets, and human warfighters in a shared data mesh and command-and-control system would close those gaps. The U.S. military’s Combined Joint All-Domain Command and Control (CJADC2) aims to forge that very integration. Yet CJADC2 remains limited to “fragmented deployments,” according to the Pentagon. Fixing that is a critical next step.

Innovating in the unmanned domain will require the Pentagon to be more imaginative in how it acquires, tests, and links its manned and unmanned platforms. That requires thinking smaller, by acquiring more expendable unmanned systems, and thinking bigger, about operationalizing a joint-domain network. It also should involve Washington acquiring Israeli, Taiwanese, and Ukrainian unmanned technology, and expanding co-production with those U.S. partners at the cutting edge of warfare.

Successful adaptation also requires re-examining of how the Pentagon allocates resources. Currently, the Pentagon’s unmanned capabilities are constrained by cost overruns on large, manned surface combatants that are not well calibrated to today’s threat landscape. Studies indicate that guided-missile destroyers would be highly vulnerable in a Pacific war, and that reliably fixing and returning them to battle would be nearly impossible. Spending on these platforms, while important, represents a disproportionately large portion of the Navy’s budget — crowding out unmanned innovation and acquisition.

The Pentagon’s recent unmanned successes show it is not completely outpaced by warfare’s rapid evolution. Yet this race is a marathon, not a sprint.

Vice Admiral Michael Connor, USN (ret.) is former Commander of the U.S. Submarine Forces and a Jewish Institute for National Security of America (JINSA) Generals and Admirals Program participant. Vice Admiral Connor also previously served as director of the Pentagon’s Naval Warfare Integration Group.

Yoni Tobin is a senior policy analyst at JINSA.

Read the original piece in DefenseScoop.

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Transcript: Webinar – Three Years Since October 7: Reflections and the Threats Ahead

jinsa-shavdala — Wed, 07 Oct 2026 21:00:43 +0000

Click here to watch the webinar.

PANELISTS

IDF MG (ret.) Yaakov Amidror

JINSA Distinguished Fellow; Former Director of the Israeli National Security Council

IDF MG (ret.) Amikam Norkin

JINSA Distinguished Fellow; Former Commander of the Israeli Air Force

MAJ John Spencer, USA (ret.)

Executive Director of the Urban Warfare Institute

John Hannah

JINSA Randi & Charles Wax Senior Fellow

The discussion was moderated by JINSA President & CEO Michael Makovsky, PhD.

—

TRANSCRIPT

Transcript has been lightly edited for flow and clarity.

Michael Makovsky, PhD

Thank you very much for joining us today. I’m Michael Makovsky. I’m the President and CEO of JINSA, and we’re here to talk about the third anniversary of October 7. I don’t think I need to tell the audience about October 7, and there’s been so much that has happened since then. Let me first just introduce everybody. We have General Yaakov Amidror, a Distinguished Fellow with JINSA and former National Security Advisor to Prime Minister Netanyahu. We have General Amikam Norkin, a previous commander of the Israeli Air Force, and another Distinguished Fellow with JINSA. We also have retired Major John Spencer, who’s the head of Urban Warfare Studies at West Point, and we have John Hannah, who’s the [Randi & Charles] Wax Distinguished Senior Fellow here at JINSA. So, I’m actually going to go reverse rank here. I’m going to start with the retired major, John Spencer, because John is one of the signatories of a letter that JINSA put out today that has been signed by [originally] 76 [and] a 77th this morning. [They are] retired former senior U.S. military commanders and also some military lawyers, JAGS, who signed a letter rejecting the accusation that Israel is committing genocide. I hope all of you have already seen that letter. It’s already gotten a great deal of play on social media. [At] JINSA we care a lot about what, and I think most Americans do as well, senior retired four-star, three-star, two-star, one-star U.S. generals and majors thinks about what is genocide and what is not. It offers both legal refutations as well, and just frankly, [a] common sense rejection. So, John, I’m going to turn to you because you signed that letter, and I’d like you to address it. You’ve been in the trenches, so to speak, on this issue for a long time in a very prominent way. First of all, thank you very much for signing that letter, and thank you very much for all your work on this issue. I’d like you to first talk about this anniversary on that issue and how you see things. We’re going to talk about what’s happened in Israel and the region-but [also] what’s happened outside has been very important. So, thank you very much.

MAJ John Spencer

Thank you, Michael, and thank you for allowing me to be on such a distinguished panel. I signed the letter based on a lot of my work as the Executive Director of the Urban Warfare Institute, my seven trips into Gaza observing IDF operations, [and] also over a decade of study of like scenarios, based on analyzing the veracity of the claim. What the genocide lie has spread around the world is founded on supposed statements and what’s called effects-based numbers. I’ve been into Gaza enough to clearly state that Israel has done more to prevent civilian harm. It’s almost an anti-genocide. And why I signed it is [because of] how the letter ends, because I think it’s very dangerous [to call it a genocide]. Basically, if Israel’s operation in Gaza is a genocide, then every war that’s ever happened is a genocide. When a military like the IDF can take such extraordinary precautions and civilian harm mitigation measures, and then a lie is made that they’re intentionally trying to harm civilians or even target civilians, which is the opposite of the truth, I think it’s really dangerous for U.S. forces, for the United States, [and] for any Western military. That, despite the mountains of evidence that I’ve seen [with] my own eyes, but really that anybody can see, I mean, the data is in the letter as well [as] the historic aid and services that Israel has provided to supposedly the population they’re trying to genocide. As you said, I mean there’s an element of common sense, but the letter actually analyzes the accusation: what is the definition, what is required, but there’s a whole lot of common sense that needs to be approached, and I’m very proud to sign it.

Michael Makovsky, PhD

Thank you very much, and I encourage anyone who hasn’t seen it yet to go to JINSA.org to see it. We also sent out an email blast this morning, and it’s been [seen] a lot on social media. Even I appreciated RFK Junior’s response to your tweet there, John, but Mayor Mamdani thought it was important to put out a statement that he tweeted out today. He didn’t mention Jews, but he did cite what happened on October 7^th. 1,200 people were killed, and 251 were taken hostage. Then he went on to call this a genocide. What Israel is doing in Gaza. I mean, it’s really something that you actually have to, and many others have to respond to this.

MAJ John Spencer

Yeah, it’s pretty disgusting. And I responded to his post that’s been seen by millions. [First,] to call it an ongoing genocide. He’s putting not only American Jewish communities in danger [but putting] American soldiers in danger by propagating this lie about military operations, which he clearly has no clue about.

Michael Makovsky, PhD

Let me just stick to the American side, and then we’ll go to the Israelis because what’s happened in the region has also been very dramatic. But let me go to John Hannah. John, if you look back three years ago, and I remember the first Zoom webinar we did, I think on October 9th, that included you and General Norkin, General Amidror, and also General Ayish—could you have imagined that there’d [be] this kind of response where you’ve had not only the surge of anti-Semitism, but things [also] like the genocide accusation? Would you have predicted that or did you remember thinking that you knew this would be the response here in the West? I’m not talking about the official response, not what President Biden did, but I’m talking about [how] many people in the West [responded to the attacks]?

