Proposal envisioning Hamas exile could be key part of Gaza endgame.
A reported cease-fire proposal from Qatar contains a key element that might help end the ruinous three-month war that has killed over 20,000, left much of Gaza in ruins and so far failed to spring most of the hostages kidnapped from Israel on Oct. 7: The exile of Hamas leaders, presumably to Doha.
That is a key element of a peace plan I have myself proposed on these pages.
According to a report Wednesday on Israel’s Channel 13, Qatar has proposed that Yahya Sinwar and the rest of the Hamas leadership go into exile and hand over the remaining 140-odd hostages (some of whom are believed dead) in exchange for an Israeli pullout and the end of the war. It is highly unlikely that Qatar, which is a supposedly rational country that is also a main patron of the Jihadi terrorist group, would have proposed this on its own: if the report is true, this is a Hamas offer.
Israel’s Cabinet is reportedly meeting to discuss the proposal, and it will certainly reject it in its present form. That is because – again, according to reports – the offer is missing key elements to make it realistic. These would include the Palestinian Authority being restored to power in Gaza and the international community forcing Hezbollah (which has been shelling Israel for three months) to honor UN Security Council Resolution 1701, pull back from the norther border and leave Israel alone. Fast-tracking Saudi-Israeli peace would also be useful.
But it is a massive step forward nonetheless. It is incredibly important that the principle of a Hamas leadership exile – similar to the PLO withdrawal from Beirut in 1982 – has been raised and is perhaps accepted by the group. If Israel, Qatar, the US and others play their cards right, that can jumpstart the process that ends the war.
Indeed, Israel should use the platform it has this Thursday and Friday at the Hague to promote the larger plan that might actually work. The toothless-yet-respected International Court of Justice will hear claims by South Africa that Israel is committing genocide (see here why they are nonsensical). Israel should use the spotlight to remind the world it was barbarously attacked and reverse months of diplomatic haplessness on the part of its inept government by declaring loudly that the war could be over in one minute if Hamas so chooses.
The terms in question would bring rejoicing around the world, including most probably in Gaza. The sole exceptions might be the jihadis’ useful idiots on US campuses and on London streets.
As it is, though, the offer is a non-starter. There is, in my estimation, no way Israel is ending this war without Hamas no longer controlling any territory neighboring it. Not after it invaded on Oct. 7 with thousands of terrorists who massacred 1,200 people in the most brutal fashion imaginable. Not after about two decades of firing rockets at Israel. That ship has sailed.
I cannot say if Hamas and its vile associates understood this at the time of the invasion and therefore can be said to have sought this situation. I do not know whether Hamas was simply stunned by its own success that day. I do not know whether they think they can actually win this war against a nuclear power simply because asymmetric warfare favors the weaker side, or some such nonsense.
I favored holding off on an invasion — but once it started, Israel cannot stop without Hamas removed from power. It was, in hindsight, a terrible mistake for Israel to have not intervened in 2007, when Hamas seized control of the Gaza Strip from the Palestinian Authority in a violent coup.
For the war to end, both sides will have to give something up: Hamas will need to understand that the gig is up in Gaza, and there can be nothing left of its military force in the strip; Israel must accept that Gaza, once demilitarized, needs to be handed over to the West Bank-based Palestinian Authority, for all its imperfections.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s refusal to date to understand this is wrongheaded, in his usual arrogant way. He has no better option – not an Israeli occupation, which will end badly as these things always do; not an Arab force, which Israel has not even started trying to assemble and which is extremely unlikely in any event; and not a Western force, since it is just not happening.
The government’s floated notion that local leaderships will magically materialize is naïve; if any such thing happens, it will be the mafia families that have thrived under Hamas, and the place will be hell on earth once more, just in a different way.
Netanyahu’s rejection of the US coaxing on this issue is an excruciating display of ingratitude toward President Biden, who has paid a tremendous political price in an election year for standing so firmly by Israel so far in the war.
A cynic might suspect that Netanyahu is trying to harm Biden in order to get Donald Trump elected in November – the same Trump whom Netanyahu idiotically coaxed into mindlessly withdrawing from the Iran nuclear deal, which is the reason why Iran is now a nuclear threshold state.
A cynic might even think that Netanyahu is interested in prolonged the Gaza conflict indefinitely, or truly inflaming the northern border with Hezbollah, as there is every indication that the end of the war will also conclude his calamitous term in office.
It’s such a fine line between a cynic and a realist.
One might ask whether it is really acceptable to let the demonic leaders of Hamas get on a boat and sail away. That would be a very good question.
I’ve never been one for the death penalty, assassinations or extrajudicial killings, but there are exceptions that prove the rule and principles that can be taken too far. One needs to be an unreasonably extreme humanitarian to wish a long life to Sinwar and his fellow cannibals.
That said, they can also be met with an unfortunate accident at some point in the future. And if these supposedly pious people are right, and there is a God, when they meet him at last the scene will not be convivial. Let them leave and take their evil with then, and live to die another day.
