Israel Matzav

Why would Israel kill Mahmoud al-Mabhouh?

Marc Lynch questions why Israel would kill Mahmoud al-Mabhouh (which obviously, no one knows for sure that Israel did; in fact, we may never have an unequivocal admission that Israel killed him).

Why would Israel put this de facto ceasefire at risk by an assassination? First off, it's impossible to say at this point whether they did --- no evidence has yet been presented to back up Hamas's claims. Much of the Arab public immediately believed it, though, as it immediately recalled the botched operation against Khaled Meshaal in Amman a decade ago, as well as the assassinations of leading Hamas figures such as Ahmed Yassin and Abd al-Aziz al-Rentissi in 2004. That doesn't mean that it's true. But since Hamas has already gone public with the accusation and promised revenge, it may spark off a dangerous cycle anyway.

What if it's true? There should be questions about the legitimacy and morality of assassinating one's enemies abroad, one would think. But that seems unlikely in this day and age, when the United States openly brags of its Predator strikes, discusses them primarily in terms of whether or not they "work" as opposed to whether or not they are legal or morally acceptable, and muses about whether or not to target Anwar al-Awlaki (the radical Islamist in Yemen who is also an American citizen). The international norms against such assassinations have been thoroughly degraded by the Global War on Terror, and the Obama administration has escalated rather than reined in such measures.

So the real debate is more likely to be about the logic of the assassination and whether it "works." But it's not obvious what that would even mean in this context -- it makes little strategic sense. If Israelis and the PA both acknowledge that Hamas has been controlling attacks against Israel from Gaza, what is gained by a provocation such as this? Would it have "worked" if Hamas fails to respond, demonstrating its impotence? Would it have "worked" if Hamas does respond, killing innocent Israeli civilians and possibly triggering another round of horrific violence? Would it have "worked" if a Hamas retaliation (or even an unfulfilled threat of retaliation) offers a pretext for maintaining or intensifying the blockade of Gaza? At this point I'm seeing a blizzard of Arab commentary on the subject but no real consensus. But smaller things have sparked disastrous confrontations in the past, and I only hope that this one does not.

There are two issues to be dealt with here: Why would Israel want al-Mabhouh dead and why would it risk the de facto cease fire in Gaza to get the job done?

There are two reasons why Israel would want al-Mabhouh dead, and I'm going to take the second reason first because the main reason segues into the second question. Think Munich. Remember after the Munich Olympic Massacre how Israel sent agents all over the world to kill the murderers of Israel's Olympic team? Why did Israel do that? To show that actions have consequences. Al-Mabhouh kidnapped and murdered two Israeli soldiers. The kidnappings were among the very first terror attacks carried out by Hamas. If Israel killed al-Mabhouh, it has shown that it knows how to settle scores and that terrorists should not expect to ever be able to live in peace (think Sheikh Yassin, who was released from an Israeli prison in the aftermath of the botched Khaled Meshaal assassination, and got his virgins via IDF helicopters a few years later). Al-Mabhouh knew all that - that's why he lived in exile in Syria and it's why he had a security detail.

But the second reason for knocking off al-Mabhouh is far more important. It also provides a military justification for the operation.

Mabhouh helped found Hamas’s armed wing Izzadin Kassam in the 1980s, was behind the kidnapping in the first intifada of two Israeli soldiers and later established strong ties in Sudan, which he used to smuggle weaponry from Iran to Hamas in the Gaza Strip.

He was reportedly responsible for the weapons convoy that, according to foreign reports, Israel bombed during Operation Cast Lead as it was making its way to Gaza through the Sudanese desert.

In other words, if Israel took out Mabhouh, it also took out Hamas' weapons supplier, lessening the likelihood of any retaliation from Gaza. And indeed, that's why we're already hearing about the possibility of Hamas trying to take revenge from abroad, where its capabilities are low. It will need help from Hezbullah to even try to take revenge - and I wouldn't bet on that help being forthcoming.

posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 2:43 PM