It's Israel, Not Hamas, That Is the Only Thing Stopping a Ceasefire

Israel insists it will continue its warfare until Hamas is eliminated, Hamas has accepted the ceasefire proposal. Yet Antony Blinken falsely claims it is Hamas that stands in the way of an agreement.

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There is a worldwide consensus that a ceasefire in Gaza is imperative, with only the most vicious of genocidal racists, largely on the rapidly expanding far right, disagreeing. On May 31, even U.S. President Joe Biden was finally compelled to put forth a proposal for a ceasefire, despite his repeated demonstrations of disdain for the value of Palestinian life. The proposal offers a workable outline, but is vague about details that could, potentially, be exploited by bad faith actors in Washington and Jerusalem.

Biden presented the offer as an Israeli one, though it is not very different from one that Israel had rejected only weeks earlier. Hamas immediately declared that it viewed the proposal favorably, but details were scarce and Israel—from Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on down—repeatedly stated that the terms were different in crucial ways from what Biden had put forth.

Now, the United Nations Security Council, in a unanimous vote from which only Russia abstained, has placed its imprimatur on the plan Biden put forth. Yet even as the UNSC celebrated the passage of Resolution 2735, Israel was already trying to twist it into something it is not.

Israel’s representative to the UNSC, Reut Shapir Ben Naftaly, said,  “We will continue until all hostages are returned and until Hamas’ military and governing capabilities are dismantled.”

Netanyahu’s office, which has been consistent in this messaging, stated on Monday that “Israel will not end the war until all its conditions are met — that is, fighting until Hamas is eliminated, returning all of our hostages, and ensuring that Gaza never again represents a threat to Israel.”

This directly contradicts the plan that the UNSC approved, and that Biden put forth. But it is consistent with what Israel has continuously stated since Biden put forth the proposal. If we are to believe that this is an Israeli proposal, then Israel is rejecting its own proposal.

What does the proposal say?

The terms of the offer have only been summarized, both by Biden and by the UNSC resolution. As always, the devil is in the details, and there are many questions that will concern the Israeli government, Hamas, the ordinary people on both sides and interested parties, advocates, and activists all around the world. This is the plan that Biden described and that the UNSC endorsed:

·        In Stage One, there would be a complete ceasefire for six weeks. Israel would withdraw from “all populated areas of Gaza;” Hamas and other militant groups would release some hostages, including women, elderly and wounded, in exchange for the release of “hundreds” of Palestinian prisoners; Palestinian civilians can return to their homes anywhere in Gaza; and at least 600 trucks of humanitarian aid would enter Gaza every day.

·        Stage Two is somewhat open-ended, and the details are supposed to be worked out during Stage One. It would see an agreement on a permanent end to hostilities, the release of all living hostages held in Gaza, and a full Israeli withdrawal from Gaza.

·        Biden explicitly said, and UNSC 2735 reiterated that if those negotiations were not complete at the end of Stage One’s six week period, the ceasefire would be extended until they were as long as both sides continued to negotiate in good faith.

·        Stage Three would then see the return of the remains of all dead hostages, and the start of a massive reconstruction effort in Gaza by the international community.

·        Biden added that if Hamas broke the terms of the agreement, Israel could resume its operations, presumably free of any further pressure from Washington. He offered no consequences for Israel breaking its side of the bargain, nor did he say who arbitrates the two sides’ compliance. The UN resolution does not mention these issues.

There is apparently a written document laying all of this out, but that document has not been made public. Indeed, according to reports, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has not shared it with his war cabinet. The implication of that story is that Netanyahu is trying to hide the fact that the plan calls for the end to hostilities he keeps denying it does and envisions a permanent end to “the war.” This would cause the extreme right fringe of Netanyahu’s government—led by Itamar Ben Gvir and Bezalel Smotrich—to bolt, bringing the government down and starting the next election cycle.

Hamas has responded to the UNSC resolution with a clear statement, accepting and declaring its readiness to work with mediators on working out the details. It is not an “official” acceptance, as it shouldn’t be until it is clear who decides if each side is negotiating in good faith and what happens if Israel does not abide by the terms of the agreement.

At a press conference on Monday after his meeting in Cairo with Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken repeated the mantra that Biden started with his speech: that the only thing holding up the ceasefire is Hamas. On Tuesday, speaking in Tel Aviv, Blinken repeated that Netanyahu told him he supports the resolution and that there was a “consensus” of support for it in the Israeli government. Yet the public statements from Israel continue to contradict this.

Despite that, Blinken insists that it is Yahiya Sinwar, Hamas’ leader in Gaza, that is holding up implementation of the resolution.

That is a blatant lie.

The most likely scenario is that Netanyahu agreed to the deal with Biden and Blinken in private, with the potential for a permanent ceasefire included, then simply said he didn’t in public. This is bolstered by his having hidden the text of the deal from the security cabinet, which includes Smotrich and Ben Gvir.

Israel’s Channel 12 reported Monday that this was indeed what Netanyahu had agreed to, although the Prime Minister’s Office quickly denied the report. In the end, though, it’s just another example of a gullible U.S. President and Secretary of State being deceived by a consummate liar.

Netanyahu has already responded to the truce proposal

The constant repetition of the false claim that everyone is just waiting for Hamas to agree to the deal does much more damage than merely maintaining Netanyahu’s fiction. It costs lives, by the thousands. Those lives are overwhelmingly Palestinian, and as Biden and Blinken have repeatedly made clear, Palestinian lives are worth less than nothing in Washington, just like in Israel.

