Mitchell Plitnick
Mondoweiss / December 6, 2024
In the wake of the ceasefire deal between Israel and Lebanon, there has been speculation about a similar deal between Israel and Hamas to finally bring about an end to the genocide in Gaza. But are there reasons to think this time may be different ?
In the wake of the ceasefire deal struck between Israel and Lebanon, there has been a lot of speculation about a similar deal between Israel and Hamas to finally bring about an end to the genocide in Gaza.
In many ways, the process we are seeing in revived talks in Cairo—where Qatar has agreed to resume its role as a mediator—are familiar. The terms under discussion have many similarities to previous proposals. The rhetoric from the United States is cautiously optimistic, as it was so many times before, while Israel, again characteristically, has been vague, sending mixed messages.
Are there reasons to think this time is different? Yes, there are, not the least of which is the relatively quiet role the United States has played so far. Does that mean there will finally be an end to Israel’s genocide? This is much less clear.
Israel’s triumph by force
One reason for optimism in the current round of talks is that Israel sees itself in a much better strategic position than it has before. It also believes that it can manage a deal for itself like the one it got with Lebanon.
The ceasefire with Hezbollah came with an understanding between Israel and the United States that Israel could continue to violate Lebanon’s sovereignty and keep on attacking sites in Lebanon, and it has done so consistently since the agreement was signed.
France, one of the guarantors of the ceasefire, as well as U.N. peacekeepers have noted scores of Israeli violations of the ceasefire, but all of these have gone without remark by the only party that really matters, the U.S. By contrast, when Hezbollah launched two mortars clearly intended as symbolic warning shots, Israel launched an intense wave of attacks on Lebanon, which, again, went unchallenged.
Lebanon and Hezbollah can do little about this. Cruel and destructive as the Israeli actions are, they are much more limited than the onslaught the ceasefire agreement diminished. A significant response from Lebanon risks reigniting that large-scale assault. Lebanon simply can’t afford that.
This is not a flaw in the ceasefire. It is precisely what was intended with the so-called “side letter” Washington sent to the Netanyahu government. In essence, that letter authorized Israel to launch lower-level attacks on Lebanon as it sees fit while stripping Lebanon of its sovereign right to self-defense.
That is the sort of arrangement Israel believes it is now in a position to achieve with Hamas in Gaza.
Hamas has reportedly shown more “flexibility” in its demand for a full and immediate Israeli withdrawal from Gaza. The current proposal would have a 60-day window for a phased withdrawal which would accompany a prisoner exchange in several phases.
Hamas has not suddenly decided that Israel can be trusted. The reality is that Israel’s assault on Lebanon and its intimidation of Iran have badly undermined Hamas’ calculus. Much of its resistance strategy has been premised on the support it would get from Hezbollah, Iran, Ansarallah, and various allied militias in the region.
At first, that materialized, although certainly not to the extent that Hamas had hoped. But the overwhelming brutality of Israel’s response, its willingness to target civilians, and, most of all, the silence and complicity of so much of the world in the face of Israel’s blatant criminality, have shattered the idea that Israel would be forced to fight a multi-front battle.
Ultimately the threat of a regional war, and the spectre of more places, especially in Lebanon, facing a fate similar to that of Gaza was too much for parties who, ultimately, were putting the lives of their children in jeopardy out of solidarity with the Palestinian people, not to defend themselves.
With Hezbollah and Iran forced to back away, Hamas can either fight a hopeless battle to the end or try to end the slaughter. They are opting for the latter, and trying to salvage what they can from what will inevitably be an admission of defeat.
This isn’t about Trump’s threat of even greater violence against Gaza, which is likely more of his unique brand of hot air. But if Hamas can end this with freeing Palestinian prisoners in exchange for the remaining Israelis held in Gaza, there is no better outcome possible anymore.
