Donald Trump hopes to secure and claim credit for a settlement to end the Israel-Hamas war

Donald Trump commemorated the one-year anniversary of the October 7 attack on Israel by visiting Ohel Chabad Lubavitch in New York, with the family of Edan Alexander, who was taken hostage by Hamas. Picture: Getty Images

Donald Trump has just raised the stakes in the Israeli war with Hamas in Gaza, but he has clear strategic and political motivations for doing so.

In a message directed at Hamas, Trump has vowed to inflict massive punishment on those responsible for taking the hostages – unless they are released by his inauguration.

This is a calculated gambit straight out of the Trump playbook. By threatening a future escalation, Trump hopes to achieve two things.

First, he hopes to help bring about a resolution to the still unfolding conflict before he even takes office on January 20. Depending on its terms, a potential settlement promises a major strategic victory over Hamas with the potential to reshape the Middle East landscape. Yet this is not without risk. If he doesn’t follow through with action in the event of ongoing Hamas resistance after January 20, Trump could look weak. In the event of no deal being reached, he will need to respond appropriately.

Second, the threat is also political: it will allow him to claim credit if Joe Biden manages to clinch a late settlement to end the war.

Strategic Analysis Australia ­director Michael Shoebridge says Trump has a clear political motivation to raise the stakes: the need to take out insurance.

“After the Hezbollah ceasefire Hamas has had the rug pulled out from under it,” Shoebridge tells The Australian. “They (Hamas) probably now want a ceasefire and … reasonably quickly.

“Trump is vaccinating himself against a ceasefire happening before he takes over. He now will be able to take credit. It’s vaccinating himself against a Biden ­success.”

The latest threat from Trump is also aimed at drawing a contrast between him and Biden. Trump wants to look stronger, more decisive, more committed to ending the conflict and more unreservedly pro-Israel.

This is diplomacy Trump-style. Posting on his Truth Social platform, Trump says there will be “hell to pay” if the hostages are not released on his timeline.

If they are not freed, Trump has vowed to hit those responsible “harder than anybody has been hit in the long and storied History of the United States of America”.

He is talking a big game, so he will be under pressure to follow through. Failure to do so will expose the threat as meaningless and weaken Trump’s international image at the start of his second term.

The key question is what kind of action Trump might take.  Shoebridge says the president-elect is “trying to set the conditions for when he takes power to say, well, there is no end in sight for Hamas”.

“If you were thinking that with the change in administration in Washington options would open up for you, you now have to think that options are closing for you,” he says.

Other options available to Trump could be to harness the power of the Treasury and State Departments to target Hamas’s international support network, sending additional munitions to Israel, bringing greater pressure to bear against Qatar, Turkey, Lebanon and Iran to cut off political and financial lifelines and for Egypt to cut Hamas supply routes.

These measures have been proposed by the former director for countering Iranian weapons of mass destruction on the National Security Council, Richard Goldberg, who has argued for the US to lead a stronger international effort against Hamas.

Goldberg, a senior adviser at the Foundation for Defence of Democracies, says the US should drop its opposition to sanctions threats against the International Criminal Court and its chief prosecutor while also using the UN Security Council to put forward resolutions condemning Hamas and its state sponsors in a bid to increase the pressure on Russia and China.

These are all measures that Trump may be more inclined to take.