Beit Hanoun’s Lesson for Achieving Victory in Gaza

Israel rightly framed the October 10 ceasefire and hostage release as a strategic victory over Hamas. The Palestinian terrorist organization may have secured only a temporary reprieve before total defeat. To understand what the true defeat of Hamas might look like, it is worth examining the localized but highly instructive victory Israel achieved on August 2 in the northern Gaza town of Beit Hanoun.

Israel’s Triumph in Beit Hanoun

After repeated incursions since the start of the war, the IDF finally announced the dismantling of the Hamas Battalion in Beit Hanoun, killing, capturing, or expelling its fighters. A handful of stragglers were later hunted down in a tunnel beneath the casbah. Since then, the town has remained silent. The rocket and infiltration threat that had plagued neighboring Sderot for years has been eliminated.

The battle for Beit Hanoun came at a steep price. At least 15 IDF soldiers were killed.
More than 50,000 civilians were evacuated southward to clear the battlespace, with no residents — civilian or combatant — permitted to return thus far. Above ground, the town’s dense skyline, including its multi-story apartment blocks, is reduced to rubble. Underground, IDF engineers had to map and destroy a vast labyrinth of tunnels, bunkers, and weapon depots. This was the unavoidable reality of rooting out a terrorist army embedded within a civilian environment — one that Hamas deliberately transformed into a fortress.

Israel’s success was not clean, quick, or easy. It was, however, decisive, offering the clearest model for what the International Stabilization Force (ISF) — envisioned in President Trump’s peace plan and authorized by UN Security Council Resolution 2803 — will need to replicate across the 47 percent of Gaza still under Hamas control.

Why Hamas Capitulated

Israel launched Operation Gideon’s Chariots 2 — nicknamed “Conquer and Crush” — in August with the explicit intent of reproducing Beit Hanoun-style successes in Hamas’s remaining strongholds: Gaza City, Deir al-Balah, and Nusseirat. Hamas capitulated within weeks, agreeing to release all remaining hostages in exchange for an operational pause and IDF redeployment to the “Yellow Line” separating Israeli-controlled areas of Gaza from those controlled by Hamas. The speed of this capitulation underscores the deterrent effect of the Beit Hanoun operation. Hamas knew that its remaining battalions would meet the same fate.

The ceasefire, however, has provided Hamas with a lifeline in Beit Hanoun. Hamas is now attempting to turn the cessation of hostilities into an indefinite freeze on Israel’s offensive, taking advantage of the lull to reconstitute itself as a fighting force.

West of the “Yellow Line,” the group is rebuilding—digging new tunnels, booby-trapping buildings, reassembling arsenals, and reasserting its dominance over Palestinian civilians. The IDF recently published captured Hamas footage from Beit Hanoun illustrating the challenge ahead: terrorists in civilian clothing transporting weapons through a school; a tunnel shaft hidden between residential buildings; and scores — perhaps hundreds — of similar shafts dotting the town.

The ISF’s Burden — And Its Limits

Under the Trump plan, all terrorist infrastructure across Gaza must be dismantled. Under UN Resolution 2803, the International Stabilization Force (ISF) will be responsible for that task.

Yet none of the countries likely to contribute troops has indicated willingness or capacity to forcibly disarm Hamas if the group refuses to comply. Arab and Muslim states may hesitate to confront Hamas directly, while Western states may judge the mission too bloody and politically costly.

If the ISF will not do the job, Israel will.

Israeli officials have signaled repeatedly that they will not allow Hamas to reconstitute itself behind a peacekeeping force unwilling to fight. The Beit Hanoun model will need to be applied — at scale — from Khan Younis in the south to Gaza City in the north. It is a grim model, but the only proven one.

The Trump administration will have to maintain the world’s focus on a simple truth:
Hamas is solely responsible for this war, solely able to end it, and solely to blame for the devastation it deliberately caused.

Israel cannot accept a Gaza where Hamas remains armed, entrenched, and prepared to strike again. Beit Hanoun shows what it takes to defeat that threat — and what the international community must be prepared to support if it truly wants a stable Gaza freed from Hamas rule.

Mark Dubowitz is chief executive of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies (FDD). For more analysis from Mark and FDD, please subscribe HERE. Follow him on X @mdubowitz. Follow FDD on X @FDD. FDD is a Washington, DC-based nonpartisan research institute focused on national security and foreign policy.