-Analysis-
CAIRO — All parties involved in the Gaza ceasefire negotiations know that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu does not intend to end the aggression against the Palestinian people. Rather, he aims to reoccupy the Gaza Strip, or at the very least, gain full control and subjugate it.
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Back in May, The Jerusalem Post reported on what it said was a plan from Netanyahu’s office to end Gaza’s role as an “Iranian outpost” that “sabotages emerging supply chains.” The three-phase plan calls for establishing Hamas-free zones within 12 months, starting in northern Gaza, before slowly spreading to the south. An Arab and Palestinian force would take over security and oversee aid distribution and a de-radicalization program.
During the second phase, which would come in the next five to 10 years, Israel would maintain security in Gaza, while Arab countries would be in charge of the Strip’s reconstruction. The third phase, termed “self-governance,” would see Israel retain the right to act against “security threats,” the newspaper reported.
Power would slowly be transferred to either a local Gaza government or a unified Palestinian government (including the West Bank). Yet this is contingent on the successful de-radicalization and demilitarization of the Gaza Strip and will be subject to agreement by all parties, it reported, “The final step would be for the Palestinians to fully manage Gaza independently and join the Abraham Accords.”
Subjugating Gazans
The plan could not succeed unless the Palestinian people and their resistance surrender, under the pressure of the Israeli violent strikes. And the plan has been spoiled by their steadfastness and resistance as well as Arab countries’ refusal to take part in any day-after arrangements before the aggression has stopped.
Yet that has not stopped Netanyahu from working to subjugate Gaza in a way that does not allow it to remain a threat to Israel’s security.
As external and domestic pressure mounts on Netanyahu, he shows some flexibility and agrees to dispatch intelligence and technical delegations to participate in the negotiations held in European or Arab capitals. At the same time, he creates obstacles that disrupt effects to achieve a ceasefire deal — no matter how many concessions the resistance makes.
Netanyahu agreed to participate in the latest round of negotiations under pressure from the United States. Washington called for the talks, with the aim to cool the fire that Netanyahu ignited — by assassinating Hezbollah commander Fouad Shukr, and Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh — and to delay the response from Iran and its allies to those attacks.
Not one Israeli soldier
Delegations moved between Egypt and Qatar. But Netanyahu announced that he would not leave the Strip and that his army would continue to control the Netzarim Corridor, the Philadelphi Corridor and the Rafah Crossing. He rejected all proposals put forward by the mediators, including the deployment of an international force along the narrow border strip between Egypt and Gaza.
Netanyahu’s undeclared goal is to spoil the talks.
By rejecting the proposed American and Egyptian solutions, Netanyahu has thrown a wrench in the works. His undeclared goal is to spoil the talks. He knows full well that neither Hamas nor Cairo will accept the presence of Israeli forces in the Philadelphi Corridor, which deprives the resistance of its air, violates the peace treaty, its security annexes, and the crossings’ agreement with Egypt.
“We will not accept the presence of even one Israeli soldier on the Philadelphi Corridor or the Rafah Crossing, and this is a decisive position that cannot be reversed, even if it leads to a direct escalation between Egypt and Israel,” a senior Egyptian official told me. He said Egypt could accept participating with other Arab countries in “day-after” arrangements, but only after aggression stops.
Oslo revisited
“The Philadelphi Corridor is the great trick that Netanyahu has been holding onto since the establishment of the State of Israel,” said Israeli retired Major General Yitzhak Brick, adding that Netanyahu seeks to deceive the Israeli public when he says that controlling the corridor “a major achievement that cannot be dispensed with.”
“The army is present on the corridor above ground, but in the depths, there are many tunnels that are 50 meters underground and the army cannot reach them,” Brick said on Israel’s Channel 12. He believes that Netanyahu is sabotaging the negotiations by insisting on controlling the corridor and that he prime minister doesn’t want the war to stop because its end would mean the end of his political future.
Aluf Benn, editor-in-chief of Israeli daily Haaretz, wrote in an analysis that Netanyahu’s war goal is the occupation of Gaza, as the he has repeatedly declared since the beginning of the war: Israeli security control. Benn wrote that controlling the Philadelphi Corridor allows Israel to encircle Gaza on its three land sides and isolate it from Egypt, while controlling the Netzarim Corridor enables Israel to determine the number of displaced people who will return to their homes in northern Gaza.
If Donald Trump returns to the White House, Netanyahu expects to be given more freedom.
Meanwhile, Benn wrote that “the south of Gaza will remain Hamas’s, and the movement will be forced to care for the residents who lack everything, imprisoned under an Israeli siege, especially after the international community loses interest in this story and moves on to other crises (in the world).
Eyes on the U.S.
According to Benn, Netanyahu estimates that after the U.S. presidential election in November, the influence of pro-Palestinian protesters on American policy will diminish, even if Kamala Harris wins. If Donald Trump returns to the White House, Netanyahu expects to be given more freedom.
Benn concluded that in the cabinet meeting last week, Netanyahu reiterated his 1996 election slogan when he campaigned against Oslo Accords: “Negotiations, not concessions,” which means that the occupied territory will not be returned, not even under international pressure.
With Netanyahu’s plans known to all parties, including the Israelis, the question is: How will the resistance deal with it? And what will the mediators do?
