T. Belman. The three diplomats questioned are clearly anti-Israel. What they see as bad news, I see as good news.
By asserting it will maintain security control over Strip, rejecting PA return, not advancing alternate plans, Israel likely to find itself stuck in enclave, top officials tell ToI
Israel is setting the conditions for the Israel Defense Forces to reoccupy Gaza after the war, three senior Western diplomats told The Times of Israel over the past week.
The diplomats — two of whom are ambassadors — acknowledged Israel’s stated desire to avoid such a scenario.
However, they explained that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s rejection of the Palestinian Authority returning to govern Gaza, his failure to advance viable alternatives, and Jerusalem’s assertion that Israel will maintain overall security control of the Strip are dissuading regional and global actors from cooperating with US efforts to rehabilitate the enclave after the war.
“Given these circumstances, I don’t see a more likely scenario,” said one of the diplomats who spoke on condition of anonymity.
“We will work to prevent the reoccupation of Gaza, but there aren’t any volunteers to govern there besides the PA, which the current Israeli government is determined to weaken, so where does that leave us?” asked a second diplomat, highlighting the decision by the cabinet last month to withhold hundreds of millions in Ramallah’s own tax revenues, robbing the already cash-strapped PA of much-needed funds.
The third diplomat agreed with the prognosis shared by the other two but speculated that Israel could change course eventually, as it did after occupying southern Lebanon for 15 years. The government withdrew its forces in 2000 amid waning public support for a mission that took the lives of hundreds of IDF soldiers stationed there.
The comments from the Western diplomats revealed the sobering outlook held in several of the countries that continue to support Israel’s military operation against Hamas but that are increasingly opposed to Netanyahu’s plans for Gaza when the war winds down. The remarks also exposed the limited degree of sway that some of the world’s most influential governments believe they currently have over Israel after October 7.
In the two-plus months since Hamas’s terror onslaught — in which roughly 1,200 people were massacred in southern Israel and some 240 were taken hostage into Gaza — Netanyahu has insisted that Israel will maintain “overall security control” of the Strip after the war in order to ensure that a similar attack can never take place again.
The view is shared across Israel’s leadership, with war cabinet minister Benny Gantz saying last week, “We will establish full security control over the space, including a territorial seizure that will allow the continuation of the operational effort.”
In addition to the creation of a military buffer zone inside Gaza, the IDF will also enter the enclave as needed in order to neutralize brewing terror threats, Israeli leaders have also declared.
“We know that we will have the freedom to eliminate any kind of threat in the future, and there will be no serious military threats against Israel from Gaza… We will conduct any needed operation and military effort in order to secure our future,” Defense Minister Yoav Gallant said on Monday.
In that same breath, Gallant clarified that Israel “will not control Gaza in any civilian way.”
Israeli officials have privately likened the future status they envision for Gaza to that of the West Bank’s Area B, where Israel maintains security control while not being responsible for civilian services for Palestinians.
“No Arab force will agree to enter Gaza under such circumstances,” said one of the diplomats. They argued that this breakdown of responsibility is what led the PA to become so unpopular in the West Bank and that Abbas could therefore not be expected to return to Gaza under a similar format.
But Netanyahu has all but rejected both conditions, saying repeatedly that he will not allow Gaza to become “Fatahstan,” in reference to Abbas’s party, and declaring Saturday that he is “proud” to have prevented the establishment of a Palestinian state.
As for what government he would accept in Gaza after the war, Netanyahu sufficed by saying, “There will be a civil administration that does not educate its children to destroy Israel.”
Gantz was slightly more specific, saying last week that Israel should “identify local sources who will take care of sewage, medicine and civil issues” with support from “moderate Arab states.”
But the United Arab Emirates, for one, has conditioned financial and political support for the reconstruction of Gaza after the Israel-Hamas war on the advancement of a US-backed initiative toward a two-state solution.
A long-term ‘transition period’
For its part, the US has included opposition to the reoccupation of Gaza and to the reduction of Gaza’s territory via a buffer zone among its “five principles” for post-war Gaza.
Biden aides have acknowledged, though, that the IDF will have to maintain a security presence in Gaza for an initial period after the war.
“Yes, there will need to be some transition period at the end of this conflict, so there is not a security vacuum on the ground. But ultimately, as the secretary has been very clear and the president has been very clear, there cannot be a reoccupation of Gaza,” State Department spokesperson Matt Miller said Monday.
But Israel views this interim period as one that could last years and wants to take a page out of the US playbook.
“The United States was in Germany for several years, and they were in Japan for several years, and today Germany and Japan are two of your strongest allies. That’s the change we have to have with the Palestinians,” Strategic Affairs Minister Ron Dermer told MSNBC last month.
Asked to characterize Dermer’s comments, one of the senior Western diplomats responded, “That sounds a lot like occupation of Gaza to me.”
I completely agree with Heartland, about Israel controlling the funding.
There are simple solutions to prevent Hamas or the PA from being in charge of Gaza.
The question is, what is really behind the posturing of a Two State Solution which everyone in the Middle East knows no one wants.
I believe behind the determination to have the PA in charge or a two state solution is the determination to have a genocidal Palestinian population that can at any time be activated to attack Israelis and/or destroy Israel.
Of course the Americans in power won’t admit this. The progressives in Israel are either too ignorant of or incapable of reading between the lines, or they too, believe Israel should be faced with a genocidal population that is always there, ready to be activated by Iran.
The purpose of Oslo was to put an Iranian asset INSIDE ISRAEL, and not only just inside Israel, ON THE HIGH GROUND which would make it almost impossible for Israel to defend herself.
The problem we have in America today is that the people in command and control positions pretend to be Israel’s ally, especially in public speeches. But their actions betray their real intent: their actions are the actions of an adversary.
The public speeches, e.g. of Biden, are a form of Information War, on the American people as well as on the global population at large. They are meant to be a smokescreen that covers all manner of aggression.
The authors of this article are trying to influence public opinion by describing Israeli control of Gaza as an “occupation” and quagmire. “Occupation” implies the land belongs to Hamas or the PA. It is a politically loaded term that is meant to delegitimize Israel’s need to control the area for the safety of all people, the Jews and the Palestinians who otherwise would be abused and used as human shields.
Also Hamas is not a state, they are a terrorist group using the land of Gaza as their military headquarters. Nobody is safe there. The PA will not make the people safe either, because they too have as their goal the destruction of Jews and Israel.
Also the term “occupation” is always used to imply Israel doesn’t have any right to any of the land at all. The Palestinians believe the entire country of Israel is an illegal occupation.
So when this term is used, it is meant to make people understand that Israel has no right to any of the land it owns.
The only long-term solution for Gaza is to prevent the misuse of ‘donations’. Rearming will take place if funds can be diverted from civilian use. If all monies funding Gaza were funneled through an Israeli civil authority, average Gazans would become the most well-off Arabs in the Muslim world. It would also remove monies that influence policies detrimental to Israel like USAID, UNWRA and EU funds. To the advice to “follow the money” we must add “control the money.” Money fuels policy. Israel can condition its military withdrawal from Gaza on getting control of funding.