John Hannah

I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t shocked by how far this has gone. How it started after October 7, and the way it’s really taken off, particularly on college campuses. But obviously, as you say, the explosion of anti-Semitism and what’s happening to Israel’s standing in the United States, more broadly, particularly in the Democratic Party, the support for Israel looks like it’s almost collapsing, and in the Republican Party we also see signs of worry. I knew on October 7th it was going to be brutal; that the Israeli response to this was going to be extremely tough and aggressive, that the coming war would be brutal because Hamas would ensure, and in fact wanted and welcomed, a brutal war in which its own people and population would be the primary victims, and they would be able to exploit and make use of that amongst the useful idiots of the West, and they’ve done that extremely well. That’s one thing Sinwar was able to succeed in: he destroyed his own people and he destroyed Gaza. But [in doing so] he certainly changed the dynamics in a significant way internationally regarding attitudes toward Israel and toward Jews and the issue of anti-Semitism. But of greatest concern to me is what it’s done here in the United States to support Israel in what was obviously such a just war. You know the fact that I don’t think any of us anticipated on October 7th, that we’d be sitting here three years from now, with the situation better strategically and operationally, both in Gaza and on Israel’s other fronts, [including] with regard to Iran, but still in so many ways unresolved on many of these fronts, in any kind of strategically conclusive way. I think that the length of this and the sense that it’s gone on and on for an American population that was already tired of the Middle East and our own involvement there to have to continue to think about it, look [at] it, and devote resources, military and people, to the wars of the Middle East. I think it is taking its toll.

Michael Makovsky, PhD

I’ll just add [that] we have a mayor of New York who puts out this [letter calling IDF operations in Gaza a genocide], [in] the city with the biggest Jewish population outside of Israel. We have a Senate Democratic candidate in Michigan [named Abdul] El Sayed [who] says Israel is committing genocide, which I consider blood libel, and yet you have all these prominent Democrats endorsing Sayed, as they did [Zohran] Mamdani. I mean, you have the Jewish senator of Michigan, [Elissa] Slotkin, [who] just appeared with El Sayed and thought the optics would look good to have a Jewish senator and a Muslim senator in Michigan. He makes Jews, certainly in Michigan, feel very nervous. And then of course you have President Obama [who’s] going there tomorrow to work to campaign with him as Kamala Harris did a few weeks ago. Then you have on the right these populists, certainly these populist podcasters, like Tucker Carlson and others, who also are perpetuating various lies about Israel and blaming all the world’s ills on the Jews. I personally didn’t expect that to be the case three years after October 7th. Let me turn to the Israeli side and [I’ll] start with General Amidror. General, I remember in our first webinar on October 9th, three years ago, I believe you said that on this awful day, the worst day I think in Israeli history, certainly in Jewish history since the Holocaust, that Israel had to restore its sense of security and deterrence in the region, and obviously a great deal has changed since then. And Israel has looked at it as kind of adopting a new doctrine. It seems like [it’s] for its own security. I’d like you to kind of address that. You know how things have changed, particularly how Israel is looking in these wars of what we call the wars of October 7th. They’re not over yet, right? Even though I think the world would like them to be over, and a lot of Americans, but it’s not over yet, is it?

IDF MG (ret.) Yaakov Amidror

I think that this is a war that we are still in, and this is why we cannot conclude it. We have to remember that we are in the process when you are under the wave. It’s almost impossible to give a good assessment of the situation. What we can say for sure is that we succeeded in this long war, [in destroying] the main part of the Iranian strategy, and if you look at it from this point of view, the Iranians had a plan on how to destroy Israel. The plan does [now] not exist. Here, there is an element that we have to take care of in the future—what remains [of] the nuclear project. Here, we have to take care [of] what remains from the missile project. We have to finish the job in Lebanon and in Gaza, but the strategy as a whole, the whole idea that the proxies [waged] the war to [make] Israel crumble when Iran is far away. The Iranians will [slowly] build the nuclear umbrella under which they can control the Middle East and push [anywhere] when they decide [it] is in their interest. [There was the] belief that at the end of the day Israel will not have the ability to compete with the number of missiles that the Iranians have, and under the nuclear umbrella the Iranians will [lead] to the destruction of Israel. [However Israel is working against this plan, Iran’s] missile stability is almost gone, and the destruction of the land bridge between Tehran and the Mediterranean, because Syria was moved out of the axis thanks to Israeli efforts to not let the Iranians build independence capabilities in Syria since 2012, gave us the fruits during the war when the regime collapsed under the pressure of the rebels coming from Turkey. So, I think that one thing is very clear: this strategy that the Iranians built since the 80s and involved many elements around Israel and far from Israel – the Houthis, the militias in Iraq, and so on – they invested probably between half a trillion [and] a trillion dollars. We [haven’t] finished the job yet, but the strategy as a whole [no longer] exists. I think that from a strategic point of view, it’s a huge achievement. If we had one huge mistake before the war, maybe the biggest one is that we didn’t understand the level of threat the Iranians [built] under this strategy. The vision of the Iranians [was] to have enough capabilities around Israel – the proxies [of] Iran, the missiles, and the nuclear project – [so] that Israel will be destroyed when the Iranians decide that the time is ready. That collapsed, and they will have to find another strategy if they want to continue the Iranian project of controlling the Middle East. So, if you look at it only from this point of view, it’s a very long war, three years. The number of casualties is very high. Inside Israel, we are facing now elections in which we are still fighting with each other about responsibility and who should be blamed and so on and so forth, but we should not ignore the huge achievement of destroying the Iranian vision and strategy to destroy Israel, in which they were very efficient, and they had been very close to have this capability. And Sinwar made a huge mistake by [doing] what he did, and the Iranians are paying the price in a way. I think this is the most important conclusion from the war. And yes, we can speak [about] what should be done against Hamas in Gaza, and what should be done against Hezbollah in Lebanon, and how to deal with the terrorists in Samaria and the West Bank, and so, relating to that, I want to make two remarks that I think are very important. One, Iraq became maybe the most important country in the Middle East if you want to isolate Iran. It is the only Arab country with which Iran has good relations. It is very close to Iran. It is, in a way, the only gate that Iranians still have towards the other side of the globe. And after the retreat of the American forces from Iraq, Iraq should be under pressure from the Americans, because if they don’t disarm and/or dismantle the militias in Iraq, you will see Iran going slowly, slowly into Iraq, and the combination of Iran and Iraq under the control of Iran is a different Middle East. [There is also] the question that all the audience used to ask about Israel’s capability to deal with Iran without the United States of America. I think that after the fantastic cooperation that we had with the Americans, I was surprised by the level of trust that both sides had in each other. The answer to the question is clear. Yes, we need the technology coming from the United States of America. Yes, we need the support of America in the international community. Yes, we are. It is much easier to fight [alongside] America in some areas. It’s even crucial for us, but at the same time everyone will have to admit that Israel succeeded to deal with Iran, at least in the first round, without America. The Americans joined the war [on] day 12, I think, just to hit Fordow. We had a plan for Fordow. Nobody knows it. I know it. It was not as good as the American one. We don’t have B-2s. We don’t have nice B-2s, but we had capabilities, and we have capabilities that we didn’t use, because the Americans took part of the job, and they finished for [us]. So, I think these three remarks are very important. It is about the Iranian strategy. Now you have to focus on Iraq, which became, after the collapse of the Iranian strategy, more important for the Iranians, and the ability of Israel to fight over Iran and to do what we did in Iran without Americans, and for sure with the Americans is very significant for the future of the Middle East. And yes, in spite [od] all the success, there are some missions that we didn’t fulfill yet, and how it will be fulfilled in the future is a big question. Part of it related to American diplomacy: what about the 20 points of the president in Gaza, the efforts of the Americans that the government of Lebanon will do its job and dismantle Hezbollah, and so on and so forth? So, we understand that our mission that we will have to fulfill in the future. But after three years, [this] very hard and complicated three years in which we suffered many casualties and all of them should be remembered, Israel can look back and say yes, it was a great success of our military forces. But the job is not done yet.

