ANALYSIS: A PAUSE IN FIGHTING – WHAT’S IN IT FOR HAMAS?

  Members of Jewish Voice for Peace and IfNotNow hold a demonstration in support of a ceasefire in Gaza in the Cannon House Office Building on October 18, 2023, in Washington, D.C.ALEX WONG / GETTY IMAGES

Wed 22 October 2023:

Hamas can benefit militarily from the ambiguous truce deal, but as an opportunity rather than a necessity.

The deal that people on all sides of the fighting in Gaza and the international community anticipated and longed for has finally been agreed.

In many ways, it has been vague, starting with the time it was accepted by all sides – overnight on Wednesday and across 8 hours’ worth of time zones between Qatar, the main intermediary, and Washington, the principal force pushing the Israeli cabinet, with its reluctant and eager ministers, to accept it.

The deal’s designation is vague, possibly deliberately: The official statement from Qatar calls it a “humanitarian pause” but media in the Arab world and Israel seem to prefer “truce” or “ceasefire”, as does world media. Apart from the difference in meaning between those terms, this reflects how sensitive the weeks-long indirect negotiations must have been.

True to the uncomfortable and nervous relationship between Israeli and Hamas negotiators, even the duration is vague: Leaks during the last days of the indirect talks have ranged from three to five days. In the end, the span is in the middle, four days but, to add vagueness, the deal allows for the extension by one day for each extra batch of 50 captives Hamas releases.

The final ambiguity is when this difficult deal will come into force – that will be announced by the end of Wednesday.

Yesterday, I analysed what Israel has to gain and lose from the deal. The slight change now is that Netanyahu earned some brownie points with the Israeli public by presenting the Israeli cabinet with the deal, which he was most likely arm-twisted into by Joe Biden. Still, his political survival after the fighting in Gaza stops for good is far from being assured.

His initial public opposition to the first mentions of a deal indicated the opinion of the Israeli extreme right wing, politically mostly directed by Jewish settlers in the occupied West Bank and their patrons in the Knesset and cabinet. To them, Hamas are terrorists to be killed, eradicated and expelled from the Gaza Strip with captives being released either voluntarily or by force, and they took any suggestion of negotiating with Hamas as an insult and an offence.

Having become the party that negotiates with the State of Israel, even if through intermediaries, Hamas gained political acceptance in the international community. In just six weeks since October 7, its status changed from “terrorists with whom any negotiations are unacceptable” to “an organisation that has control on the ground”.

Even though Israel and the United States continue calling it “terrorist”, a term that usually connotes “people we do not negotiate with”, they have recognised reality and accepted the Palestinian organisation as their opposite side in negotiations.

To be sure, Hamas and Israel have negotiated truces in the past, always through third-party mediation, usually that of Egypt. But those were tactical battlefield issues rather than full-fledged international agreements involving several states.