But if only Israeli lives matter to them, then they should consider the harm they are doing to some 120 hostages still in Gaza. Around 30 of them are already believed to be dead, and the greatest likelihood is that most or even all of them were killed by Israeli bombs or bullets. The games Netanyahu is playing with Blinken and Biden are the proximate cause of those deaths because the deal that could have brought all the hostages home has been on the table almost from the very beginning of Israel’s genocidal operation.

Whatever Netanyahu did or did not agree to in his talks with the Americans in the last two weeks, Israel’s murderous actions in Nuseirat and Deir al-Bireh last weekend were the real response to the proposal Biden put forth, whether it is Israeli offer or not. Netanyahu has never wanted a deal, and the reasons are obvious.

Netanyahu is almost certain to be out of office as soon as the slaughter in Gaza is over. That is even more certain if it happens via a negotiated agreement, which will lead to the collapse of his government. It is very unlikely that he will be prime minister after the next election, and that also means his corruption trials will resume and he will face imprisonment.

But beyond Netanyahu’s personal interest, he does not want to stop the slaughter in Gaza until he has accomplished “his goals,” which are clearly different from the ones he talks about publicly.

The release of the hostages has never been of any real importance to Netanyahu, or to the Israeli right in general. But the rescue of the hostages is a different matter. Freeing them by military means validates the right’s rejection of diplomacy and of international opinion. It enables them to argue that the Palestinians “only understand force,” and thus cannot be reasoned with. This provides strong backing not only for continuing the Gaza genocide, but also for persisting in the effort to resolve the occupation not by recognizing Palestinian rights but by forcing Palestinians out of the West Bank and Gaza in sufficient numbers that those that remain, as devastated second class- or non-citizens, have no hope of being a cohesive minority in Greater Israel.

This is how we must understand last weekend’s massacre in Nuseirat and Deir al-Balah. It was Israel’s response to the ceasefire proposal: to slaughter and injure over 1,000 people in an operation that, while it did rescue four hostages, also killed three others, according to reports.

The lack of value that is placed on Palestinian life could not be clearer. The inhumanity of Israel is equally clear. This was Israel’s way of telling the world, especially the United States, that nothing matters more than destroying Gaza entirely. That was what those hundreds died for.

The way forward hasn’t changed

With the force of a UNSC resolution behind the ceasefire proposal, there is a clearer path than ever to bringing an end to the horrific slaughter in Gaza. But the conditions for bringing it about are the same.

Despite the blatant lies from Blinken, Israel remains obstinate in its determination to sacrifice the remaining hostages for the sake of “ensuring Gaza can never again be a security threat.” That is code for destroying the Strip, making it unlivable in the near term, and pounding it into submission. It’s the same brute force strategy that Israel has used since the 1940s and which, for all the death and destruction it has caused, has only made Israelis less safe.

Netanyahu is playing games with Washington because he recognizes that Biden has been forced to acknowledge that his Gaza policy is handing the White House to Donald Trump. Netanyahu, of course, wants to see Trump back in power, just as he rejoices about all far-right victories around the world.

If Biden wants this ceasefire to materialize, he and Blinken must stop pretending that Hamas is the obstacle. Hamas has accepted the proposal, while Israel says it will continue its operations until its “goals” are achieved, which is impossible. That is the truth that Blinken is so desperate to bury.

This obfuscation is magnified by repeating that “pressure must be put on Hamas.” By whom, and in what form? Even if Hamas were the recalcitrant party, what pressure could anyone exert on them beyond the relentless attacks by Israel? Their material support at this stage is minimal; virtually nothing—not food, water, medicine, cash, or weapons—gets into the Strip with Israel’s leave. There is no political pressure to bring to bear except from the Palestinian people themselves, and they support Hamas’ conditions for a ceasefire, because those conditions are the bare minimum they need.

Pressure must be brought on the party that is preventing the ceasefire, Israel. That pressure can take the form of an arms embargo or trade restrictions, either of which would immediately bring Israel to heel and which the UNSC resolution provides the rationale for enacting.

Right now, it looks like the Biden administration is hoping that Netanyahu will simply accept the ceasefire agreement, a hope that has no basis in reality. Secondarily, they seem to be setting the stage for blaming Hamas when Israel’s refusal makes a ceasefire impossible.

As always, the cost for this political theater will be paid in blood; Palestinian blood for the most part, though in this case, the remaining hostages will pay the price as well. We should not expect better from Netanyahu. We have every right, indeed the duty, to demand better from Biden and Blinken.

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News Roundup

Inside the Nuseirat Massacre: This Is the Carnage I Saw During Israel’s Hostage Rescue

By Shrouq Aila, The Intercept, June 10, 2024

U of Minnesota backtracks on Holocaust Center hire who accused Israel of genocide

By Andrew Lapin, Jewish Telegraphic Agency, June 11, 2024

Nuseirat massacre: Dehumanising Palestinians is the first step towards their extermination

By Ahmed Abu Artema, Middle East Eye, June 10, 2024

UN adding Israel to ‘blacklist’ of countries harming children in conflict

Al Jazeera, June 7, 2024

How the Sports Media Is Manufacturing Consent Over Gaza

By Dave Zirin, The Nation, June 11, 2024

Israel’s Legal Reckoning and the Historical Shift in Justice for Palestinians

By Reed Brody, The Nation, June 6, 2024

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