Yossi Schwartz ISL (RCIT section in Israel/Occupied Palestine), 11.07.2024
In an opinion piece published on Thursday by the senior commentator of the “Washington Post” David Ignatius, he claims that “an American official told him last night that there is an agreement on the basic lines of a deal for the release of hostages, and now the two sides are discussing the ways of its implementation.”
According to Ignatius, the deal includes three stages. In the first, there will be a six-week ceasefire, during which Hamas will release 33 Israeli hostages, including all the women held captive, men over the age of 50, and all the wounded. In return, Israel will release hundreds of Palestinians from its prisons and withdraw its soldiers from densely populated areas towards the eastern border of Gaza. Humanitarian aid will flow in, hospitals will be repaired, and teams will begin clearing the rubble.
Hamas gave up the demand for a written agreement on the permanent cessation of the war. This is not good . Instead, they agreed to adopt the approach of the United States and the United Nations, which says that if the negotiations on the continuation of the cease-fire in the first phase last more than six weeks, the cease-fire will be extended as long as the negotiations continue. Even if Netanyahu will say that he agrees to this new deal he may sabotage it in the negotiations. Israel and Hamas agreed to an “interim government” in the Gaza Strip, a temporary government that will be established during the second phase. Such a government should lead to neither Israel nor Hamas controlling the Strip. A security force trained by the United States and supported by Arab countries will enter the enclave. It will include, among other things, 2,500 people from Gaza who support the Palestinian Authority and have been approved by Israel. Hamas has told mediators “that it is ready to give up authority for the interim government arrangement,” a US official said. In the real world such forces will not be able to prevent the real power of Hamas in Gaza.
In addition, it said each side feared the other would use the first phase of the deal to rearm and return to the fight, and Israel wanted to make sure it achieved its primary goal of blocking Hamas from controlling Gaza again.
The breakthrough came recently when Hamas gave up on its demand for a written guarantee of a permanent end to the fighting. Instead, Hamas accepted the reassuring language of a UN Security Council resolution passed last month endorsing the US-brokered deal
If “the negotiations will take more than six weeks in the first phase, the ceasefire will still last as long as the negotiations continue,” the UN resolution reads. American, Qatari, and Egyptian mediators will work to ensure that negotiations continue until all agreements are reached and the second phase can begin.
Additionally, Hezbollah has signaled that following a ceasefire in Gaza, it will support a package that includes the withdrawal of Hezbollah forces north from the border to the Litani River. The agreement will also include Israeli agreement to border changes that Hezbollah has long demanded and other confidence-building measures to end the exchange of rocket fire between the two sides.
Also, Saudi Arabia has signaled that if the cease-fire agreement is implemented – they will be ready to move forward in the normalization procedures with Israel. Riyadh is interested in securing a way to establish a Palestinian state as part of such a deal with Israel, according to an official American source.
This deal is weaker than the previous conditions Hamas demanded that could guarantee a permanent ceasefire. On the other hand, Netanyahu is under heavy pressure from the Israeli public, and 58% want an end to the war.
We can expect a flood of articles in Israel and other imperialist countries singing Hallelujah to the victory of Israel, while in reality, the Zionist monster lost this war. It did not achieve its goals: Hamas has not lost its political power, and Israel could not release the captives by military pressure. The small force of the resistance fought for more than nine months and destroyed the image of the Zionist army as a very powerful force. In addition, a pro-Palestinian mass movement has shown solidarity everywhere, and the isolation of Israel is growing. Thus, this war is the prelude to the destruction of the monster.
For Palestine, red and free from the river to the sea!