The fighting in Gaza has stopped, but the war is not over

Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar at the end of the war in Gaza in 2021 He took a picture sitting in a chair in the ruined house, a symbol of continued resistance to Israel.

Mr. Sinwar was killed in this latest Gaza war, in which Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has vowed to crush and destroy Hamas. However, as a ceasefire was reached on Sunday after 15 months of mass destruction and death, a badly wounded and diminished Hamas survived and will remain in charge in Gaza, at least for now.

Thousands of Hamas fighters have already come out of hiding and taken to the air to retake control.

Daniel Levy, a former Israeli negotiator and president of the US/Middle East Project, a research organization based in London and New York, said: “To put it bluntly, Hamas is not only standing, it remains the most important force in Gaza.”

The situation underscores the fragility of the deal reached with Mr. Netanyahu great political pressure at home. It also comes as Donald J. Trump prepares to run for president again amid great uncertainty about how he plans to deal with a landscape that has changed greatly since his first term in the Middle East.

And the war is not over. The three-phase cease-fire deal, largely unchanged from the plan President Biden announced eight months ago, is extremely fragile, as evidenced by the tension-filled delay to its launch Sunday morning. It will take 16 days to start negotiations on the second stage.

Transitioning from this first phase to the second phase, which would mark a truly effective end to the war with the near-total withdrawal of Israeli troops from Gaza, is considered by many to be extremely difficult, if not impossible, given the concessions and political possibilities required. dynamics on both sides.

Mr. Trump was widely seen as providing cover for the Israeli prime minister to do so by demanding that Mr. Netanyahu do the deal now. With so much else on his mind, Mr. Trump and his team are not sure if they will take the time and resources to get through the next, most difficult phase.

Nathan Sachs, director of the Brookings Institution’s Center for Middle East Policy, a Washington think tank, said Mr. Trump would not want the fighting to continue on his watch. But Mr. Netanyahu, who faces strong opposition to the deal within his own coalition, “does not want to end the war, and Hamas intends to continue its military struggle and rearmament,” Mr. Sachs said.

Sanam Vakil, director of Chatham House’s Middle East and North Africa Programme, said Mr Netanyahu is likely to look to Hamas’ violation of the ceasefire terms as “justification for why a second phase cannot and will not happen”. , a research institute in London. “And he’s going to play real hard on the terms of an Israeli withdrawal.”

Ms Vakil said the deal could stop the fighting for now, but would give Israel and its army “perpetual freedom to operate”, as in Lebanon. A ceasefire was signed in November With Hezbollah militias based in Lebanon. Mr. Netanyahu himself said in a public address on Saturday that Israel “reserves the right to resume hostilities if Israel concludes that negotiations on a second phase are hopeless.”

Mr Netanyahu has consistently refused to discuss who or what will rule Gaza in place of Hamas, which has ceded territory to the group Israel has been trying to destroy for the past 15 months, killing tens of thousands of people, both civilians and fighters. process. The war began after Hamas led attacks on Israel on October 7, 2023, killing about 1,200 people and capturing about 250.

Now that Hamas has regained control of Gaza, it will be effectively responsible for the massive flow of humanitarian aid. Yahya Sinwar’s brother Mohammed currently controls Hamas in Gaza.

Mr. Trump will also face a complex and knotty choice about how much to invest his authority in the Middle East, especially if he wants to revive his plans to normalize relations between Saudi Arabia and Saudi Arabia, as he says. Israel. A deal between the two countries seemed on the verge of happening before the war in Gaza broke out.

Mustafa Barghouti, a member of the Palestinian Legislative Council, said the ceasefire agreement is good for Palestinians — “the killings will stop and prisoners will be released” and there will be an increase in humanitarian aid. But he said there was no guarantee a deal would be secured, saying Palestinians “need a real process that leads to an end to the Israeli occupation” in both Gaza and the West Bank.

The Saudis have made clear during the war that they now demand concrete steps towards an independent Palestinian state, and Mr Netanyahu has repeatedly vowed to block that. Some in Mr. Trump’s circle favor further, if not complete, Israeli annexation of the West Bank, which would make an existing Palestinian state all but impossible. Mike Huckabee, his candidate for the position of ambassador to Israel, said this Visit to Israel in 2017 That there is “nothing” like the West Bank or the occupation of the Jordan River.

“The annexation of the West Bank will kill the chances of a two-state solution,” Mr. Barghouti said.

Aaron David Miller, a former American diplomat currently working at the Carnegie Foundation, said that “Netanyahu will come into conflict with Trump, who wants an agreement with the Saudis and Iran.”

Even the Gaza deal poses a serious domestic political problem for Mr. Netanyahu. Already, one of the far-right parties in the coalition led by Itamar Ben-Gvir has resigned and promised to return only if the war starts again. If the other far-right party in the coalition, led by Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich, also bows out, Mr. Netanyahu would lead a minority government nearly two years before the next election.

In addition to Gaza, Mr. Netanyahu has two difficult domestic challenges: a new budget and a draft law on the conscription of the Haredim, or ultra-Orthodox, that set him at odds with the ultra-right and religious parties. Budget is important. If it is not passed by the end of March, Mr. Sachs says, the ruling coalition will automatically collapse.

“There could be a real political crisis, so as we get closer to the runoff, we can compare Trump to Ben-Gvir and Smotrich,” Mr. Sachs said.

Those political considerations could pay off if Mr. Trump decides to strike a deal with Saudi Arabia, presenting Mr. Netanyahu with a tough choice.

The Israeli leader could make concessions to his coalition partners, stall the deal and likely anger his most important ally, the United States. Or he could leave the government and call for elections based on working with Mr. Trump for more lasting regional peace, including real steps toward a Palestinian state.

This latest choice would pose a significant risk to Mr Netanyahu, whose unpopularity among centrist voters forced him to team up with Mr Ben-Gvir and Mr Smotrich in the last election.

It is Iran that depends on everything enriching uranium to weapons level at a fast pace. Iran denies it is aiming for a bomb, but it has deteriorated regionally and its economy is collapsing. Both Israel and the US have vowed to prevent any nuclear bomb by Iran, and there is a strong argument within Israel that now is the time to strike Iran.

But Mr Trump is unlikely to want to be dragged into another war and is said to be open to dealing with a weakened Iran. Iranian President Massoud Pezeshkian reached out Telling European diplomats and Trump officials that his country also wants to reach a deal on its nuclear program in exchange for the lifting of punitive economic sanctions.

Mr. Sachs said Mr. Trump was essentially unpredictable. Mr. Netanyahu and the Israelis, he said, “will certainly be very pro-Israeli and will want to curry favor, but they will face a US president who will be strong in demanding whatever he thinks is in their interests. “