Israel’s genocidal war on Gaza is poised to enter its most devastating phase. The April 30 statement by Israel’s prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu that he would order a full ground offensive into Rafah, the southernmost city in the strip, with or without a deal has increased the precarity of the situation.
The dark and looming question is, what next.
Let’s begin first with the directly warring actors: Israel and Hamas.
Hamas has a five-point position: a permanent ceasefire, the withdrawal of Israeli forces from Gaza, unrestricted return of displaced Palestinians to their homes, more aid for the besieged enclave and the start of a reconstruction process.
Israel’s position has two contradictory objectives: complete destruction of Hamas and return of captured Israelis. Its actions have been informed by the pressures of these two objectives — destruction of Hamas necessitated, according to Israeli war plans, laying Gaza waste from the air before the commencement of the ground offensive and to strike targets selectively while the ground troops operated in different parts of the strip.
The second objective required that it kept the communication channels open for negotiations to bring back the captives.
Netanyahu has a divided house at home — his coalition has rightwing ministers that have made clear that they want to expel Gazans, occupy Gaza and build illegal settlements there.
The Israeli war cabinet has tried to reconcile these two objectives by arguing that destroying Hamas’ capabilities was and is essential to generate pressure on the group for negotiating the release of the captives.
To this end Israel has deliberately killed civilians (+972 and Local Call have done extensive reports on its targeting strategy) and destroyed Gaza’s agricultural lands and other essential infrastructure to create a humanitarian crisis.
There’s enough evidence to indicate that the strategy was (and remains) not only vengeful but also meant to make Hamas’ resistance cost-prohibitive.
The essential features of Israel’s latest offer, what US Secretary of State Antony Blinken called “extraordinarily generous,” have not changed from the previous two ceasefire-for-captives arrangements. Reports suggest Israel has offered a 40-day ceasefire for the return of the elderly and sick captives, which number about 33/34. In return, it would release an unspecified number of Palestinian prisoners. Some have put the number at 900, though there are also reports that Israel has rejected the names of some of the prisoners Hamas wants released.
A CNN report says “The second phase is what sources described as the ‘restoration of sustainable calm,’ during which the remaining hostages, captive Israeli soldiers and the bodies of hostages would be exchanged for more Palestinian prisoners.”
Hamas’ deputy chief for Gaza, Khalil al-Hayya, was reported as saying last Saturday that Hamas would study the draft and respond. The group is to give its response on Wednesday evening, a few hours before the writing of this article.
Aside from the direct contestants, other interested parties include the United States and its western allies, most of whom continue to support Israel, but have become increasingly queasy as the human toll in Gaza has risen. The United Nations is deeply concerned about the ramifications of a ground assault on Rafah. The UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres has already issued a dire warning against the offensive. The discovery of two mass graves at two hospitals in Gaza have also put further pressure on Israel.
Many observers inside and outside Israel know that it is in Netanyahu’s interest to stay in power. His choice is stark: either create more chaos or get ready for new elections. The other problem are the cases against him.
On the other side of the divide, Hezbollah and Houthis are already in the play, though while attacking Israel and its interests they are also cognisant of escalatory pressures. Iran is another interested party. Additionally, the US’ Arab allies, Egypt and Jordan, have their own interests that run contrary to Israel’s policy of attacking Rafah and the exodus to Egypt it could cause. Egypt had even declared the expulsion of Palestinians to Sinai as a red line — if Israel does go into Rafah, it will be skating on Egypt’s thin ice.
So, what’s it going to be?
Netanyahu has a divided house at home — his coalition has rightwing ministers that have made clear that they want to expel Gazans, occupy Gaza and build illegal settlements there.
This coalition is fragile. National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir and Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich have signalled to Netanyahu that they would bring down the government if any deal involved what they perceived to be concessions to Hamas.
“A government headed by you will have no right to exist,” Smotrich said in a video message addressed to Netanyahu.
Others like former IDF Chief and Defence Minister, Benny Gantz, currently a member of the Israeli war cabinet, and Yair Lapid, Leader of the Opposition, say getting the captives back is and should be the top priority.
One of the basic principles of negotiations is to focus on interests rather than stated positions.
Many observers inside and outside Israel know that it is in Netanyahu’s interest to stay in power. His choice is stark: either create more chaos or get ready for new elections. The other problem are the cases against him. The trial and the appeal process could be a somewhat long, but it’s a sword hanging on Netanyahu’s head, one sharp enough for him to invest much political capital in the months preceding the October 7 attack to legislate to defang Israel’s Supreme Court.
Ideologically, Netanyahu is cut from the same cloth as Smotrich and Ben-Gvir. But he is also Janus-faced and one of those faces are for the US and Israel’s European allies. In other words, while, ideally, he would like to expel all Palestinians not only from Gaza, but also the Occupied Palestinian Territories, regardless of the human cost, he also has to take into account the interests and compulsions of those external state actors whose support is crucial for Israel.
Hamas will be under pressure, given the humanitarian situation in Gaza, to not be viewed as the party that scuttled the deal. Israel and the US have already put the onus on Hamas.
Hamas, as noted above, wants a permanent ceasefire and complete Israeli withdrawal from Gaza. Negotiations have so far made shipwreck on these very points. Recently, Al-Hayya spoke of hudna, an Arabic word that denotes “calm, quiet” and goes back to the 10-year truce between the Prophet (PBUH) and the Qureysh at Hudaibiya.
Hamas will be under pressure, given the humanitarian situation in Gaza, to not be viewed as the party that scuttled the deal. Israel and the US have already put the onus on Hamas. As Blinken said at the World Economic Forum in Riyadh, “In this moment the only thing standing between the people of Gaza and a ceasefire is Hamas.”
Equally, Hamas is aware of the international pressure on Israel to stay clear of Rafah. Before Netanyahu’s Tuesday statement, Israel’s foreign minister, Israel Katz, told an Israeli TV channel that “If there is a deal, we will suspend the operation. The release of the hostages is a deep priority for us.”
From this perspective, Hamas could consider Netanyahu’s statement as a pressure tactic to get the group to agree to a deal even if it didn’t satisfy Hamas’ demands. Or, it could estimate that Netanyahu would use the pause to get the captives back and then have a free hand to move in with greater force. Either possibility could make Hamas dig in and let this play out. On the other hand, it could also ascertain that accepting the deal would put the pressure back on Israel.
Netanyahu too could be weighing the pros and cons. On the pros side, further use of force could keep his coalition intact; the US, despite making noises, would be hard pressed to pull back its support. Netanyahu could argue that while the war on Gaza has been a PR disaster for Israel, the world hasn’t been able to stop Israel from devastating Gaza. And this might just be the opportunity force the Palestinians out.
On the cons side, the putsch could fail to destroy Hamas. Despite IDF presence in northern and central Gaza, Hamas continues to operate in those areas. More casualties could invite a stronger response from Hezbollah. And Egypt could finally decide to issue a warning with actual mobilisation of a division or two. That seems like a remote possibility but events have a strange way of doglegging from the mapped course.