{"id":60863,"date":"2025-10-05T12:01:10","date_gmt":"2025-10-05T12:01:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/60863\/"},"modified":"2025-10-05T12:01:10","modified_gmt":"2025-10-05T12:01:10","slug":"hamas-and-israel-are-on-the-verge-of-a-ceasefire-whats-being-left-unsaid-though-could-scupper-the-deal","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/60863\/","title":{"rendered":"Hamas and Israel are on the verge of a ceasefire. What\u2019s being left unsaid, though, could scupper the deal"},"content":{"rendered":"

Hamas announced that it has accepted<\/a> several parts of the peace plan put forth by US President Donald Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to finally end Israel\u2019s war on Gaza.<\/p>\n

Hamas has agreed to release the remaining Israeli captives it holds and is willing to hand over administration of Gaza to a technocratic committee proposed by the plan. <\/p>\n

However, Hamas did not say it would disarm. Nor did it agree to withdraw from Palestinian politics fully. Instead, it said the future of the Gaza Strip and legitimate rights of the Palestinian people should be decided on the basis of a \u201ccollective national position\u201d and relevant international laws and resolutions.<\/p>\n

With ceasefire talks resuming<\/a> in Egypt on Monday, Netanyahu said he expected the hostages to be quickly released<\/a> and Trump said he believes Hamas is \u201cready for a lasting peace<\/a>\u201d. <\/p>\n

However, there are many reasons for Hamas to be reticent about supporting a plan that is replete with ambiguity and robs Palestinians of agency to decide their own political fate. <\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

US President Donald Trump (right) and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu announce Trump\u2019s 20-point peace plan at the White House in late September.
\n Will Oliver\/EPA<\/p>\n

A future governance plan sidelining Palestinians<\/p>\n

So, why does Hamas seem reticent? <\/p>\n

First, the plan envisages<\/a> Israel\u2019s continuing military occupation of Gaza until it can hand over responsibility to an \u201cinternational stabilisation force\u201d at some point in the future. <\/p>\n

Then there is the plan\u2019s proposed governance structure.<\/p>\n

Under the plan, Gaza would be administered through a transitional period by \u201ca technocratic, apolitical Palestinian committee\u201d. This would be responsible for delivering basic services to millions of starving, traumatised, homeless and jobless Gazans. <\/p>\n

Yet, this committee would also include international experts, which will dilute Palestinians\u2019 voices and their ability to decide the fate of Gazans. Again, many details remain unknown, including who will sit on the committee, when it will be formed and how many members would be Palestinian. <\/p>\n

A new international transitional body called the \u201cBoard of Peace\u201d would also be formed, headed by Trump and purportedly including former British Prime Minister Tony Blair. Importantly, the plan does not specifically say the board would include any Palestinians.<\/p>\n

The board would be responsible for the committee\u2019s \u201coversight and supervision\u201d. It would also oversee the reconstruction of Gaza until the Palestinian Authority (PA), which is currently dominated by the Fatah party, has undergone reforms<\/a> and is able to take back control of Gaza. <\/p>\n

Many questions remain unanswered here, too. These include:<\/p>\n

a timeline for new elections for the Palestinian Authority
\nwhether Gazans can take part in an election
\nwhich political factions would be permitted to run candidates
\nwhether these candidates would be screened by the board, and
\nwho decides whether the PA has reformed sufficiently. <\/p>\n

This leaves an open-ended political process exposed to differing interpretations that Hamas may fear will take power out of the hands of Palestinians. <\/p>\n

After Hamas\u2019 statement was released, a senior Hamas official outright rejected<\/a> the idea of the \u201cBoard of Peace\u201d, saying:<\/p>\n

We will never accept anyone who is not Palestinian to control the Palestinians.<\/p>\n

The plan also stipulates that Hamas \u201cand other factions\u201d (left unstated and open to interpretation) will not have a role in the future governance of Gaza. And it mandates that Gaza be demilitarised. But how this would be achieved and by whom, again, remains unknown. <\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Internally displaced Palestinians flee during an Israeli military operation in Gaza City in late September.
\n Mohammed Saber\/EPA<\/p>\n

What Palestinians say they want<\/p>\n

These stipulations not only deprive the Palestinians of agency. They ignore the reality of Palestinian politics<\/a> and the legitimacy that Palestinians attach to resisting Israeli occupation and the Netanyahu government\u2019s stated goal of denying Palestinian statehood<\/a>.<\/p>\n

This highlights the greatest challenge for the \u201cBoard of Peace\u201d \u2013 a reformed Palestinian Authority under the control of the Fatah party would struggle to gain legitimacy<\/a> among Palestinians. <\/p>\n

In a poll of 1,270 respondents in the Occupied Territories in May, Fatah garnered<\/a> only 21% of popular support, compared with 32% for Hamas, and 12% for third parties. <\/p>\n

When asked what the PA should be doing, most respondents nominated forming a unity government comprising all Palestinian factions to negotiate with Israel and the international community to rebuild Gaza.<\/p>\n

When asked about plans to disarm Hamas, 77% of respondents in both the West Bank and Gaza opposed this action, with 65% of respondents opposed to expelling Hamas leaders from Gaza. <\/p>\n

Tellingly, 80% of total respondents believed that if Hamas did disarm, Israel would not end the war and withdraw from Gaza. <\/p>\n

The reality is some Palestinians still want Hamas to be a part of any future Palestinian government and remain capable of protecting Gazans from Israel\u2019s military. <\/p>\n

The disconnect between the plan\u2019s aspirations and the political reality on the ground means it may have little chance of success, even if Hamas ultimately agrees to it.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s also unclear if Netanyahu truly supports the Palestinian Authority running a future Gaza, as the peace plan says. His remarks<\/a> alongside Trump last week run counter to the plan:<\/p>\n

Your plan is consistent with the five principles my government set for the end of the war and the day after Hamas. [\u2026] Gaza will have a peaceful civilian administration that is run neither by Hamas nor by the Palestinian Authority.<\/p>\n

This suggests that Netanyahu\u2019s primary goal here is dismantling Hamas\u2019 military capabilities and political rule, while also maintaining the political division that currently exists between Gaza and the West Bank and East Jerusalem. <\/p>\n

However, this would deny Palestinians the only faction many see as willing to resist Israel\u2019s occupation and its intent of destroying any chance of Palestinians gaining statehood. <\/p>\n

Additionally, the establishment of a new civil and military bureaucracy to help Gaza\u2019s transition would take an indefinite period of time. It would also be subject to the political whims of capricious Western leaders. <\/p>\n

This would leave the Israeli military occupying Gaza for the foreseeable future. This means there would be nothing to protect the millions of Gazans from further assaults from a military already accused of serious breaches of international humanitarian law<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Hamas announced that it has accepted several parts of the peace plan put forth by US President Donald…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":60864,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[42,43,40,38,41,39],"class_list":{"0":"post-60863","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-headlines","8":"tag-headlines","9":"tag-news","10":"tag-top-news","11":"tag-top-stories","12":"tag-topnews","13":"tag-topstories"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/60863","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=60863"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/60863\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/60864"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=60863"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=60863"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=60863"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}