The Gaza Peace Plan Has Gone Nowhere

Seven months ago, Israel and Hamas reached a ceasefire agreement, largely ending the war in Gaza after two years of Israeli attacks and the deaths of more than seventy thousand Palestinians. The agreement, imposed on the Israeli government by the United States, involved a step-by-step process that would ultimately lead to the disarmament of Hamas and the reconstruction of Gaza. This is still what the Trump administration claims to want, through its Peace Council, but the situation remains unstable, with Israel continuing to strike the parts of Gaza it does not control, killing more than seven hundred people since the ceasefire began. (Last weekend, three people were killed in an Israeli drone strike on a food distribution center in Gaza.) Meanwhile, Hamas shows no signs that it is considering disarming.

I recently spoke on the phone with Michael Milshtein, director of the Palestinian Studies Forum at Tel Aviv University. Milshtein was previously an advisor to COGATwhich oversees civilian policy in the West Bank and Gaza Strip. He was also head of the Palestinian Affairs Department within the IDF’s military intelligence branch. During our conversation, which was written for length and clarity, we discussed the humanitarian situation in Gaza since the ceasefire, what a weakened Hamas seeks to accomplish, and whether Israeli elections this fall could change the country’s Gaza policy.

How would you describe the current situation on the ground in Gaza, and what, if anything, has changed since the ceasefire began late last year?

You know, nothing has changed. Since the ceasefire began in October, we have been able to say one thing very clearly: Hamas is the major player in Gaza. On the eve of the ceasefire, people talked about the possibility of some kind of alternative government, or maybe Hamas would consider disarmament, or maybe even Palestinian public opinion would be more critical of Hamas and there would be protests against its rule. But at present, Hamas is in complete control of the Palestinian part of Gaza. They control about forty percent of the total territory of the Gaza Strip, which is the area that is not under Israeli control.

And now we’re stuck. There has been no progress in the second phase of the ceasefire, which was supposed to focus on disarmament, governance and the reconstruction process. But nothing happened.

And what I can say about Israel is that it faces a T-shaped intersection with two options. And even though all options may be bad, we must choose the least bad one. One of these options is the one that members of the government talk about daily, namely resuming the war, defeating Hamas and perhaps occupying all of Gaza. This is what people like Bezalel Smotrich, the far-right finance minister, want. They want to resettle Gaza, and perhaps drive the Palestinians out of Gaza. But that desire depends on Donald Trump, and I don’t see Donald Trump currently allowing such a dramatic decision.

And the other option is actually to accept this idea of ​​a more bureaucratic Palestinian government. This may not be ideal, and Hamas would still exist in this scenario, but it is better than the alternative of occupying Gaza.

In fact, the second phase of the ceasefire included not only the disarmament of Hamas, but also the beginning of a more bureaucratic sort of government that would empower the various Palestinian factions to oversee governance in Gaza. And then, perhaps over time, Israel would grant more autonomy over the territory. Was that the idea?

Yes, the Israeli government even promoted this idea after the ceasefire was imposed on it: Hamas would give up its weapons, there would be some sort of alternative government, which would not be affiliated with Hamas, and we would encourage some sort of reconstruction with the support of the UAE and Saudi Arabia, and there would be a deradicalization of the Palestinians. It was a utopia and, from day one, a total illusion.

On the one hand, if you ask Hamas what it wants, it says very clearly that it is against disarmament, even after saying yes to Donald Trump’s plans. They said, “OK, we’ll accept this idea of ​​bureaucratic government.” But they made it clear that they would not give up their weapons and that this was important to who they were. So from day one it was obvious that there was a huge gap between what Israel, and perhaps even the US administration, wanted and what Hamas wanted. So, you know, in reality, nothing is really surprising about the current situation and the fact that we are stuck right now in a very problematic situation.

Don’t be too cynical here…

It’s OK

But do both parties really want this status quo?

Hamas, yes. But Israel, no. This agreement was imposed on Netanyahu by Donald Trump. It’s obvious. If you could ask Netanyahu six months ago, before the ceasefire, if he wanted to, he would say: no, I want to continue the war. For him, it’s a never-ending war. But his entire plan was really undermined by his idiotic attack on Hamas leaders in Qatar, because it caused Trump to pressure him to end the war.

My point was that, given Netanyahu’s inability to restart the war without US support, isn’t the status quo, with Israel controlling large swaths of Gaza, what he would prefer?

Yes, but both sides still hope to get what they want. If you ask Hamas, they will tell you that they really hope that Donald Trump will push Israel to expand its withdrawal from the yellow line, where it is positioned, and to promote reconstruction. But that didn’t happen. And if you ask Netanyahu, he will tell you that he wants the green light from Trump to resume the war, but so far that has not happened.

In a way, this all sounds a lot like what is happening in Lebanon. The Americans are the only ones who can solve this problem, because if you depend on Israel and Hamas, or, in the case of Lebanon, Israel and Hezbollah, there is no way to bridge the gap. There have been all kinds of negotiations with the Lebanese government and Israel, but the only one who could actually get a ceasefire right now is Donald Trump, telling Israel that this is what he is demanding.