Here's why it DOESN'T WORK to try to "Crush Hamas".
Look, Hamas are a horrible group, they've used insane tactics, and they've brought nothing positive at all to the situation(all of which you could equally say about Netanyahu and his partners in crime, er, coalition government, but let's discuss that at another point).
The problem is, the insistence that Hamas be "crushed", is pointless and useless.
For one thing, as the Iraq and Afghanistan situations have demonstrated, wars in the Middle East don't ever actually end with anybody "winning". Therefore, it isn't even actually possible to "crush" Hamas, anymore than it is to "crush" Israel.
And for the other, even if Hamas, as an organization, were to be "crushed", this wouldn't mean the end, or even the slight reduction, of the type of tactics that Hamas uses. It would simply cause the creation and emergence of even more extreme and violent groups on the Palestinian side...each of which would be pledge to "avenge the shame" of the destruction of Hamas. These groups would be far less disciplined, far less centrally controlled, and almost certainly far less defeatable.
If the Israel/Palestine dispute is ever to be settled, it can't be settled through military victory as we know it in the West. It can only be settled by REAL negotiations, preceded by the end of all sanctions against Gaza and the West Bank AND a permanent moratorium on any more West Bank settlement expansion at all. Even Hamas, with its massive flaws, has indicated it is willing to negotiate. This type of negotiation will require massive compromises and concessions on both sides, it may require new models of statehood(possibly including, for example, a Belgian-style federated state compromised of both Palestine and Israel-but not, under any circumstances, a return of the West Bank to Jordanian control or Gaza to Egyptian control, measures, opposed by virtually all Palestinians and considered insulting by every single person on both countries). It will require acknowledgment that Israeli Jews AND Palestinian Arabs have an equal connection to the overall area, parity of esteem as communities, and an equal right to redress of grievances and injustices), and apologies and acknowledgment of wrongdoing in all cases where innocent people on either side have been dislocated or otherwise made victims of injustices.
In negotiation, there is ALWAYS hope. In the fantasy of "crushing the foe", there is no hope at all. No foe can be crushed in the Middle East, and no war there can ever be "won" again.
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