Going Through the Phases

Why the ceasefire agreement may result in a frozen conflict

The first phase of the ceasefire passed off relatively smoothly, accompanied by the Hamas propaganda tricks we saw in the November 2023 hostage release. Now the wheels are in motion, focus turns to the prospects for making it as far as phases two and three. A reminder: During the first phase, Hamas is due to release 30 more Israeli captives (in addition to the three released yesterday), most of whom are thought to be alive. In return, Israel will release 30 Palestinian children and women for every Israeli civilian released and allow the entry of increased aid into the Gaza Strip. Palestinians will be able to return to what’s left of their homes, and Israel will gradually withdraw from some parts of Gaza, while not conducting military flights over the territory for 10-12 hours per day.

In the second stage, Hamas is supposed to release all remaining alive male Israelis, both civilians and soldiers, while Israel is supposed to release an agreed number of Palestinian prisoners. The remaining Israeli soldiers are also supposed to withdraw from the Gaza Strip. In the third stage, Hamas would release the remains of deceased Israeli captives in exchange for deceased Palestinian captives. An agreement is supposed to be reached on future governance of the Strip, will end its blockade, and Hamas will be prevented from rebuilding its military capabilities.

Obviously, this massively contradicts Netanyahu’s promise of “total victory.” As a result, it has sent his supporters and sycophants into a spin. After relative radio silence, the consensus has emerged that Netanyahu will resume the war as soon as he can. The journalist Amit Segal, for example, who is closely associated with the prime minister, has said that only tens of the hostages will be released before the war resumes. According to other reports, Netanyahu has promised Ben-Gvir (who quit the coalition when the ceasefire began) and Smotrich (who has promised to quit the coalition if the hostilities are terminated) that the war is not yet over.

On the other hand, Netanyahu faces a formidable and tricky opponent in the form of President Trump, who is already disappointing those on the right who thought they had him in their pocket. Trump has been consistently unequivocal in his demand for an end to the war; it’s no great secret that he’s desperate to cement his legacy – and perhaps even become an unlikely contender for the Nobel Peace Prize! – by following up the cessation of hostilities in Gaza with a Saudi-Israeli normalization agreement and an end to the war in Ukraine. On the other hand, even if the war does end, it’s hard to see real progress being made on the Saudi front unless Netanyahu makes concessions on the Palestinian question that would certainly doom his already fragile coalition.

Predicting the future in the Middle East is a fool’s game, but I tend to think that, at this juncture, the full resumption of hostilities isn’t the most likely scenario. Israel withdrawing from territories and Palestinians returning home, even in small numbers, creates a new dynamic that will be hard to reverse. In addition, as the stories of captivity begin to emerge, public pressure will continue to advocate for no one being left behind. While key figures in Trump’s camp have said that Israel will be able to resume the war if needed, it’s clearly not in Hamas’s interest to offer them this pretext, given that Trump has already made clear he has no plans to restrict Israeli militarily in the way the Biden administration did (albeit half-heartedly).

On the other hand, the chances that the two sides can come to an agreement on a postwar framework seem slim. While perhaps Netanyahu might prefer a rump Hamas ruling Gaza, in order to return to the pre-October 7 strategy that he still hasn’t apologized for, the Israeli public wouldn’t accept such an arrangement. And it still seems unlikely that the surviving Hamas leaders would accept exile or total replacement by the Palestinian Authority or some other entity. Perhaps they would accept some kind of fudge in which they would take up a position akin to Hezbollah’s in Lebanon, but Israel surely wouldn’t accept this.

This would mean deadlock. But what if this deadlock was in the interest of all parties? It would leave Hamas alive and kicking and in control of the ruins of Gaza, and it would mean Netanyahu could placate both Smotrich and Trump by indefinitely postponing key questions on the Strip’s future. Gaza can’t conceivably be rebuilt without comprehensive agreement, of course, but a dramatically increased aid supply would surely remove it from the global headlines and Hamas would be able to enjoy the fruits of the “victory” they and their supporters worldwide celebrated earlier this week by indefinitely ruling over the territory in its limbo state.

Like everyone else who’s had dealings with him, Smotrich already knows not to trust Netanyahu, having previously called him a “lying son of a liar.” At the same time, Trump’s Middle East envoy, Steve Witkoff, who’s already shown he doesn’t do diplomatic niceties, is apparently considering a visit to Gaza to keep the ceasefire on track, saying that “there’s a lot of people, radicals, fanatics, not just from the Hamas side, from the right wing of the Israeli side, who are absolutely incentivized to blow this whole deal up.”

I wrote last week that the Gaza ceasefire agreement repeats the mistakes of earlier Israeli-Palestinian negotiations by postponing the most contentious issues indefinitely. On reflection, though, perhaps the best we can hope for at this juncture is that the interests of Hamas, Netanyahu’s government, and the American administration collide to produce an indefinite but peaceful postponement of attempts to achieve a lasting resolution. At this stage, this appears to the most realistic option available.