Washington DC – US Secretary of State Antony Blinken has become the latest US government official to warn Israel that it cannot “reoccupy Gaza” after the war with Hamas, in response to recent comments by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
Netanyahu raised concerns this week after suggesting the Israeli military could control security in Gaza “for an indefinite period” when fighting in the besieged Palestinian enclave ends.
Israeli officials have since said that Netanyahu did not mean that Israel was considering taking administrative control of the Gaza Strip, but the country’s intentions remain unclear amid conflicting statements from senior government leaders, including the country’s security minister. Defense Yoav Gallant.
Speaking to reporters in Japan on the sidelines of the G7 meeting on Wednesday, Blinken said that “the only way to ensure that this crisis does not happen again is to start creating the conditions for lasting peace and security ”, including “no reoccupation of Gaza after”. the conflict ends.”
The Israeli government has claimed that its occupation of Gaza ended in 2005, when it withdrew its military forces and settlers from the enclave. But this position has been described by Israeli rights group B’Tselem as “totally baseless” and rejected by international law experts.
Here, Al Jazeera speaks with Michael Lynk, who until last year was UN special rapporteur on the human rights situation in the occupied Palestinian territories, about recent discussions around the Israeli occupation of Gaza and what might happen after the war ends.
Al Jazeera: The United States has said it opposes Israel’s “reoccupation” of Gaza. But did the Israeli occupation of Gaza ever end?
Michael Lynk: A few years ago, a comment was made on Canada’s CBC radio that Gaza was no longer occupied. Myself and another organization (Canadians for Justice and Peace in the Middle East) each sent letters to say that Gaza remained effectively occupied.
The test of international law is this: does the army exercise – the term means “effective control” – over the land or territory?
It’s as if the guards are leaving the prison, but they are taking all the keys with them; They still control the amount of food that enters the prison each day and the amount of electricity that enters the prison each day. People inside the prison are free to move wherever they wish within the confines of the prison, but are not allowed to leave – this would be “effective control” over the prison.
It is in the same way that Israel exercises effective control over who and what leaves Gaza and who and what enters Gaza as well.
AJ: What significance does it have for the United States to use the term “reoccupation”?
Lynk: I suspect the United States does not argue that Gaza is occupied. I don’t know if they have a coherent position on the current status of Gaza. They probably accepted that Israel, by leaving Gaza in 2005, had officially ended this occupation.
In fact, it is very difficult to find a statement from a recent Republican or Democratic administration that uses the word “occupation” to describe any part of Palestine on this subject.
So I guess I understand why they use the word “reoccupy”, in the sense that they are talking about Israeli troops retaining power inside Gaza and exercising military authority whenever the current fighting ends.
But as I said, this is not a reoccupation, but an occupation in a new form.
Al Jazeera: What differences do we see between the United States and Israel in their vision of what will happen after the war in Gaza?
Lynk: We are witnessing a tactical debate between the United States and Israel over what Gaza would look like immediately after hostilities end.
Israel says it will likely have to stay in Gaza for some time. And that’s probably because they absolutely want to destroy everything they can find regarding Hamas’ military presence.
Given Blinken’s tour of parts of the Arab world last week, he acknowledges the intense pressure coming from the Global South in general, and in particular, over what Gaza would look like afterward, and he acknowledges that any form continued Israeli presence in Gaza is a failure.
Keep in mind that there are calls not only for the reoccupation of Gaza in Israel, but also (among some far-right Israeli lawmakers) for the resettlement of settlers in Gaza. This is an argument that can be heard in the far-right settler movement.
However, I suspect that there are all sorts of voices within the Israeli military and Israeli military intelligence that say this is not a solution.
Al Jazeera: What’s next in terms of the Israeli occupation and the future of Gaza?
Lynk: There are several possibilities.
The first, which I think must be one of the weaker possibilities, is that Israel remains on the ground inside Gaza and governs it through direct military administration for the foreseeable future. .
I think this is very unlikely to succeed, both because I think Israeli soldiers would likely pay a high price, as they did to maintain their occupation of Lebanon in the 1980s and 1990s.
A second option, which I think is the one that the United States would prefer – and you would probably find support from the countries of the North – would be the arrival of an international administration, either led by the Arab world, led by the Nations United Nations, or led by the United Nations. a combination of these, where there would be international troops on the ground, there would be an international fund to rebuild Gaza.
And there would be, I suppose, a serious attempt to try to build governance capacity to be able to provide basic services in Gaza, as any national or municipal administration would do.
And that would include, I suppose, a plan for the Palestinian Authority to take over at some point.
Al Jazeera: Could there be a path to an end to the Israeli occupation?
Lynk: For the Palestinian Authority to step into the picture, it must itself make a difficult political choice.
Are they simply intervening to provide stability and manage, if you like, Gaza, or is this actually a first step towards an independent Palestinian state? And I would be quite confident in saying that the Palestinian Authority would insist that it would not want to take over the administration of Gaza.
I think there would be great reluctance to be able to be seen going in, governing and taking over the administration of Gaza, on the back of Israeli bayonets. They would like a guaranteed prelude to the end of the occupation of East Jerusalem and the West Bank.
And the problem is…if the Biden administration doesn’t have the political clout to force Israel into humanitarian pauses, let alone a ceasefire, what hope is there for the United States to use its political capital to coerce Israel – in American elections? year – to conclude the substantial agreements necessary to be able to create a single independent Palestinian state, where the settlements have ended and where the Palestinian capital in East Jerusalem is located?
I think the chances of this happening are less than zero.
This interview has been edited for length and clarity.