I wonder about the genocide. It is the only genocide in the world in which the number of those who are the victim of the genocide, the number of people in the area, is growing. Today there are more Palestinians in the Gaza Strip than were [there] before the beginning of the war. So, it’s a very peculiar genocide in which the number of your victims is growing and not going down.

Michael Makovsky, PhD

Yeah, well, Israel isn’t very good at [committing genocide]. Let me just ask one more thing to you, General Amidror. Elliot Abrams wrote something this morning that I just want to mention now. You know, Israel’s doctrine seems to have changed before. It might have been focused on what it thought were intentions, and on what it perceived as deterrence, and now since October 7th, it is focused on capabilities and preemption. [Do] you look at that the same way?

IDF MG (ret.) Yaakov Amidror

I very much agree about preemption. I think that was one of the mistakes: that we ignored the preemption as an alternative. It was not within our tools, and what was a big mistake, you know, and I know that I tried to preach and to convince that we should make a preemptive operation in Lebanon before the war. I thought that we should not deal with Hamas in Gaza at the end of the war. We will have to ask ourselves the question that we are asking today. Okay, what’s next? And I didn’t have an answer, and I said to you and others, and I preached it publicly, and I even wrote about it in one of the publications of the IDF that we should focus on the preemptive operation in Lebanon. So, I think that should be part of our tools in the future, no question. About the tension between intentions and capabilities, and so on and so forth. At the end of the day, you cannot economically [support] any system that we built only on capabilities. Look at the capabilities of countries in the Middle East. All of them. You have to be prepared to evolve tomorrow morning. It will not work. You have to make a combination between capabilities and intentions, and the key point for that is how you build yourself on the defensive lines. On the defensive lines, we have to be built in more flexibility [with] more capabilities. Not like Gaza, in which the whole forces were very, very, very weak according to every standard around the world. We didn’t have in Gaza even one gun, one gun on the defensive line. If you go to such [an] extreme situation, of course you are endangering your ability to defend yourself. And the conclusion is not that you have to be built for capabilities. The conclusion [is] that you have to be built according to the doctrine of defense, which we didn’t. So, I think it will be a huge mistake to build our forces and all our operations and our defensive structure and positions based only on capabilities. That will be [a] waste of money, and at the end of the day, you have to take the budget issue into your account. There is no unlimited money for defense and security, and you have to take into account both intentions and capabilities. But more important, to be built according to the doctrine, a new defense structure, something that we didn’t make before the war. I can tell you, I met one of the commanders of the Northern Command [a] few months before the war, and he asked to ask my advice about the new position that he is going to be in, and I analyzed for him the structure of his defense forces, and I told him it will not work. It will not work. It doesn’t matter how strong [you are] and how smart you are. If this is the structure of your defense forces, it will not work. I visited him [a] few months ago, and he mentioned this meeting to me and said we were lucky that our system in the north was not tested by [a] surprise attack [on] Israel because we were not prepared for such an attack, and it is not because of the tension between capabilities and intentions. It is because we didn’t fulfill and we didn’t act based on what was written in our books, let alone the international knowledge about it; our books, and this is the bridge between intentions and the capabilities [it] is the doctrine. There is no way to prevent surprises. You will be surprised, no question, but it will prevent you from [collapsing].

Michael Makovsky, PhD

By the way, I’ll just add to an earlier point you made, General Amidror. One of my favorite subjects [is] Winston Churchill, and I was thinking—in the U.S. [and] in the West, we often think of clear ends to things. There was a VE Day. There was a Victory in Europe Day. There was VJ Day. On VE day, you had Churchill and others out on the balcony. Of course, Churchill himself was actually already depressed because he was worried about the Soviet threat. But there was a clear end to that war. Here, this war may be more like the Cold War that is going to go on for a long time.

IDF MG (ret.) Yaakov Amidror

No, I think that this is one of our mistakes. We thought about this war in terms of the Second World War, and for that you have to reach Berlin or use two nuclear bombs. We cannot reach the Berlin of the Middle East, and we don’t have the nuclear bomb. So, it is out of our reach to think that we can do something which was done in the Second World War-a totally different way of how to define what we want to achieve. And in one of the papers that I wrote about Lebanon, I was very specific about it because I understood that if someone is taking the example of the Second World War, it is beyond our capacity. We cannot reach the Berlin of the Middle East. It is impossible from our point of view. Remember the number of Israelis. It is less than the number of people entering Manhattan in the morning and going out of Manhattan in the evening. So, we have to understand our limitations. We cannot reach the Berlin of the Middle East, and we have to be very humble and very precise [about] what should be achieved, what can be achieved. Otherwise, we will be surprised by the reality.

Michael Makovsky, PhD

General Norkin, thank you for being so patient. I remember sitting with you in Israel a few weeks after October 7th, and you were telling me, if you don’t mind mentioning, aside from all the tragedy, how stunned you were about the breakdown in the IDF on October 7th. You retired, [in] April of ‘22, and you know, by all accounts, as everyone knows, we did a tremendous job in building up the Air Force even further. How do you see that day and where we are today, and what you’ve seen also with the Air Force? You don’t have to just talk about the Air Force, but certainly the way the Air Force, the performance they’ve done in Lebanon, in Syria, and especially Iran, has been rather spectacular. After, it seemed like such a breakdown on October 7th with the whole IDF.

IDF MG (ret.) Amikam Norkin

Yeah, well, there is a prize to be patient. I will start with some thoughts, and then I will answer your question, Mike.

Michael Makovsky, PhD

Please, thank you, thank you.

IDF MG (ret.) Amikam Norkin

First of all, I think that JINSA should start such a session by remembering all the people that lost their life.

Michael Makovsky, PhD

Yes, you’re right.

IDF MG (ret.) Amikam Norkin

This is October 7th. The families are there. We lost many children, babies, wives, women, men, and it’s a very tough period of time in Israel. We should remember them all, and we should understand that this is something that still impacts Israeli society, that we still assess the pain. So, before we [speak] about strategy, we should speak about those issues. Second, as a [retired] military general, we should start [with] that we failed. We failed. The military failed on October 7th to protect the citizens, to protect the border, and to defend the state of Israel. And I was part of the team that investigated the military failure, and the failure [has] three layers: strategy, tactical, and professional. And I think that once Amidror mentioned, and he is completely right, and he spoke about the doctrine of the Northern Command. Some of our commanders—they lost their profession. How to be a military commander, and what is [your] the responsibility, and how should you prepare your forces, your border, and your team? So, this is something that we might speak about maybe in another session. I think that what John mentioned in our first Zoom on October 9th that we didn’t imagine that we are going to be in a war after three years, but I think today that once we understood what happened on October 7th, the Middle East cannot remain the same Middle East. The Middle East cannot remain the same Middle East after such an attack on October 7th. This is something that the state of Israel understood, maybe a little bit, not in the beginning. Not all of the people understood it, and you cannot change the Middle East in two months. Why? Because of what Amidror mentioned, we are 8 million people. We need to do it one by one. We need to do it: Gaza, Lebanon, Syria, Iran. And yes, now the Middle East is a different Middle East. There is no military threat from Lebanon. The Lebanon front was the highest threat in Israel: Hezbollah. And today there is no military threat. There is a terror threat. There is no military threat from Gaza. There is a terror threat from Gaza.

