All eyes have turned to Hamas as President Trump unveiled his 20-point peace plan for Gaza on Monday. The plan, which was unveiled in the presence of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, was viewed by West Asia watchers as a take it or leave it offer to Hamas. Give back all the hostages within 72 hours, disarm completely, and take no part in any future government in Gaza. For Israel, there were no such conditions.
Instead, as the document pointed out, the Israeli military “will withdraw based on standards, milestones, and timeframes linked to demilitarization that will be agreed upon between the [Israeli military], ISF, the guarantors, and the United States.” In other words, the IDF would not be leaving Gaza anytime soon. Trump also made clear to Hamas the price of non-compliance. If the group refused, he said.
“Israel would have my full backing to finish the job of destroying the threat of Hamas.” The Trump plan is interesting in its timing. Diplomats believe the president is looking to get selected for the Nobel Peace Prize whose winner is set to be announced on October 10. The other requirement was securing Netanyahu’s political survival. The Israeli prime minister who is under heavy pressure both from members of his right-wing coalition and the public to bring the hostages home, has been offered a face-saving route by which he can accomplish this without giving up his larger aims of annexing both Gaza and the West Bank.
According to Ambassador K.P. Fabian, West Asia expert the sustained pressure on Hamas could mean the group may have to surrender. “Hamas would understand, and I’m sure it knows that eight Islamic nations met Trump on September 24 on the sidelines of the UNGA. I am sure the proposal would have been presented to them, and they would have said yes. This means Hamas will stop getting any diplomatic support from them should it reject the deal.”
The other telling point in the document is the absence of any concrete plan for the West Bank. This was surprising given that Arab leaders had made it a point to tell both Netanyahu and Trump that annexation of the West Bank was unacceptable. However, for West Asia expert Ambassador Talmiz Ahmad, this was a given. “If you had brought in the West Bank, then you would have issues relating to what is the status of the occupied territories. How long are they going to continue to be occupied?” he said.
“I think the Israelis have a separate agenda regarding the West Bank. This may include annexation of a certain part of the West Bank and the cornering of the rest of the population into a little enclave. This ensures that they are deprived of economic opportunity and encouraged to disappear from the land.” Hamas is a key obstacle in that happening, and the Trump plan is looking to put the group in a nowin situation. Should it continue the fight, Palestinian blood will be on their hands, not Israel’s, and should it reject the proposal, it will be an unconditional surrender. The blame shifts away from Netanyahu, who is being accused of “genocide,” and from Arab rulers who have been accused by their public of doing nothing while Palestinians have been killed by Israeli airstrikes.
Ambassador Fabian believes timidity towards Israel has been there for some time in the Gulf nations. Speaking about the normalisation process between Israel and the UAE in mid-2020, he said. “Before the agreement was signed, the UAE made a statement that Israel had agreed to freeze settlements in the West Bank. And Netanyahu came out saying that nothing doing. ‘We had never given any such assurance.’ And the UAE still signed the agreement.” Ambassador Fabian also noted that the other Gulf nations had also not pushed Israel forcefully on the issue so far. So is the fight for Palestinian statehood over for now if Hamas were to say yes?
Diplomats say this is unlikely, as this will be just the first part in a series of talks between Israel and Hamas. Coordination between Hamas leaders in Doha and those in Gaza will have to be done. Also, as Ambassador Ahmad points out, large numbers of Palestinian resistance forces have been killed before only to regroup later. “In Jordan, we had the Black September movement when Jordanian troops killed many Palestinian fighters.
It also happened in Lebanon, where Palestinians were killed by the Lebanese Christians. So we have had such occasions when violence has been inflicted upon the Palestinians with a view to extinguishing their aspirations and their identity. But to pretend that this would extinguish the people and permanently deprive them of their identity, I do not believe that is likely to happen.”
