On Friday, the U.S. announced that it will be providing the Ukrainian army with cluster bombs to use against invading Russian forces, bringing condemnation from Russia apologists and anti-Americanists, and much handwringing from pro-Western countries that are among the 111 signatories of a 2008 pledge not to use these weapons. Benny Avni notes that the Convention on Cluster Munitions was prompted by Israel’s use of these weapons in its 2006 war with Hizballah:

Cluster munitions, which break into hundreds of bomblets, have been used in battle since the Vietnam War to hit wider areas than other artillery or aerial-dropped bombs. Critics have long zeroed in on the weapons’ high rate of unexploded munitions, or duds, which pose dangers to civilians, including children, well after wars end. While human-rights groups have long raised such concerns, the push for banning the munitions gained crucial speed following the 2006 war, in which Hizballah shelled Israeli cities daily from missile launchers placed inside villages and towns in southern Lebanon.

The Israel Defense Forces’ use of cluster bombs to neutralize the threat led to criticism at the United Nations and in Congress. Unlike when NATO employed cluster bombs against Serbia a few years earlier, or when the allies used those arms in Iraq and Afghanistan, the IDF was widely accused of violating the rules of war.

Israel’s Winograd commission that investigated the IDF’s conduct in the war criticized the army command’s lack of clarity on when and where cluster bombs would be used. Yet, the IDF’s top legal official, Avichai Mandelblitt, ruled that the army was acting according to the rules of war relating to proportionality.

The cluster munition is a useful weapon of war that can help the Ukrainian army defeat a well-dug-in Russian force. Countries that never fathom fighting wars tend to frown on almost any weapon that kills. Those who do fight wars face a much more complex decision-making process.

Ron Ben-Yishai, reporting from a visit to IDF forces in the Gaza Strip, analyzes the state of the fighting, and “the persistent challenge of eradicating an entrenched enemy in a complex urban terrain.”

Hamas, sensing the war’s end, is mounting a final effort to inflict casualties. The IDF now controls 65 percent of Gaza’s territory operationally, with observation, fire dominance, and relative freedom of movement, alongside systematic tunnel destruction. . . . Major P, a reserve company commander, says, “It’s frustrating to hear at home that we’re stagnating. The public doesn’t get that if we stop, Hamas will recover.”

Senior IDF officers cite two reasons for the slow progress: meticulous care to protect hostages, requiring cautious movement and constant intelligence gathering, and avoiding heavy losses, with 22 soldiers killed since June.

Two-and-a-half of Hamas’s five brigades have been dismantled, yet a new hostage deal and IDF withdrawal could allow Hamas to regroup. . . . Hamas is at its lowest military and governing point since its founding, reduced to a fragmented guerrilla force. Yet, without complete disarmament and infrastructure destruction, it could resurge as a threat in years.

At the same time, Ben-Yishai observes, not everything hangs on the IDF:

According to the Southern Command chief Major General Yaron Finkelman, the IDF is close to completing its objectives. In classical military terms, “defeat” means the enemy surrenders—but with a jihadist organization, the benchmark is its ability to operate against Israel.

Despite [the IDF’s] battlefield successes, the broader strategic outcome—especially regarding the hostages—now hinges on decisions from the political leadership. “We’ve done our part,” said a senior officer. “We’ve reached a crossroads where the government must decide where it wants to go—both on the hostage issue and on Gaza’s future.”