IDF MG (ret.) Yaakov Amidror

Even that is very manageable.

IDF MG (ret.) Amikam Norkin

Yeah. There is no military in Syria, so there is no military threat from Syria. As a pilot, as a commander, it’s hard to understand that there is no military threat from those fronts today, and of course, the threat from Iran is completely different today because of the two campaigns. So yes, we cannot get into Berlin, and we [do] not [have] the two nuclear bombs, and we cannot finish the war like Great Britain and the United States did in the Second World War. But we must finish the war, or at least [we] need to move from military activities to strategic and diplomatic activities. And [we need] to stop to organize and wrap up each of those fronts. I think that the best opportunity for Israel now is the north border. Gaza, it’s a long story. In Gaza it will take years, but [in] Lebanon and Syria, we should move forward. And [for] Iran, I think we should do some other activities to push the Iranian regime to the position that we can close the war with Iran. So, this is the situation. After three years, we changed the Middle East, and without changing the Middle East, Israel cannot exist for the next tens of years. And this is something that we didn’t understand [in] the beginning, and I am happy that later on the government understood.

I would like to speak about the American support. First of all, the brave pilot that flew with the Israeli Air Force together above Tehran. You know they are not flying from Tel Aviv. They are not flying, and they are not defending Haifa. They are coming from Texas and other states of the United States, and they are flying above Tehran to protect Israel and to protect the United States and the Western world. They are brave guys, and we all saw how the American Air Force [rescued] the two pilots. But this is a tactical issue. The strategic issue is that we should know that the Israeli military dropped 100,000 bombs. Is there any other military in the world that dropped 100,000 ammunitions? No one. No one. And as we all know, the logistic is the queen of the war. Without the American support, we cannot do it. We got less than 20 percent in the beginning of the war in Israel, in the Israeli storage. So, the American support is not just to fly shoulder to shoulder; it’s the logistic support, the maintenance support, and other equipment that, without those capabilities, Israel cannot change the Middle East like we did, and we should appreciate it, and we should keep it because it’s very important for our national security.

The fourth topic that I would like to speak about is prevention. You know, the decade between 2010 to 2020 was the best one in Israel economic[ally]. So, you need to look at a holistic situation. You cannot start a war every two years as a state, and there is a reason to start a war in Israel every week. Unfortunately, any prime minister needs to think, “Okay, what should I do?” So, I think that yes, what Amidror said is the right thing. But we should balance between prevention and strategic agreements with allies around Israel, with more nations that should come to Abraham Accords, and by that we might have a better strategic depth. And yes, we cannot spend such a budget [on] defense.

[Lastly,] we lost our legitimacy, unfortunately. We can do more. We didn’t manage a campaign about the Israeli legitimacy, and this might come as a strategic issue. It’s already a strategic issue, but today, it might have some impact also over the Israeli economy, and we should care about our legitimacy around the world.

And now to your question, Mike. I’m ashamed about October 7th, but I’m very proud about what the IDF and the Air Force did since October 7th till today. All the plans and all the capabilities that we built in the last 20 years—we demonstrated a very high level of military activity and air dominance above the Middle East. But it’s very hard for such small military to fight for three years. There [is] less training [and] education. The routine of the military is not a normal routine, and if we would like to have the best military in the Middle East for the next 10-20, years. We must support the military to go back to some normal routine and to rebuild itself and to take care about the operational discipline. There are too many accidents, operational accidents in the military, and we lost more than 150 soldiers because of operational accidents in the war. So, there are many gaps, but yes, today the military is ready, and the commander [has] a lot of experience. But the IDF is a small one; it’s very hard for him to fight for three years, and we need to move forward with some strategic and diplomatic actions, and by that to reduce military activity in some of the forms.

Michael Makovsky, PhD

First of all, thank you, General Norkin. I appreciate what you said. I should have started with that about the individuals. You know, three years later, it’s easy to say these were the numbers of people killed and taken hostage. And you know, out there, I’ve been looking, especially in the last few days, as Israel commemorated its three-year anniversary. There have been a lot of postings on X, for instance, reminding people what happened to this family and what happened to that family and that individual or that soldier.

IDF MG (ret.) Amikam Norkin

This is the exact issue. Once I mentioned, we didn’t assess the pain. You know, we [are] still learning the stories of those families and people.

Michael Makovsky, PhD

Yeah, the savagery was really unimaginable. I think, at least to a Westerner, and I think even to Israelis, to fully appreciate what happened to the Bibas [family]. There’s a new book I think that just came out by one of the hostages. It’s hard to imagine how these people survived in these tunnels. By the way, Brett McGurk’s book that just came out, which I’m eager to read, called Brink, [is] about his experience of trying to free the hostages. When you think about what’s happened to these individuals, the barbarity that was committed to these individuals, we don’t know everything, and there was a lot of heroism It’s hard to even stomach, honestly, [what happened] to just one of these families. How whole families were wiped out. How children were killed in front of their parents. Parents killed in front of their children, people raped, men and women, and so on. For the Americans listening—one of the big news stories recently is what happened at Cornell, and we don’t know fully everything. But it was kind of a reminder that people actually care about rape because they certainly didn’t, the Western world didn’t seem to care that much about the mass rapes that happened on October 7th when it happened to Jews. But anyway, but I appreciate what you said, and ultimately that is the most important thing. General Norkin as you know what happened to these individual people and individual families—it’s just really unimaginable. But I encourage everyone to read up about these individuals. And again, there’s a lot of this on X right now, which I encourage people to read. So thank you, General Norkin. We don’t actually have much time. We only have a few minutes left. But John, I’ll go back to you. And I guess maybe we have a few minutes if you want to talk about where things are as you see [them]. You mentioned you were in Gaza, and I agree with General Norkin. There may have been opportunities in the north. Certainly, with Lebanon, there was. I don’t know if we missed the opportunity in Syria. There was progress on that sphere. I’ll mention that our colleague Ron Dermer, who’s a distinguished fellow with JINSA, has talked about this recently. About, you know, there isn’t a lot of internal pressure in Israel to withdraw from everywhere, but that’s the time you really start needing to settle some of these fronts, and he was focused, for instance, on the north, like General Norkin was. But how do you see [this], John? I don’t know if you wanted to comment on anything that has said since you spoke, or if you want to just talk about where things are and how you see the Gaza situation. Things could stay the way they are, or perhaps there could be a little progress on that front, but there will be more focus on Gaza, I think, soon after the Iran issue is maybe dealt with a little more.

MAJ John Spencer

Sure. So, I was just there. It’s about a month and a half now with the IDF; I also got to go all the way up to the Belfort Castle in Lebanon. But specific to Gaza, I just came back from the high-level meeting of the Peace Board, got an update from people like General Jeffers and others. They’re part of the stabilization force with the plan there. While some people may like it or not, but it’s actually a very sound plan with a lot of lessons learned from even U.S. military operations on doing what the 20-point plan said and making it conditions-based. Full disarmament, full demilitarization can be done sector by sector, and that’s their plan. They’re moving pretty aggressively forward. What they’ve done in the last 12 months, forming the NCAG [National Committee for the Administration of Gaza], already having schools with de-radicalized curriculum, I see a lot of hope. Although I trust nobody. Verifying everything is a very big part of the plan, and having that leadership there. Of course, the future is always unknown. I agree with a general that said that this will take years—the Gaza situation [like] all post-conflict operations. But this enemy still has some guns, and that being a key part of the movement forward, it will take years. But I actually see a plan, not a settlement on status quo of anything like the past, so I actually am pretty hopeful on the Gaza situation.

