Gaza Cease-Fire Should End With Hamas' Exile

[JohnSJ]

The right kind of deal would trade removal of Hamas leaders for Israel’s withdrawal and acceptance of the need for a political settlement.
May 7, 2024 at 7:52 AM PDT

Marc Champion (Bloomberg opinion columnist)

"Negotiations to secure a cease-fire in Gaza aren’t yet dead, but Israel has begun its assault on Rafah nonetheless. While everyone will take a side when it comes to assigning blame for this unfolding human catastrophe, the talks have been revealed as an exercise in bad faith by all involved.

There was bad faith from Israel because, in the days before the latest round of peace talks, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had been so vocal in his insistence that no matter what might emerge in Cairo, the Israel Defense Forces would at some point move into Rafah. This was a transparent attempt to doom efforts at bridging the gap with Hamas.

There was bad faith on the part of Hamas, because its Political Bureau Chairman Ismail Haniyeh implied by omission that the document he approved was the same one Israel already accepted. This was untrue. What Hamas agreed to on Monday was a counteroffer. I doubt Haniyeh believed for a second that Israel would accept, so for him this was about shifting responsibility for collapse of the talks."
...........

The first is that the proposal was so clearly an attempt to paper over the yawning gap between two essentially unreconcilable positions. Israel wants its hostages back without having to accept an end to the war; that would leave Hamas in place in Gaza and therefore victorious. Hamas, meanwhile, will trade its hostages only for a permanent Israeli withdrawal. Both demands can’t be met simultaneously.

The purported deal mediated by officials from Egypt, Qatar and the US consists of a three-stage plan in which the first 42-day phase included detailed procedures to begin an Israeli stand down and partial hostage release. The two remaining phases, according to the Al Jazeera document, would move to a “sustainable calm” in which all hostages would be traded for prisoners and an Israeli withdrawal, followed by reconstruction and compensation. The deal was to be guaranteed by Egypt, Qatar, the US and the United Nations.

I’ve argued many times that it’s in Israel’s long-term interests, and in the shorter term that of the hostages, to accept less than its war aims in exchange for their return alive. Israel could then engage the international community to take on the burden of Gaza’s reconstruction, and crush Hamas using a much broader military, economic and diplomatic toolkit over time. The key is to stop the bloodshed, and with that the erosion of Israel’s perceived international legitimacy and rise in global antisemitism that it’s causing.

It's clear that Israel is not buying this argument. The war cabinet decision to reject the latest cease-fire offer from Hamas was unanimous and the IDF’s plans in Rafah didn’t skip a beat. But before dismissing that response as warmongering in its purest form, consider what was not in the mediated agreement: Any mention of Hamas and its future.

I have been critical about the way in which Israel has conducted the war, in particular its failure to build a political strategy and its high tolerance for civilian deaths. The operation in Rafah, which involves closing a key entry point for aid and attacking a town that’s host to more than 1 million refugees from other parts of the strip, can only promise worse. Even so, the Israeli concern about Hamas remaining in Gaza as the IDF leaves is justified.

https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2024-05-07/gaza-ceasefire-should-end-with-hamas-s-exile?srnd=homepage-americas

[Think. Again.]

1. Personally, I think hamas should be obliterared once all the civilians are safe.

[JohnSJ]

2. Sure, but I am not sure how that can be achieved. Who is Hamas and who isn't? Similar to Viet Nam. Who were Viet Cong

and who were the South Vietnamese?

[Think. Again.]

3. I imagine that's a difficulty when dealing with...

...any subversive organization, any terrorist situation, or even any war.

Luckily, most respectable (and legitimate) military organizations are trained to protect non-combatants from collateral harm.

[JohnSJ]

4. Unfortunately, I disagree with your last statement. Maybe on paper, but reality paints a different picture during war.

[Igel]

5. They're trained.

Sometimes they do, sometimes they don't.

Which makes headlines: "US forces bomb wedding" or "US forces don't bomb wedding"?

And could that possibly influence the knowledge-base we use for making decisions? I think the answer's obvious.