Biden Pushes Hezbollah Solution in Gaza

How close is Iran to a bomb?; UNC axes DEI; Senators ask IRS to sanction Tides, WESPAC

By Park MacDougald, THE DAILY SCROLL    14 MAY 2024

The United States claims that it supports Israel’s goal of an “enduring defeat” of Hamas, even as it has also struggled desperately to secure a cease-fire deal that it hopes would end the war while pressuring Israel not to expand its operations into Rafah. In a Tuesday story, anonymous U.S. officials spoke to The Times of Israel’s Jacob Magid to explain the apparent contradiction. What they said offered further confirmation of what we’ve been saying for a long time, which is that in Gaza, as in Lebanon, the United States and Israel are on opposite sides.

First, there’s the question of what the “defeat” of Hamas looks like. Here, U.S. officials have variously claimed that “victory” in Gaza is impossible, and that it has already been achieved. The contradiction here is only apparent, since, practically speaking, they cash out to the same demand: that Israel not enter Rafah. A non-exhaustive selection of recent quotes:

• “The goal is for Hamas to be severely weakened … but we have to be honest about the fact that Hamas will remain in Gaza in some form after the war is over. The past six months have proven no amount of fighting is going to change that.” —one of the U.S. officials quoted in Magid’s story
• “Sometimes when we listen closely to Israeli leaders, they talked about mostly the idea of some sort of sweeping victory on the battlefield, total victory. I don’t think we believe that that is likely or possible.” —Deputy Secretary of State Kurt Campbell, speaking at a NATO Youth Summit on Monday
• “We have learned in our own experience in difficult wars that eliminating something is different than making it no longer be a threat. The challenge is to reduce Hamas to the point that it’s no longer a threat.” —U.S. Ambassador to Israel Jack Lew to Israel’s Channel 12 News on Sunday
• “We believe that [Israel has] put an enormous amount of pressure on Hamas and that there are better ways to go after what is left of Hamas in Rafah than a major ground operation. … The picture of Hamas today is not what it was six months ago.” —National Security Council spokesman John Kirby in a press conference last week
• “Military pressure is necessary but not sufficient to fully defeat Hamas. If Israel’s military efforts are not accompanied by a political plan for the future of Gaza and the Palestinian people, the terrorists will keep coming back” —National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan on Monday

Israel can’t win, so it should stop the war and proceed to a “political plan,” but also it’s already won, so it should stop the war and proceed to a “political plan.” As Omri Ceren and Tablet’s Tony Badran point out on X, this communications playbook is not even unique to Gaza. Rather, it’s standard operating procedure for Team Obama-Biden whenever an Iranian “equity” is threatened, going back to the Syrian civil war:

For instance, here’s then White House Press Secretary Jay Carney on May 29, 2012, responding to reports that a Syrian government militia had massacred over 100 people in the town of Taldou:

We do not believe that militarization, further militarization of the situation in Syria at this point is the right course of action. We believe that it would lead to greater chaos, greater carnage.

And here’s Carney again on Feb. 18, 2014:

It is still our view, absolutely, that there is not a military solution to this conflict and that a negotiated political settlement is the only path forward for Syria, and the Geneva process is the process by which that is pursuable and achievable at this time.

In reality, of course, the U.S. line that the conflict could not be resolved by “militarization” or a “military solution” was merely cover for U.S. inaction while Iran and Russia successfully implemented a “military solution” to ensure the Assad regime’s survival. Later reporting revealed that the Iranians had told the Obama administration directly that they would collapse nuclear talks if Washington intervened against Tehran’s Syrian “equity.”

But let’s return to Gaza. The Americans claim that Hamas cannot be defeated and has already been defeated. What do they propose instead? Formally, the answer is a two-state solution, with a Palestinian state led by a “revitalized” Palestinian Authority, with Israel receiving normalization with Saudi Arabia as an inducement. Informally, according to Magid’s reporting, the answer is a Hezbollah-style arrangement in Gaza in which Hamas reconciles with the PA and formally withdraws from government while remaining as an independent political and military force. Per Magid:

The American source said there are some in the administration and in Arab capitals who believe that Hamas will be willing to formally withdraw from governing responsibilities in Gaza if it is part of a reconciliation deal with PA President Mahmoud Abbas’s Fatah movement.

Notably, the US has signaled its tepid support for China’s recent efforts to strike a long-elusive deal between Hamas and Fatah. “If China wanted to play a productive role in bringing this conflict to an end, that is something that we would welcome,” [State Department Spokesman Matthew] Miller said last week.

This would likely mean a degree of Hamas approval of the individuals tapped to lead the transitional Palestinian government in Gaza, but the American source said that no Hamas members would be allowed in the government.

Ah. Hamas will approve the individuals tapped to lead the Palestinian government, but Hamas will not be in the government. This White House drives a hard bargain!

Except—hold the fort—the U.S. plan almost precisely mirrors Hamas’ plan, as articulated by Matthew Levitt in a recent article in Foreign Affairs. That plan is to withdraw from governing responsibilities in order to create a Hezbollah-style arrangement in a future Palestinian state. Here’s Levitt:

In launching the October 7 attack, Hamas upended the status quo in Gaza. Less noted has been what it wants instead. In fact, as debate ensues over postwar administration of the strip, Hamas has begun to lay the groundwork for reconciling with and ultimately taking over the PLO, thereby guaranteeing that it is part of whatever governance structure emerges. Al-Hayya, the Hamas official who explained that his group wanted to change the whole equation, recently acknowledged this plan and has floated the idea of a five-year truce with Israel based on the armistice lines that existed before the 1967 war and on a unified Palestinian government that controls both the West Bank and Gaza Strip. Indeed, since December, senior leaders from Hamas have been meeting with factions of Fatah that are opposed to Mahmoud Abbas, the deeply unpopular leader of the PA, to discuss just such a rapprochement. On April 21, Haniyeh explicitly proposed restructuring the PLO to include all Palestinian factions.

For a militant Islamist movement that has long disavowed the more moderate and secular Palestinian Authority, seeking to join forces with the PLO may seem surprising. But behind Hamas’s recent push is the more important strategic goal of emulating the Hezbollah model. In Lebanon, Hezbollah is nominally part of the weak Lebanese state, allowing it to influence policy and have at least some say in directing government funds, yet it maintains complete autonomy in running its own powerful military and in fighting Israel. Under a new arrangement for Gaza and the West Bank, Hamas hopes to exert the same influence and independence with its own movement and militia, neither beholden to nor controlled by a government.

Indeed, we’d go one farther than Levitt. Hezbollah does not merely “influence policy” in Lebanon, but effectively controls the country on behalf of its sponsor, Iran.

So U.S. policy is the Lebanonization of “Palestine,” which also happens to be Hamas policy—and, we presume, Iranian policy. The only ones who aren’t on board are the Israelis, which is why we’re seeing a full-court press to bring them in line.

Read more here.

And here.