Michael Makovsky, PhD

Hey John, maybe we’ll say quickly, and then we’ll go to Amidror on this. Look, you led The Day After [Gaza] project. Maybe we were a little early on that, though we did seem to have some influence on [it], some help. You led it with Elliot Abrams and the Vandenberg coalition. [It] was a JINSA Vandenberg coalition effort, and you’ve obviously focused a lot on Gaza. How do you see [this situation]? Are you as optimistic as John is?

John Hannah

Well, I agree with John that there’s a reasonable plan on paper. I do think it’s on paper primarily. And it is a situation where it’s going to take a lot of time. But I just [think] back to last October [when] we had a lot of momentum. The president was deeply engaged, and it wouldn’t have happened except for the president’s deep personal involvement in getting that ceasefire done, getting those hostages all out—something nobody thought could be done, but we’re here a year later. Hamas is recruiting again. Doesn’t have the same military capability to threaten Israel, but it certainly retains an ability on the political level, the terror level, [and] the intimidation level, to control nearly all of Gaza’s population still, and we haven’t made really any progress on building some kind of alternative to Hamas. So, you’ve got two million people still living in abject misery, with no prospect on the horizon of developing any kind of alternative to Hamas. Hamas earns millions of dollars every day from humanitarian aid that is flooding into Gaza, taxing it, stealing it. So, the ISF [International Stabilization Force], yes, is great on paper, but we got a couple of 100 guys signed up, none of whom want to do any of the hard-edged work of maintaining or replacing Hamas as the force that can impose order in Gaza. We’ve got no real Palestinian police force that can replace Hamas that’s being trained anywhere in Egypt or otherwise, so just no economy that’s running and giving people who might think of signing up for Hamas any kind of alternative. Let me just also say [that there are] no real resources now to back this plan and to move it into action, because nobody wants to throw money into this, knowing that Hamas is still there rebuilding some of its power locally, without any serious prospect yet of how disarmament is going to happen.

So, I think there’s a long way to go, and I don’t know if the president can reengage on this. He’s obviously got a lot on his plate. There may be more attractive opportunities once he’s done dealing with the Iranians in Lebanon and Syria. Gaza maybe looks less like an opportunity, but it is perhaps the most significant diplomatic accomplishment of his administration—the miraculous ceasefire that he achieved last October, a year ago, getting all of those hostages out, both alive and dead, and getting Hamas to surrender them, which is something that I’m not sure anybody, I’m not sure Brett McGurk, thought was even possible at that point in time.

Michael Makovksy, PhD

Yeah, let me just conclude with General Amidror. Look, I think it was appropriate to talk about Gaza now because this is where it obviously all started, even if it was part of a ring of fire. But General Amidror, do you have just a couple quick comments on, from an Israeli’s perspective, where things stand and where things might go in Gaza?

IDF MG (ret.) Yaakov Amidror

In Gaza, the situation is that Hamas, as was said by General Norkin, is not relevant to Israel, and there is huge exaggeration about the rebuilding of Hamas. Hamas cannot rebuild itself. They [are] using the explosives which remain after our operations, and we will find more explosives prepared to stop the IDF if the IDF tries to go in, but the ability to produce weapon systems, missiles, rockets, anti-tank missiles, and so on and so forth is close to zero. Some [were] smuggled by drones from Egypt and Israel, but it’s [a] very little amount. Hamas today is more [of a] problem for the Palestinians in Gaza than for Israel. It is far from the Jewish communities around the Gaza Strip, and without the hostility, just if the IDF decides to go in the 35 percent of the Gaza Strip, which is still under the control of Hamas, is not going to be a huge problem for the IDF. Our hands were tied when the kidnapped Israelis were there, but now after all of them have been released, I think it will be much easier for the IDF. The decision here is to give the administration, the White House, the space and the time to implement the 20-point plan of President Trump, and this is why we are not going to [go in]. We continue to kill commanders. We are eliminating all those which had [invaded] Israel on the seventh of October. Out of 6,000, only 2,000 remain still alive in Gaza, and slowly, all of them will be killed. But Israel is not moving on with the full force to wage war in Gaza because we want to give the White House the ability to implement the 20-point plan. I am very pessimistic about the ability to do it, but I was pessimistic when the Americans said that they would release all the hostages, and they did it. So, I have to be very humble and to say I don’t know, but the formal decision is clear. We are giving the Americans the chance to do it. As you know, Nicolay Mladenov made [a] huge plan, but up till now, it is more [of a] plan than something had been implemented. And how long [can] the whole system work without having any real ability to implement it? It’s a good question that I don’t have an answer for. How long will they have the support of those who promise to contribute money for that? I don’t know. It very much depends [on] how much pressure America can put on Hamas and isolate Hamas from Turkey and Qatar, which are the biggest supporters of the organization. Hamas is now very active in Turkey; operations against Israel in the West Bank are handled by people in Turkey. Turkey, by the way, is one of the only countries in the world still helping economically the Iranians bypass American sanctions. So, it very much depends on the efforts of the United States of America, and we understand that without Israeli military pressure, there is no chance that Hamas will fulfill the vision of the president. The only way is a combination of Israeli military pressure and American pressure on the supporters of Hamas, mainly, as I said, Turkey and Qatar. How can America and Israel [agree on how to proceed]? Now both have immediate elections, so I’m sure that people, even those who are supporting it, are not rushing to another war. But in the end, only a combination of Israeli military pressure, which would be strong and clear, and American pressure on the supporters of Hamas, in Turkey and Qatar, can change the situation in the Gaza Strip. For today, it is less relevant for us. It is more relevant for the Palestinians. By the way, it’s very interesting. There was a research and polled by Shai Zakin and the Tel Aviv Strategy Strategic Center, and both came to the conclusion that the support of Hamas within the Palestinian society was degraded because of the results of the war and the situation in Gaza, and the support decreased from 75 percent at the beginning of the war to 25 percent now. It’s a huge change, and ironically, all these pictures which make Israel pariah in the West are making the change within the Palestinian society. They understand that Hamas led them to a disaster, to a new Nakba, and they blame Hamas, and they don’t want Hamas’ resistance against Israel as a way, which they can see was a huge mistake. So, ironically, unlike what we had been told, this war led to more radicalism within the Palestinian society. On the contrary, it led to a huge decrease in support of Hamas. Will it stay with us? Is it for a long time? I don’t know. This is a good question that I don’t have an answer to. So, to sum it up, we have to have the ability to put pressure militarily on Hamas. That, with American determined action, can change Hamas’ attitude towards the 20-point point plan of the president. Will it happen? I don’t know. I’m very pessimistic.

Michael Makovsky, PhD

All right. Thank you, General. On that note, we’re going to conclude. I want to thank all our panelists. There’s obviously a lot of issues we didn’t touch on, for all the national, regional, and international consequences of October 7th, that General Norkin reminded us of. It’s ultimately an unimaginable human tragedy; it’s important to remember all of those: who fell that day, were killed that day, were injured that day, and responded heroically that day. I encourage all of those to read up on those stories as much as possible. I want to thank John Spencer, John Hannah, General Amidror, and General Norkin. I want to thank everybody for joining us. Obviously, we are going to be talking about a lot of the regional issues here at JINSA going forward and thank you very much, and have a good rest of your day.

