There comes a point when military strategy stops being strategy and becomes obsession. Benjamin Netanyahu appears to have reached that point. For years, Netanyahu has presented himself as the indispensable guardian of Israel’s security, insisting that overwhelming military force is the only language Israel’s enemies understand. Yet after years of war, the results tell a different story. Gaza has been devastated, but Hamas has survived. Hezbollah remains a powerful force. Israeli forces continue operating in southern Lebanon and southern Syria, while settlement expansion and territorial control intensify in the West Bank. This is not strategic resolution. It is strategic overreach.

This is not strategic resolution. It is strategic overreach.

The fantasy of permanent expansion is based on a simple logic: push Hezbollah away from Israel’s northern border, establish security zones in Lebanon and Syria, maintain control over large portions of Gaza, and expand Israeli settlements throughout the West Bank. On a map, this may look like strategic depth. In reality, every additional territory brings another population, another resistance movement and another military burden.

Israel has already learned this lesson in Lebanon. Its 18-year occupation of southern Lebanon did not produce permanent security. Instead, resistance intensified and Hezbollah emerged as a formidable military and political organization. Israel eventually withdrew in 2000. Yet Israel is again maintaining military positions inside southern Lebanon. Israel says its declared security zone is necessary to prevent Hezbollah from rebuilding its military capabilities, and it continues to conduct strikes there despite the June ceasefire. The lesson should be obvious: occupation can create the resistance that is later used to justify the occupation. That is not security. It is a self-perpetuating conflict.

Gaza also exposes the contradiction in Netanyahu’s strategy. Israel can destroy infrastructure and seize territory, but what happens afterward? Netanyahu has repeatedly said Israel will not withdraw from the territory it currently controls. On September 2, he said Israel controlled about 60 percent of Gaza and would remain on its military line. But controlling territory is not the same as governing it. Who governs Gaza? Who rebuilds it? Who provides security for its population? How long does Israel remain? Netanyahu can order the army to seize territory, but he cannot order Palestinians to abandon their national identity or surrender their desire for self-determination.

The West Bank is being transformed more quietly but perhaps more permanently. Settlement construction, land seizures, new outposts and connecting infrastructure are steadily fragmenting Palestinian territory. Recent reporting has documented the expansion of settlement outposts and the involvement of Israeli authorities in facilitating territorial expansion. Formal annexation is not necessary to change a map. Territory can be absorbed gradually through settlements, infrastructure and military control.

You can conquer territory. You can occupy land. You can destroy armies. But you cannot occupy your way to security.

Syria adds another layer to Israel’s expanding security perimeter. Israel says its military presence in southern Syria is necessary to protect its border amid instability following the collapse of Bashar al-Assad’s government. But temporary military measures have a troubling tendency to become permanent. A military position becomes a base. A buffer zone becomes an occupation. An occupation eventually becomes a political reality.

This is where Netanyahu’s vision collides with reality: Israel does not have unlimited manpower. Its military relies heavily on reservists, and occupation is fundamentally different from winning a war. Occupation requires soldiers every day — patrolling roads, guarding settlements, operating checkpoints, protecting infrastructure, gathering intelligence and confronting resistance.

Now imagine maintaining that burden simultaneously in Gaza, the West Bank, southern Lebanon and southern Syria. Every additional kilometer of territory creates another kilometer that must be defended. Military superiority does not mean unlimited manpower.

There is also an economic ceiling. War is expensive. Occupation is even more expensive because it has no natural expiration date. Weapons must be replaced. Soldiers must be mobilized. Bases must be maintained. Businesses lose workers. Government resources are diverted from civilian needs toward military operations.

Israel can sustain enormous military expenditures for years. But there is a fundamental difference between winning a war and maintaining a permanent regional military apparatus. Eventually the question becomes not, “Can Israel afford to win?” but “Can Israel afford to occupy indefinitely?”

The greatest obstacle to Netanyahu’s vision, however, is human resilience. Palestinians have survived displacement, occupation and repeated wars while maintaining a powerful national identity. Lebanese resistance survived Israel’s long occupation of southern Lebanon. Military domination has repeatedly failed to erase national consciousness. This does not excuse attacks on civilians or legitimize every form of armed resistance. But it exposes the fundamental fallacy in Netanyahu’s strategy: You cannot bomb a political identity out of existence.

You cannot bomb a political identity out of existence.

Netanyahu appears to have confused military power with strategy. Israel can win battles. It can destroy infrastructure, eliminate commanders and seize territory. But strategy requires answering what comes next. If there are no answers, military victory becomes an endless process rather than a solution. That is Netanyahu’s central failure.

He can expand the battlefield, but he cannot eliminate the political grievances that sustain resistance. He can occupy land, but he cannot permanently occupy the people living on it. Netanyahu’s greatest strategic miscalculation may therefore be believing that Israel can achieve permanent security by making itself territorially larger and its neighbors permanently weaker. It cannot.

At some point, expansion becomes overextension. Security zones become occupations. Military victories become strategic liabilities. What appears to be strength begins to look like exhaustion.

The Middle East does not need another redrawing of its borders enforced by military power. It needs a political settlement that recognizes the rights and security of all the people who live there.

Because the fundamental truth remains: You can conquer territory. You can occupy land. You can destroy armies. But you cannot occupy your way to security.

– Jamal I. Bittar is a university professor and opinion writer focused on Middle East politics and U.S. foreign policy. He is based in Toledo, Ohio. The views expressed are solely his own and do not represent those of any institution with which he is affiliated.