Gaza: Netanyahu at An Impasse

As the war in the Gaza Strip is entering in the month of February, its outcome remains unclear. The Israelis have air superiority which in practice is spent on genocide of civilians and destruction of urban infrastructure. This armament is excessive, yet it is not enough to defeat the Palestinian army. While the Israelis control the northern and part of the central Strip above ground, the Palestinians for their part control the south-central Strip while their underground infrastructure remains intact, which allows them to inflict significant losses on the Israelis.

While the front remains, therefore, static, Israeli announced its plan for the post-war Gaza. The Israeli plan foresees the full military, political and economic control of the Gaza Strip by Israel, the cross-border cooperation of Egypt and the consolidation of an international group of states for the reconstruction of the Gaza Strip.

The plan is maximalist just like the rhetoric of Netanyahu and Gallant about the future of the Palestinian Resistance at the beginning of the war. The announcement of the plan is intended to hide Israel’s impasse in this war.

Here, then, is the impasse: On the one hand, if he tries to expel the Palestinians from the Strip, then he risks getting involved in an unprecedented war in the region with four Arab countries, two of which he shares a border with (Syria, Lebanon). On the other hand, if Tel Aviv does not attempt to displace the Palestinians from the Strip, then it will not be able to defeat Hamas, since the underground power of Hamas cannot be dealt with without first moving out the civilians who are above ground; yet apparently they have nowhere to go inside the Strip. Egypt is not an option.

Therefore, Tel Aviv’s options are two: either to extend the war beyond Palestine, hoping to methodically displace the Palestinians from the Strip in order to hurt Hamas, aiming to defeat it, or to accept Hamas as an equal interlocutor in a plan of peace for the release of prisoners on both sides and the reconstruction of the Strip.

Both options are painful, time-consuming and of uncertain outcome for Israel: while in the second option Hamas emerges victorious but largely maintaining the existing status quo, the same is not true for the first option. In a regional war the Palestinians and the Axis of Resistance will have an increased chance of changing the status quo if they win or lose their gains in Palestine and the region if they are defeated. The same goes for Israel. Obviously, the first option is high risk for Tel Aviv because it unleashes uncontrollable and unpredictable forces that put the status quo in doubt. In any case, the choice Israel makes will show whether it is willing to risk eight decades of gains in a few months or compromise in an attempt to buy time.