Three days after the start of the four-day truce between Israel and Hamas, the agreement seems to be holding and there is even talk of extending it. By Monday, 50 Israeli women and children are expected to have been exchanged for 150 Palestinian women and children, with mediators suggesting the deal could continue for a few more days under the same formula.
Although the terms of the truce resemble those proposed by Qatari mediators in recent weeks, Israel’s war cabinet insisted it was the result of military pressure it had exerted on Hamas. But only a few weeks ago, the government committed to freeing its hostages by force.
By agreeing to the terms of the release, Israel showed that it could in fact negotiate with Hamas, tacitly admitting that it was no closer to eradicating a group that had literally gone underground. Rather, by destroying much of Gaza City and, with it, Hamas’s institutions of governance, Israel’s actions have only made the group more elusive.
This was clearly demonstrated by the Israeli army’s siege and raid on Gaza’s al-Shifa hospital, which failed to produce conclusive evidence of the existence of a command center run by the Hamas, as she had claimed. Instead, the operation against al-Shifa, which proved disappointing at best, added to growing skepticism about Israel’s ability, with American support, to uproot Hamas from Gaza.
It is time for this reality to be recognized in the corridors of power in Washington. The Biden administration must abandon unrealistic Israeli rhetoric about the “end of Hamas” and adopt a more feasible political solution that takes into account the movement’s survival.
Increase in deaths, change in public opinion
Proof of Israel’s faltering mission can be found in the bloody dividends of war. Its air and ground attacks, which Defense Minister Yoav Gallant promised would wipe Hamas “from the face of the earth,” have so far failed to put an end to Palestinian fighters’ ambushes against Israeli positions or the almost daily volleys of rockets launched at Israeli towns.
Now in its seventh week, the war has killed more than 14,800 Palestinians, including some 6,100 children, razed residential neighborhoods and refugee camps, and displaced more than a million people across the besieged strip.
Military analysts had said the massive bombing campaign would “soften” Hamas’ positions ahead of Israel’s ground invasion, limiting the group’s ability to wage urban warfare in the densely built-up enclave. But in recent weeks, some U.S. officials, echoing Israeli media reports, have begun to admit that Israel’s relentless bombing has failed to neutralize Hamas’s fighting capabilities.
Tolerance for Israel’s actions also appears to be waning. On November 10, French President Emmanuel Macron became the first G7 leader to call for a ceasefire. On November 24, the Spanish and Belgian prime ministers criticized Israel’s “indiscriminate killing of innocent civilians” and the destruction of “Gaza society.” Pedro Sánchez, the Spanish Prime Minister, even promised to unilaterally recognize the Palestinian state.
In the United States, the Biden administration may be supporting its Israeli ally, but public opinion is rapidly shifting in favor of a permanent ceasefire. Massive protests calling for a ceasefire have taken place across the country and several major US cities, including Atlanta, Detroit and Seattle, have passed resolutions echoing the call.
A recent poll showed that only 32 percent of Americans think their country “should support Israel” in its war on Gaza. Having left little difference between his position on the war and Israel’s continuation of it, US President Joe Biden has already seen his numbers plummet in the polls.
Public pressure may have encouraged not only Washington to push for the hostage exchange, but also the Israeli government to agree to it. In addition to the backlash he has faced from the families of hostages held by Hamas, reports indicate that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has been pressured by Israeli security services and the military to make an exchange.
Although Netanyahu, Gallant and former Defense Minister Benny Gantz, who sits in the current war cabinet, have all said the war against Hamas will continue, public pressure could also cause them to reverse that intention.
The conflict is already taking a heavy toll on the Israeli economy, which is losing more than a quarter of a billion dollars a day. It is expected to decline by 1.5% in 2024 as fighting has disrupted air travel and cargo and the recent hijacking of an Israel-linked ship could even threaten shipping.
Then there are the tens of thousands of Israelis displaced from areas along the borders of Gaza and Lebanon, as well as all the families of the hostages who are demanding the release of all. The ongoing truce has demonstrated that Israelis held captive can be easily released without firing a single shot. This could help sway Israeli public opinion – which so far has been overwhelmingly supportive of the war – towards a ceasefire.
Some Israeli analysts are already noting a shift toward extending the truce. Indeed, continuing negotiations would make it possible to limit the country’s growing economic losses and preserve the lives of its prisoners and soldiers. The Israeli army has acknowledged the deaths of 70 soldiers since the start of the ground invasion.
The path to a ceasefire
Another problem with the Israeli government’s insistence on continuing the war is that it has not actually defined an endpoint acceptable to its allies, including the United States.
In addition to the stated goal of “eradicating” Hamas from Gaza, Israeli officials have also indicated that they want to expel the Palestinian population to Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula.
Pressure from Arab allies quickly quashed U.S. support for the idea as well as Israeli plans to claim undefined “security responsibility” in Gaza. The Biden administration’s alternative – that the Ramallah-based Palestinian Authority take control of the enclave – has been roundly rejected by Israel and Hamas, which, in the absence of Israeli reoccupation, would remain the sole power broker in Gaza.
Instead of recognizing this, the United States has stubbornly refused to launch policy proposals that take Hamas’ survival into account. In this willful blindness, Washington is joined by a chorus of experts who continue to propose “solutions” which presuppose the destruction of Hamas. But given the still-fresh memory of Afghanistan, American policymakers should know all too well that it is, ultimately, impossible to eradicate a local resistance movement.
It would be more possible to build on the example of the current hostage agreement, which showed that Israel and Hamas have the political will to negotiate. By working with mediators Qatar and Egypt, the United States can help move the dialogue around Gaza beyond the disastrous “with us or against us” rhetoric that has characterized the U.S. war on terror and engage discussions on a long-term ceasefire, which should be negotiated through the Hamas political leadership in exile.
There is precedent for this. Recall that in December 2012, Israel allowed then Hamas leader Khaled Meshaal to return to Gaza as part of a negotiated truce following that year’s eight-day war. The ability of current exiled leader Ismail Haniyeh to moderate the position of his Gaza counterpart, Yahya Sinwar, who is widely seen as the organizer of the October 7 attacks, will depend on Haniyeh’s ability to secure international funds for humanitarian aid and reconstruction.
Just as important will be the United States’ commitment to curbing Israel’s extremist policies, including its siege of Gaza and its support for settler violence in the occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem. Once such de-escalation occurs, it will become crucial for the international community to fulfill its commitment to the reconstruction and development of Gaza, alleviating the desperate conditions that helped give rise to the October 7 attacks.
Certainly no vision of a peaceful future can tolerate the killing of civilians. But finding a way out of the current crisis means reckoning with the reality exposed by the first seven weeks of this war: there is no way to wipe Hamas “from the face of the earth” without eliminating a number countless Palestinians – and Israelis – live with it.
If Hamas’s long-term survival strains the imagination, the risks of simply avoiding the thought are even more unimaginable. While this is clearly not a widely held sentiment in Israel at present, some Israelis, such as former government advisor and Bar-Ilan University professor Menachem Klein, are rallying around the idea. Speaking to Tel Aviv Tribune after the release of the first Israeli hostages, Klein acknowledged that it was “impossible to totally destroy Hamas by force.” The way forward, he argued, should include the group in new negotiations around a Palestinian state.
Given the horrific suffering endured by the people of Gaza, the growing international and domestic pressure to end it, and the ever-looming prospect of a broader regional conflict, the United States can no longer insist that the elimination of Hamas is the only way to end this war.
The opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the editorial position of Tel Aviv Tribune.