Throughout the history of the 20th century, two patterns of aerial bombardment have emerged. The classic approach, as formulated by renowned Italian airpower theorist Giulio Douhet, sees strategic bombing as one meant to eradicate significant enemy assets and hit its home front with the aim of causing a moral breakdown, or at least the understanding that it would be better to hold fire than keep getting hammered.
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According to this approach, an airstrike should strive to inflict maximum damage on the enemy and its strategic facilities in as little time as possible.
Another approach lends airstrikes a psychological role, saying it should be designed to make clear to the enemy that our intentions are serious and to exert internal political-political-mental pressure on the enemy with aim of making it change its ways.
According to this approach, airstrikes should not inflict significant strategic damage, but should "send a message" to the other side.
This, for example, was the objective of Operation Rolling Thunder – the gradual and sustained aerial bombardment campaign conducted by the US during the Vietnam War. Proponents of this approach will often use terms like "psychological campaigns" or "effects" and others taken from the world of public relations rather than that of the military.
This rather crude segmentation can, however, illustrate why Operation Guardian of the Walls was different than previous military operations in Gaza.
Operation Protective Edge in the summer of 2014 clearly followed the second pattern of "sending a message." Then-Defense Minister Moshe Ya'alon said, airstrikes on Gaza "would continue until they understand that the escalation is not worthwhile and that we will not tolerate rocket fire on our communities and civilians."
He later pledged that the military campaign would end rocket fire on Israel, saying, "We will make anyone who employs terrorism against Israel deeply regret it."
Israeli airstrikes were clearly means to also carry an educational value – making Hamas "understand" things and "regret" its actions. If the IDF had the technology, I'm sure they would have made Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh go to his room.
During the 2014 military campaign, the IDF rarely bombed targets deep in the coastal enclave, focusing mainly on neighborhoods near the border. Shujaiyya bore the brunt of the attack, as the IAF had to provide cover for ground forces destroying Hamas' grid of terror tunnels, but Hamas' home front – the towers housing its offices and the lavish homes in which top operatives live – was mostly untouched.
It was only as the conflict was waning, 50 days into the fighting and as a truce deal was being formulated, that several high-rises in Gaza were leveled.
Fast-forward seven years and Operation Guardian of the Walls was completely different. Almost immediately once hostilities erupted on May 10, massive airstrikes targeted significant Hamas assets: towers fell, luxury estates were demolished, vacation homes and hideouts were reduced to rubble and, most dramatically, Hamas' flagship project – the strategic tunnel grid – was destroyed.
The purpose of the campaign was to substantially undermine Hamas' physical infrastructure so that even if it remained oblivious to the "message" it would suffer severe losses. The fact that the Palestinians are hawking victory propaganda does not change these basic facts on the ground.
True, Hamas has not been "defeated" – but no one thought it could be defeated solely by an aerial campaign, nor was that the objective this time.
The same applies to the lull in rocket fire. Without seizing control of Gaza and remaining there for a prolonged period of time it is clear that rocket fire cannot be eradicated.
Those who pay attention to the nuances saw that, in contrast to Operation Protective Edge, this time Israel did name ending the rocket fire as a stated goal of the military operation.
The working premise at this time Arab Israeli sector that there is currently no justification to seizing control of the Strip (for a variety of reasons), and as long as that option is not pursued operational objectives should be adjusted accordingly – limited goals for a limited operation.
The pundits say that Hamas triggered the latest conflagration to send a message to the Arab world that it is a "guardian of Jerusalem." In keeping with his fundamentalist view, Hamas defines religious goals taken from the jihadi wars of the 7th century.
Even if this is true – and the fact that the Temple Mount opened to Jewish worshippers on Sunday shows the opposite – at most Hamas has shown that it has 7th century-style bravado, while Israel has clearly demonstrated that in this 21st-century competition, it has the upper hand.
In the logic of the "rounds of violence" in which we live, we can safely say that this time, Israel actually got it right.
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