Israel draws up new war plans to pressure Hamas

Donald Trump and his Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff have threatened a return to war in the Gaza Strip if Hamas doesn’t release its remaining hostages. Israel is already plotting out how that would happen.

A Palestinian child rides a bicycle near a fallen minaret of a destroyed mosque during the Muslim holy fasting month of Ramadan, in the Nuseirat refugee camp in the central Gaza Strip. Picture: AFP

President Trump and his Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff have threatened a return to war in the Gaza Strip if Hamas doesn’t release its remaining hostages. Israel is already plotting out how that would happen.

Israel has drafted plans for a series of escalatory steps to gradually ratchet up pressure on Hamas now that talks to extend a seven-week ceasefire have stalled, plans that could lead to a resumption of hostilities in the 16-month war in the Gaza Strip.

The steps kicked off in the past week with Israel blocking the entry of goods and supplies into Gaza. The next moves would include cutting off electricity and water, said Bezalel Smotrich, Israel’s powerful finance minister, who said the measures were discussed in a cabinet meeting last weekend.

US Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff speaks to reporters outside the West Wing of the White House. Picture: AFP

If those steps fail, Israel could turn to a campaign of air strikes and tactical raids against Hamas targets, an Israeli security analyst briefed on the plan said. Next, Israel could again displace the hundreds of thousands of Palestinians who have used the ceasefire to return to their homes in the northern part of the Gaza Strip, the analyst said.

Ultimately, Israel could reinvade Gaza with far more military power than it has deployed so far in the conflict, with an eye to holding ground and effectively occupying territory while it attacks the remnants of Hamas, people familiar with the plan said.

Many in Israel feel another invasion of Gaza can’t be avoided. “There’s a determination to go back in and finish Hamas no matter what happens,” said former Pentagon official Michael Makovsky, who is now president of the Jewish Institute for National Security of America, a think tank based in Washington. “I think Israel will go in tougher and stronger.” The planning comes as Israel and Hamas have reached a pivotal stage in the talks where the two foes are bringing diametrically opposed positions to the core issues in the war, hamstringing efforts to keep the negotiations going.

Israel wants Hamas to release the dozens of hostages it still holds, something Hamas has said it would do only if there is a permanent end to the fighting, which Israel won’t agree to. Israel also wants Hamas to relinquish power and disarm, which the US-designated terrorist group refuses to do.

As an interim step, Israel is offering to extend the ceasefire for a month or so if Hamas will keep releasing hostages held in Gaza and has set a deadline of Saturday for the militant group to comply. If it doesn’t, Israel has warned negotiators in the ceasefire talks that it will gradually escalate its punishment of Hamas to the point of a return to full-blown war, Arab mediators said.

Hamas is insisting on opening talks about an end to the war and refuses to discuss disarming, the mediators said.

Trump has shown signs this week of losing patience with the delays. On Wednesday, he warned Hamas in a social-media post that if it didn’t release all the remaining hostages in Gaza immediately, ” you are DEAD!” A day later, Trump and his envoy Witkoff suggested the US and Israel could take joint action against Hamas.

Some Israeli security analysts say the country is in a much better position to go into Gaza than it was at the beginning of the war. Its ammunition stores are replenished, the limits and pressure imposed on it by the Biden administration have been lifted, and it no longer needs to keep large numbers of troops pinned down on its northern border to guard against an attack by Hezbollah, the Lebanese militia that Israel forced into a ceasefire with a ferocious military campaign last fall.

An Israeli soldier looks on as a military excavator demolishes a building in the Nur Shams camp for Palestinian refugees east of Tulkarem, amid an ongoing offensive in the occupied-West Bank. Picture: AFP

The war has destroyed much of Hamas’s fighting force and much of its infrastructure, including facilities for making weapons and major tunnels that serve to connect important military sites. The group has been cut off from outside help, and Israel believes it killed 20,000 fighters, including top commanders. While Hamas has been able to recruit thousands more, they are inexperienced and will have a hard time training without becoming targets.

The analyst briefed on Israel’s plan said the preliminary stages of escalation could take up to two months, during which time Israel could begin to remobilise its forces for a large invasion of Gaza with sufficient troops to hold ground.

Thus far, Israel has fought Hamas in parts of the enclave then moved on to new battles elsewhere, allowing the militants to regroup.

“There is no way to do it without the occupation of Gaza,” Yaakov Amidror, a former Israeli national security adviser, said of any effort to wipe out Hamas militarily. Israel would need at least six months to a year to subdue Hamas, Amidror said.

The war was sparked on Oct. 7, 2023, by the Hamas-led attacks on Israel that left around 1,200 dead and about 250 taken hostage. Israel’s response has reduced much of Gaza to rubble and has killed more than 48,000 people, according to Palestinian health authorities, who don’t say how many were combatants.

Despite its weakened state, Hamas is likely to survive another round of fighting, said Tahani Mustafa, senior Palestine analyst at the conflict-resolution organisation International Crisis Group.

“I think there had been an underestimation in terms of Hamas’s numbers in terms of their operational capacity and how they were able to sustain such a long-term insurgency,” she said. “In terms of its numbers as well, it doesn’t look like its numbers are necessarily dwindling. I think if anything its recruitment has seen a significant uptick.” Hamas is deeply unpopular in Gaza, but the violence of the war and lack of an alternative ensures it has some support, Tahani said.

For any effective control of Gaza, Israel would still need to dismantle the rest of Hamas’s extensive tunnel system, much of which is still intact, in what would be a gruelling and destructive process, analysts said. Some warned that without any clear replacement for Hamas and a way to win over Gazans, Israel would be left fighting an insurgency.

Israel would face challenges returning to war while Hamas still holds hostages. Fifty-nine of them have yet to return from Gaza, including as many as 24 who Israel believes are alive. Israel has acknowledged that at least 14 have been killed by military activity including air strikes. Another six were executed by Hamas in late August, as Israeli military troops closed in on their tunnel in the city of Rafah.

Israeli polls have shown a strong majority of the public supports moving to the next phase of the ceasefire deal, which would bring home the remaining living hostages in exchange for a permanent end to the war.

The Wall Street Journal