Yet that would be a grim result in a larger sense. Through it, Israel would demonstrate that might makes right, and that when a country acts with complete disregard not only for the lives of civilians on the other side, but even for its own civilians (as Israel has done in its total disregard for the lives of the hostages) it becomes so terrifying that people are forced to back down eventually. That is especially true when the country in question receives an unlimited flow of weaponry and ammunition from many of the world’s leading military suppliers regardless of the crimes it commits. That level of force and brutality is just too much for any civilian population to withstand.
Yet Israel, in the end, would be in a weaker position politically and diplomatically. Also, despite the fact that it was ultimately able to sow such destruction that it could win these one-sided ceasefire terms, its so-called “deterrence” has been badly shaken.
The amount of resources Israel and its Western allies have expended to devastate non-state actors and unarmed civilians was huge. Moreover, the opposition Israel faced was limited by its overriding concern that a regional war be avoided. Combined with Israel’s degraded position on the international stage, it will not come out a victor even if it manages to secure the kind of terms it hopes.
But will there be an agreement ?
This is the first time that conditions have changed in favor of a ceasefire rather than encouraging Israel to dig in its heels.
U.S. President-elect Donald Trump does not want to deal with this ongoing genocide when he takes office, and he has made that plain both in public and directly to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. He has sent his new Middle East envoy, Steve Witkoff, to the region to meet with some of the players. This isn’t going to have an immediate effect on the talks; Witkoff can do little more than repeat Trump’s own bluster and his desire for this issue to disappear before he re-enters the White house.
But it does signal that Trump believes there could be a deal, and he wants to make sure he can claim that it was his involvement that brought it about. That’s really why Witkoff is there.
Hamas and Fatah have agreed on the structure of a technocratic authority to run Gaza after the genocide is over. Whether Israel and the United States will accept this idea remains to be seen, but it does signal that Hamas also believes a deal might be on the horizon.
The real wild card here, as always, is Israel.
Netanyahu has to weigh several factors. The farthest right wing of his coalition, as represented by Itamar Ben Gvir and Bezalel Smotrich, is unpredictable, but they have not been barking about the revived peace talks in Cairo, which could mean they will accept a deal to free the remaining hostages, under certain conditions.
One of those conditions would be no formal end to the war on Gaza. The current proposal is for an extended truce, not an end to the war. That may be enough to keep Ben Gvir and Smotrich in the coalition government.
On the other hand, the silence from the farthest right could simply be a matter of not having concrete details to make demands about yet.
For Netanyahu, the questions run deeper. It’s unclear what would happen in northern Gaza in the event of a conditional truce, but he will surely want to prevent a return there.
Of greater concern to Netanyahu personally will be his own grip on power, which could slip away quickly with no more so-called “wars” being fought. His trial has resumed, and that incentivizes him to continue committing war crimes that allow him to argue against having to face the consequences of his domestic crimes.
Netanyahu also faces surprisingly uncertain waters with Trump, despite his making no secret of favoring him over either Joe Biden or Kamala Harris. Trump has had a hot and cold relationship with Netanyahu over the years. He doesn’t seem very concerned with Netanyahu’s personal stake in continuing the war of Gaza to escape the Israeli courts, and a report on Tuesday from Israel’s Channel 12 indicated that he contacted the recently sacked former Defense Minister Yoav Gallant for a briefing on the hostages. That could not have sat well with Netanyahu.
On the other hand, the foreign policy team Trump has nominated is mostly a roster of Iran hawks who would like nothing more than to help Israel dislodge the Islamic regime in Tehran. Netanyahu may believe that he can simply start his project of provoking a confrontation over again under a Trump administration.
But that is a risk. It remains to be seen if Netanyahu will take it. It seems much more likely that, despite the optimism, Netanyahu will torpedo the current talks just as he has every previous round. But it is fair to say that this time there are more and more significant factors arguing for an end to the horror that Israel has unleashed in Gaza. If a rational assessment still ends with it being unlikely, there is at least more room for hope than before.
Mitchell Plitnick is the president of ReThinking Foreign Policy; he is the co-author, with Marc Lamont Hill, of Except for Palestine: The Limits of Progressive Politics