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PRESS RELEASE: 75+ U.S. Military Leaders Reject Gaza Genocide Claims

Yoni Tobin — Wed, 07 Oct 2026 11:00:47 +0000

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
October 7, 2026
Contact: Blake Johnson
bjohnson@jinsa.org

Retired U.S. Military Leaders and Legal Experts Reject Genocide Allegations Against Israel

Washington, DC – On the third anniversary of Hamas’s October 7, 2023, massacre, a group of over 75 senior retired U.S. military leaders and legal experts today issued an open letter, organized by the Jewish Institute for National Security of America, rejecting allegations that Israel committed genocide in Gaza, concluding that the allegation is unsupported by the facts and does not meet the definition of genocide.

The signatories, including those who have commanded U.S. armed forces in combat, emphasize that the standards used to judge military conduct matter precisely because war is tragic and imperfect. Lowering the standard for what constitutes genocide, they warn, could create dangerous incentives for adversaries to embed themselves among civilians, exploit resulting casualties, and characterize lawful military operations as genocide.

The precedent established today will shape the conditions under which American forces fight tomorrow.

“Accusing Israel of genocide in Gaza is obscene,” said JINSA President and CEO Michael Makovsky. “It egregiously distorts the truth, the facts, and the law. These senior U.S. military commanders and lawyers, who understand the realities of war and the unprecedented steps Israel has taken to avoid civilian casualties, have stepped forward to correct the record. I hope those who are fair-minded will take heed.”

Genocide is an exceptionally grave crime requiring evidence of an intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a protected national, ethnic, racial, or religious group. Civilian casualties, however tragic, do not by themselves establish genocidal intent. Based on their professional experience and assessment of Israeli military operations, the signatories conclude that Israel has neither intended to destroy Palestinians as a group nor conducted its campaign in a manner consistent with such an intent.

The extensive measures taken by the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) to protect civilians while fighting Hamas, included advance warnings, evacuation instructions, protected corridors, tactical pauses, stringent legal review of targets, and repeated decisions to cancel strikes because of the presence of civilians. These precautions have at times required Israeli forces to surrender tactical advantages and expose their own personnel to greater risk.

The signatories do not minimize the suffering of civilians in Gaza. They draw instead on their own experience commanding American forces pointing out that, “There is no perfect attack; there are only those in which commanders use all available information to make hard decisions and their best judgement to comply with legal obligations and protect civilians.”

The letter also distinguishes inflammatory statements by Israeli political officials, which the signatories condemn, from the conduct of the IDF itself. Political rhetoric, they argue, cannot substitute for evidence of genocidal intent in the conduct of military operations.

The signatories call on those making allegations of genocide to apply the Genocide Convention faithfully and to distinguish between the tragic consequences of combat, potential violations of the laws of armed conflict, and the specific crime of genocide.

Misapplying that standard risks rewarding adversaries who deliberately endanger civilians and undermining the ability of the United States and its allies to defend themselves.

The letter concludes: “Protecting civilians and preserving the ability of our nation to defend itself requires us to defend the truth when the laws of war are being distorted to make false charges of genocide.”

Read the Open Letter

###

Jewish Institute for National Security of America

2021 L St NW, Suite 101-239

Washington, DC 20036

www.jinsa.org

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Open Letter From 75+ Military Professionals Rejecting Genocide Allegation Against Israel

Nolan Judd — Wed, 07 Oct 2026 09:00:42 +0000

For Immediate Release
October 7, 2026

Washington, DC – As retired senior military leaders and legal experts, on this, the third anniversary of Hamas’s October 7, 2023 brutal attack on Israel, we reject claims that Israel committed genocide in Gaza.

Genocide is a grave and exceptional violation of international law, defined and prohibited by the Genocide Convention of 1948 and enumerated as a crime in the Statute of the International Criminal Court and in the U.S. federal criminal code. The allegations that Israel committed this crime do not meet the established definition and standards of genocide, are unsupported by established facts, nor do they stand up to common sense scrutiny.

A finding of genocide requires evidence of acts that are intended to destroy a protected national, ethnic, racial, or religious group, in whole or in part. Israel has neither intended to, nor destroyed, Palestinians as a group in Gaza. All the evidence, in fact, points to the contrary conclusion: that, after suffering a barbaric, indiscriminate massacre by Hamas terrorists on October 7, 2023, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF), acting in justified self-defense, went to extreme lengths to protect civilians in Gaza, including from Hamas.

Israel’s accusers allege genocide mostly because of the supposed number of civilians killed in Gaza. Such claims are rife with flaws. Genocide is not a quantitative crime; there is no number of civilian casualties that constitutes genocide. Nor are the claimed casualty numbers from Gaza credible. Issued by Hamas themselves and, at the very least, not distinguishing between civilians and combatants, they cannot be relied upon.

Further, established legal precedent makes clear that civilian deaths occurring during combat, however tragic, are insufficient, by themselves, to support a finding of genocidal intent. That is because of the unfortunate realities of war and the laws that govern it, both of which Israel’s accusers appear woefully ignorant.

Many of the signatories to this letter have commanded United States armed forces in combat against enemies who regularly hide behind civilians and put those civilians intentionally in harm’s way. Fighting under those complexities is especially difficult. We understand that the loss of civilian life in Gaza is tragic. But we also know that such tragic outcomes do not necessarily violate the law of armed conflict. There is no perfect attack; there are only those in which commanders use all available information to make hard decisions and their best judgement to comply with legal obligations and protect civilians. And that is exactly what we have witnessed from the IDF in Gaza.

Assessments of Israeli combat operations, undertaken by some of the signatories to this letter, describe a military taking an unprecedented combination of precautions to avoid civilian casualties; not one following orders to destroy Palestinians as a group. The IDF has provided civilians with numerous advance warnings—leaflets, phone calls, text messages, radio and TV broadcasts, and social media notices—evacuation instructions, protected corridors, and tactical pauses to help move them out of harm’s way, even when those precautionary measures ceded tactical advantage to enemy forces. IDF soldiers have even put themselves in harm’s way to protect Palestinians seeking to flee the fighting from attack by Hamas. Stringent legal review of targets is a standard part of IDF procedures. Repeatedly, Israel has called off strikes because of the presence of civilians.

Israel has also gone out of its way to provide aid and assistance to civilians in Gaza. More than 3.5 million tons of food, 48,000 tons of medical supplies, 5,000 tons of baby food, and up to 15,000 cubic meters per day of water desalinated by Israel have been sent into Gaza. Over half a million Gazan children were vaccinated during the war and some 5,000 Gazans evacuated for medical treatment abroad. These are not the actions of a genocidal state but of a professional military ethically and legally committed to the protection of civilian life.

This pattern of law-abiding IDF conduct in Gaza also contradicts accusers’ claims that some statements from Israeli political officials, seemingly encouraging unlawful harm to civilians, are evidence of genocidal intent. Such inflammatory statements are disgraceful. Yet, while it deserves unequivocal condemnation, rhetoric from politicians uninvolved in military decision-making is in no way reflective of actual IDF operations.

Israel has not committed genocide but rather set a high bar for how to conduct urban warfare against an enemy who will stop at nothing, including the death of its own civilians.

We call on those concerned with this issue to carefully assess the facts related to the Gaza campaign, insist on faithful application of the Genocide Convention, and reject factually and legally dubious accusations against Israel. Failure to do so incentivizes future adversaries to deliberately endanger civilians and then exploit civilian suffering to portray lawful operations as genocide, weaken public support, and divide our alliances.

