True Israeli statesman would set path to Palestinian statehood, the key to fighting Hamas long term
If Israel really wants to achieve lasting security, the physical and political reconstruction of Gaza post-conflict must be seen as only the first step in the process.
Whether Israel’s military campaign in Gaza makes the country any safer in the long term or whether it simply will be seen as a punitive revenge mission in response to Hamas’s terrorist attack on October 7 last year that killed more than 1200 Israelis and foreign nationals will be determined by what follows the fighting rather than the fighting itself.
Which is why the lack of clarity regarding what follows the fighting is so concerning.
The military is a blunt instrument and can achieve only limited outcomes. Israel has used its overwhelming superiority in technology and firepower to punish Hamas, and there is no doubt that it has significantly degraded Hamas’s military capabilities.
But it also has failed to achieve other aims – despite the recent rescue of four hostages, military pressure has not resulted in the return of all the hostages whom Hamas brazenly detained and brought back to Gaza. To be fair, it is unlikely that all the hostages were ever going to be recovered regardless of what Israel did.
Israel’s conduct of the Gaza campaign has come at significant political cost to itself and, while it has inflicted great damage on Hamas, the reality is that Israel has lost the information war.
The manner in which Israel has employed its military superiority has been used to portray the Israel Defence Forces as careless at best and disinterested at worst when it comes to civilian casualties.
Of course, little is said about the fact Hamas uses populated areas to store and fire its weapons, which is itself a war crime. But photos of children killed in Israeli airstrikes, highly public targeting errors by the Israeli military, concerns over the proportionality of Israel’s military response and wooden military spokespeople all contribute to enhance a negative view of the Israeli war effort.
And the recent resignation from Benjamin Netanyahu’s unity government of centrist politician and former IDF chief Benny Gantz over the direction of Israel’s Gaza strategy shows that concerns over the conduct of the war are shared by some inside the political establishment.
All of this however, could be forgotten in the years ahead if Israel’s ground campaign in Gaza results in a society more peaceful, more prosperous and more amenable to Israel’s security interests than what existed before the October 7 attack.
This will depend not so much on the military campaign, with its limited operational aim of degrading Hamas but on Israel and the world community’s response to three pillars of a post-conflict Gaza: security, reconstruction and governance. Each of these present substantial challenges individually. The need to undertake all three simultaneously, however, is a complex and dangerous task that may well end up undermining Israel’s attempts to destroy Hamas as a viable political and security overlord in Gaza.
The trouble for Israel’s prime minister is the incompatibility of his operational and strategic aims for post-Gaza security. On the one hand Netanyahu wants to control security in Gaza without reoccupying it. This will entail a demilitarisation of Gaza and security being provided by non-Israeli forces. Obviously the US will play a role in the post-conflict phase, but not with boots on the ground.
There are several options for security and governance, none of which appears to be well-developed but that mostly revolve around a regional Arab and/or revamped Palestinian Authority model. Neither the Arab states nor the Palestinian Authority, though, will risk being seen to do Israel’s “dirty work” in Gaza without some tangible benefit for themselves individually and for the Palestinian question more broadly.
The October terrorist attack and Israel’s response has rekindled interest in the formerly moribund two-state solution for Palestine, but whether it can be revived is another thing. Logic dictates that it is the only viable carrot to attract a range of regional players to help out in Gaza, but the Israeli government will need to cede a lot of ground on the issue of meaningful talks regarding a two-state solution before regional states are going to play ball on a post-conflict Gaza.
For its part Washington is seeking to incentivise regional players to take an active role in a post-conflict scenario by making movement towards a two-state solution part of a grand bargain in which a bilateral Saudi-American security pact could then lead the way to normalisation of ties between Saudi Arabia and Israel.
The plan is an ambitious one and predicated on an Israeli government seriously addressing the issue of Palestinian statehood even though Israel’s coalition government involving far-right parties may be unwilling or unable to do so. But if October 7 has taught us one thing it is that the Palestinian issue is not going away, regardless of how many Arab states normalise relations with Israel. Ignoring the issue provided the catalyst for Hamas’s planning and execution of a large-scale terrorist attack against Israel.
In the absence of any political pathway that at least holds out the prospect of a Palestinian state through negotiations, then groups such as Hamas or an equally radical successor will find willing recruits among the hundreds of thousands of Gazans who have lost members of their family during the Israeli operation.
Hamas’s call for the destruction of Israel is predicated on the rejection of a two-state solution, so moving towards the two-state solution poses ideological difficulties for Hamas.
Foreign Minister Penny Wong’s justification for joining a UN General Assembly vote last month that allowed for the recognition of a Palestinian state during rather than at the end of the peace process was because it ran counter to what Hamas wanted. Isolating Hamas politically is at least as important as degrading it militarily.
A permanent ceasefire will achieve a temporary window of opportunity that should not be wasted. The focus will be on rebuilding the physical, social and economic foundations of Gaza, but the legacy of more than 30,000 dead Gazans provides a deep well of animosity towards Israel that will fester unless Israel and the international community can provide a reason not to join Hamas or any like-minded successor.
The quicker the post-conflict governance and security arrangements can be sorted out and reconstruction priorities established and funded, the less opportunity there will be for a radical Islamist group such as Hamas to fill the void.
If Israel really wants to achieve lasting security, the physical and political reconstruction of Gaza post-conflict must be seen as only the first step in the process.
A true statesman would seek to ensure that another attack of the type conducted on October 7 last year could never occur again, not only through neutralising Hamas but also by setting out a pathway for Palestinian statehood.
By doing so, the reconstruction of Gaza could be seen as part of a broader strategy of achieving security through Palestinian self-determination. Absent this, Gaza simply will be rebuilt awaiting the next conflict. Hamas and its ilk must be countered not only militarily but also ideologically, but to do so will require strong Palestinian and Arab leadership and far-sightedness from Israel.
Unfortunately, for a region that has no lack of conflicts, it has a distinct lack of statesmen.
Rodger Shanahan is a Middle East analyst and former army officer.
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