Posted on 04/28/25
| News Source: Arutz-7
Colonel Richard Kemp, former commander of British military forces in Afghanistan, spoke to Arutz Sheva-Israel National News on the sidelines of the JNS International Policy Summit held at the Waldorf Astoria Hotel in Jerusalem.
Asked on the current situation in terms of Israel’s war against Hamas, Col. Kemp replied, “I think Hamas is now feeling a significant amount of the weight of the IDF on it, and the only reason it's not feeling even more is because the IDF has to be cautious about the hostages. But at the same time, they're making mincemeat of Hamas.”
“Most of Hamas's most senior leadership has been destroyed, huge numbers of their terrorists have been destroyed, a lot of their equipment, so I think they're very much on the back foot, and I would hope that Hamas will be completely eliminated as a fighting organization within perhaps a few weeks,” he added.
Asked how to reach what Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu defines as a “total victory” in the war, Col. Kemp said, “Well, a total victory goes even beyond dealing with the terrorists and with their weapons and with their tunnels. Of course, you can do all of that. It takes a lot of time, dealing with 400 miles of tunnels underneath Gaza is a long-term project. But Hamas can be certainly neutralized by sheer military force and then prevented from rising again by a long-term security presence in Gaza, and I think what I would define as total victory in Gaza is retrieving the hostages, all of the hostages. I'm not saying that's going to be 100% possible, but every effort needs to be made to do that.”
“Secondly,” he continued, “is to eliminate Hamas as a terrorist entity that's capable of threatening Israel. And thirdly, preventing anything like Hamas rising again in Gaza.”
Asked whether Israel should take into account the criticism from the world of its actions in Gaza, Kemp replied, “Israel doesn't really have to do anything differently in order to do what the world wants it to do, which is to fight within the laws of war. Israel's been doing that ever since the beginning and will continue to do so…There's nothing but lies, distortions, which have been going on not just since the war began, but long before the war began against Israel. And yes, of course, Israel has to try and do what it can, and Israel's friends have to try and do what they can to counter the lies.”
He added, “And the world can't be just ignored because Israel depends on the world for numerous things, including, in some cases, weaponry, including particularly from the US and from Germany, from Italy, from the UK to an extent. So Israel has to maintain the relationships, not to mention, of course, Israel's dependence on international trade. So yes, Israel has to do what it can to try and influence political leaders around the world, and also, of course, has to fight back against the legal warfare that's taking place with the disgraceful efforts by the International Criminal Court to arrest the Prime Minister and the former Defense Minister, and the even more disgraceful attempts by the International Court of Justice to brand Israel as a genocidal state.”
Kemp also commented on the negotiations between Iran and the US. “I think it's a reasonable position for the President of the US to take, to try negotiation first before going into what is going to be a very violent attack, if it happens, on Iran's nuclear capabilities. So I think it's reasonable to try that. I don't think it's likely to work.”
“And even if you do have some deal with Iran, it's not worth the paper it's printed on. You know, there is no negotiating with jihadists. So ultimately, I think whatever happens on the diplomatic front, I think there's going to have to be a military attack against the Iranian nuclear program,” he concluded.