The precedent established today regarding Israel will shape the conditions under which American forces fight tomorrow. Protecting civilians and preserving the ability of our nation to defend itself requires us to defend the truth when the laws of war are being distorted to make false charges of genocide.

Read the Open Letter

Letter Signees include:

Gen James F. Amos, USMC (ret.), 35th Commandant of the Marine Corps
GEN Frank J. Grass, USA (ret.), JINSA Generals and Admirals Program Participant
Gen W.L. ”Spider” Nyland, USMC (ret.), Assistant Commandant of the Marine Corps
Gen Philip M. Breedlove, USAF (ret.), Supreme Allied Commander Europe, Commander US European Command
Gen Kevin P. Chilton, USAF (ret.), Commander, U.S. Strategic Command
Gen C.T. “Tony” Robertson, Jr., USAF (ret.), Commander, U.S. Transportation Command, and Commander, Air Mobility Command
GEN James D. Thurman, USA (ret.), Commander, United Nations Command, ROK-United States Combined Forces Command, and United States Forces Korea
Gen Charles Wald, USAF (ret.), Deputy Commander of United States European Command (EUCOM)
LTG John M. Bednarek, USA (ret.), Senior Defense Official, Iraq; Chief, Office of Security Cooperation, Baghdad
Gen William Begert, USAF (ret.), Commander, Pacific Air Forces, and Air Component Commander for the Commander, U.S. Pacific Command
ADM Bruce Clingan, USN (ret.), Commander, U.S. Naval Forces Europe; U.S. Naval Forces Africa; Allied Joint Force Command, Naples
Gen Donald G. Cook, USAF (ret.), Commander, Air Education and Training Command
ADM Mark Fitzgerald, USN (ret.), Commander, U.S. Naval Forces Europe; U.S. Naval Forces Africa; Allied Joint Force Command, Naples
Gen Mike Hostage, USAF (ret.), Commander, Air Combat Command
Lt Gen Steven L. Basham, USAF (ret.), Deputy Commander, U.S. European Command
VADM John Bird, USN (ret.), Commander, U.S. 7th Fleet
Lt Gen Rod Bishop, USAF (ret.), Commander, 3rd Air Force
LTG H. Steven Blum, USA (ret.), Deputy Commander, U.S. Northern Command
LtGen Thomas Conant, USMC (ret.), Deputy Commander, United States Pacific Command
VADM Michael J. Connor, USN (ret.), Commander, United States Submarine Forces
Lt Gen David Deptula, USAF (ret.), Deputy Chief of Staff for Intelligence, Surveillance and Reconnaissance, Headquarters Air Force Lt Gen Eric Fiel, USAF (ret.), Commander, Air Force Special Operations Command
VADM Jeffrey Fowler, USN (ret.), 60th Superintendent, U.S. Naval Academy
VADM Mark I. Fox, USN (ret.), Deputy Commander, United States Central Command
LTG David Fridovich, USA (ret.), Deputy Commander, U.S. Special Operations Command-USSOCOM
LtGen Kenneth Glueck, Jr., USMC (ret.), Deputy Commandant, Combat Development and Integration; Commanding General, Marine Corps Combat Development Command
Lt Gen Michael Gould, USAF (ret.), Superintendent, United States Air Force Academy
LtGen Mike Groen, USMC (ret.), Director, Joint Artificial Intelligence Center (JAIC)
Lt Gen Joseph Guastella, USAF (ret.), Deputy Chief of Staff for Operations, Headquarters U.S. Air Force
LtGen Earl Hailston, USMC (ret.), Commander, U.S. Marine Corps Forces Pacific/Commander, U.S. Marine Corps Forces Central Command
LtGen Karsten Heckl, USMC (ret.), Deputy Commandant, Combat Development and Integration; Commanding General, Marine Corps Combat Development Command
LtGen John Jansen, USMC (ret.), Deputy Commandant for Programs and Resources
LTG James Jarrard, USA (ret.), Deputy Commanding General of United States Army Pacific
VADM Dennis Jones, USN (ret.), Deputy Commander in Chief, US Strategic Command
LTG Raymond Mason, USA (ret.), Deputy Chief of Staff for Logistics, G4 Army Staff
Lt Gen Charles May, USAF (ret.), Assistant Vice Chief of Staff
LtGen Fred McCorkle, USMC (ret.), Deputy Commandant Marine Corps Aviation
Lt Gen Thomas G. McInerney, USAF (ret.), Assistant Vice Chief of Staff, Headquarters U.S. Air Force
VADM John Miller, USN (ret.), Commander, US Naval Forces, US Central Command
LtGen Rich Mills, USMC (ret.), Commander, Marine Forces Reserve and Commander Marine Forces North
Lt Gen Charles Moore, USAF (ret.), Deputy Commander, U.S. Cyber Command
Lt Gen C.D. Moore II, USAF (ret.), Commander, Air Force Life Cycle Management Center
VADM Ross A. Myers, USN (ret.), Commander, Tenth Fleet/Fleet Cyber/Navy Space, and former Deputy Commander, USCYBERCOM LTG Raymond Palumbo, USA (ret.), Director for Defense Intelligence
Lt Gen Chris Nowland, USAF (ret.), Deputy Chief of Staff for Operations, Headquarters U.S. Air Force
VADM Carol Pottenger, USN (ret.), NATO Allied Command Transformation DCOS Capability Development
VADM Joe Rixey, USN (ret.), Director of the Defense Security Cooperation Agency
VADM Herman A. Shelanski, USN (ret.), Naval Inspector General VADM Sandra Stosz, USCG (ret.), Deputy Commandant for Mission Support
LTG Guy Swan, USA (ret.), Commanding General, U.S. Army North/5th Army
Lt Gen Thomas J. Trask, USAF (ret.), Vice Commander, United States Special Operations Command
LtGen Mark Wise, USMC (ret.), Deputy Commandant for Aviation, USMC
RADM Fred L. Ames, USCG (ret.), Assistant Commandant for Human Resources
MajGen Joseph T. Anderson, USMC (ret.), CG 1st Marine Aircraft Wing
MG Joe Arbuckle, USA (ret.), Commander, Operations Support Command
RADM Paul Becker, USN (ret.), Director for Intelligence, Joint Staff (J2)
Maj Gen Jack J. Catton, Jr., USAF (ret.), Director of Requirements, Headquarters Air Combat Command
MajGen Mark Clark, USMC (ret.), Commanding General Marine Special Operations Command (MARSOC)
MajGen Jon Gallinetti, USMC (ret.), Deputy Commander, Marine Corps Forces Command
RADM Brett Heimbigner, USN (ret.), Director Joint ISR Operations Center
MajGen Bob Hollingsworth, USMC (ret.), Vice Commander, Marine Forces Pacific
Maj Gen James P. Hunt, USAF (ret.), Deputy Commanding General, Multi-National Corps, Iraq
Maj Gen Kenneth Israel, USAF (ret.), Assistant Deputy Undersecretary of Defense for Airborne Reconnaissance and Director of the Defense Airborne Reconnaissance Office
RADM Steven Kantrowitz, USN (ret.), Deputy Commander, Naval Legal Service Command
RADM Edward Masso, USNR (ret.), Commander Navy Personnel Command/Deputy Chief of Naval Personnel
RADM William F. Merlin, USCG (ret.), Commander, Eighth Coast Guard District
MG William Moore, USA (ret.), Director for Operations, Headquarters
Maj Gen Bentley B. Rayburn, USAF (ret.), Commander, USAF Doctrine Center
MajGen Dave Richwine, USMC (ret.), Chief Information Officer and Director of Intelligence, Headquarters, US Marine Corps
Maj Gen Lawrence Stutzriem, USAF (ret.), Director, Plans, Policy, and Strategy, North American Aerospace Defense Command and U.S. Northern Command
MajGen Larry Taylor, USMCR (ret.), Commanding General, 4th Marine Aircraft Wing
MG Paul Vallely, USA (ret.), Deputy Commanding General US Army Pacific
RDML Terry McKnight, USN (ret.), Commander Task Force 151 – Anti-Piracy Task Force/Commander Expeditionary Group Two
RDML Mark Milliken, USN (ret.), Deputy Assistant Secretary of the Navy International Programs Office
BGen Michael Mulqueen, USMC (ret.), The United States Military Entrance Processing Command
Brig Gen Christopher Walker, USAF (ret.), Assistant Adjutant General and Commander of the West Virginia Air National Guard
BG Mitchell M. Zais, Ph.D., USA (ret.), Former Acting U.S. Secretary of Education
COL Marc Warren, USA (ret.), Former Special Assistant for Military Law and Operations to The Judge Advocate General, U.S. Army
MAJ John Spencer, USA (ret.), Executive Director, Urban Warfare Institute

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How to Keep the Houthis Out of the Red Sea

Yoni Tobin — Mon, 05 Oct 2026 08:41:02 +0000

The war for the world’s key maritime chokepoints now has a second front. Reportedly with Iranian assistance, Houthi forces staged a 48-hour offensive on September 10-11, seizing further stretches of Red Sea coastline and the Hanish and Perim islands. When the dust settled, the Iranian axis had gained effective control over another vital maritime chokepoint—the Bab el-Mandeb Strait, through which 25 percent of global container traffic passes in peacetime—without a clear U.S. response as yet.

Yet more is at stake than Yemen’s internal dynamics, regional tensions, or global energy prices. The Iranian regime’s ongoing efforts to hold hostage the Strait of Hormuz, and the Houthis’ seizure of the Bab el-Mandeb Strait, are fundamental challenges to the global freedom of navigation that the United States has upheld for over two centuries.

In 1785, then-ambassador to France Thomas Jefferson argued that forceful U.S. action is necessary “if we wish our commerce to be free.” That is why, as president, he dispatched the U.S. Navy against the Barbary pirates in modern Libya.

Since that war, upholding freedom of navigation has been a core U.S. strategic pillar. The 2025 US National Security Strategy (NSS), like its predecessors, noted the continued American objective of “preserving freedom of navigation in all crucial sea lanes.” Ever since presidential administrations began issuing the strategy document in 1987, 16 of the 20 total NSS papers have reaffirmed this principle. Threats to international waterways have been one of the most common causes of US military action in recent decades, including against Libya in 1981 and 1986; Iran in 1988; and the Houthis themselves in 2025.

The Houthi threat to global shipping expanded dramatically overnight, threatening the credibility of that U.S. maritime security commitment. The Houthis no longer need drones or missiles, which they used in hundreds of attacks on ships between 2023 and 2025, to threaten Red Sea shipping credibly. Given the Houthi forces’ footholds along the narrow Bab el-Mandeb chokepoint, protecting shipping will be even harder, since the group can now attack with closer-range weaponry such as artillery, rockets, and heavy machine guns. Economic impacts were immediate, as crude prices spiked above $100 per barrel.

The implications of the Houthis’ newfound effective control of the Bab el-Mandeb Strait stretch far beyond the Middle East. The Iranian-led “Axis of Resistance” is now cementing its grip on two of the world’s five most-trafficked energy trade chokepoints. Importantly, those two nearby chokepoints sit along critical intercontinental energy sea routes. Threats to the Bab el-Mandeb Strait force ships to reroute around Africa. For a container ship on an Asia-Europe route, this diversion would add 10–12 days to the voyage, and an estimated $1 million in fuel costs per round trip.

Moreover, left unchecked, this development could have cascading effects globally. Middle East chokepoints could be the first dominoes to fall as hostile actors test America’s open-seas commitment elsewhere. Days after the recent Houthi offensive, Chinese vessels were seen at the Bering Strait chokepoint linking the Arctic and Pacific oceans—where China and Russia have held joint drills and patrols. In addition, Russia’s ongoing Black Sea aggression underscores its threat to the nearby Danish and Turkish Straits chokepoints, and the South China Sea’s eight key chokepoints remain vulnerable to Chinese coercion.

While the United States is reportedly pursuing diplomacy with the Houthis, past diplomatic efforts did not deter the Houthis, and are even less likely to succeed now given the Houthis’ newly expanded territory. Houthi forces violated the 2018 Stockholm Agreement requiring their withdrawal from Hodeidah, which is still a key Houthi operations hub. Saudi-backed Yemeni forces reportedly recaptured the port of Mokha on October 5, which the Houthis had seized earlier this month.

The soundest approach is a U.S.-led coalition that protects global shipping and removes the Houthi threat. The United States has an unparalleled coalition-building ability, and dozens of U.S. partners—chiefly hydrocarbon exporters in the Middle East and importers in Europe and Asia—have strong interests in securing the two chokepoints. France recently sent troops, air defenses, and radars to protect Saudi Arabia from Houthi aggression, and the British government has agreed to conduct air-to-air refueling of Saudi jets. In a May summit, 40 nations signaled a desire to protect shipping, without detailing how.

A robust U.S.-led multilateral force would boost America’s credibility as a reliable security guarantor for its partners. Conversely, Washington staying on the sidelines would erode the confidence of friendly Arab countries, primarily an uneasy Saudi Arabia, the main target of Houthi attacks. It would also further embolden Iran and its proxies.

The United States has a narrow window to restore the credibility of its freedom-of-navigation commitment. Fortunately, its partners can help. Strength comes from numbers and concrete displays of U.S. leadership.

Lt Gen Thomas Bergeson, USAF (ret.), is the former deputy commander of U.S. Central Command. He oversaw military security cooperation and combat operations within the Arabian Peninsula, Northern Red Sea, Arabian Gulf, and Central and Southern Asian States. Before that assignment, Lt. Gen. Bergeson served as deputy commander, United Nations Command Korea. He has flown combat sorties in multiple operations.

LTG Karen Gibson, USA (ret.), is the former U.S. Deputy Director of National Intelligence for National Security Partnerships. Lt. Gen. Gibson has worked as a public servant for 37 years, first as an active-duty U.S. Army intelligence officer for 33 years, where she attained the rank of Lieutenant General, then as Sergeant at Arms of the U.S. Senate for an additional four years.

LtGen Sam Mundy, USMC (ret.), is the former commander of U.S. Marine Forces Central Command. He currently serves as President of Once a Marine LLC. He previously commanded Marine Corps Forces, Special Operations Command. From 2011 to 2013, he also served as the Executive Officer to the USCENTCOM Commander, traveling with him throughout the Gulf, Levant, and Central and South Asia.

MajGen Robert Sofge, USMC (ret.), is the former commander of United States Marine Corps Forces, Europe and Africa. As a general officer, he also served as director for strategy, plans, and policy (UCJ5), United Nations Command/Combined Forces Command/US Forces Korea; deputy commander for Marine Forces Pacific in Hawaii; and director of the combined joint operations center in Baghdad, Iraq.

All authors participated in the Jewish Institute for National Security of America (JINSA) Generals and Admirals Program.

Read the original piece in The National Interest.

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