This week’s release of three Israeli female hostages and 900 Palestinian prisoners and detainees, primarily women and children, is the first step in what is expected to be a long process of bringing home Israel’s hostages and ending the war with Hamas. The agreement provides for three phases, the first two of which involve more hostage releases, more freed Palestinians, and ultimately, Israeli withdrawal from Gaza. The third phase calls for the reconstruction of Gaza and the installation of a new government in the devastated Strip.
The third phase is but a faraway dream. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is adamant that the new government in Gaza should not be the Palestinian Authority, while not surprisingly, Hamas still plans to remain in power. Any plan to rebuild Gaza depends heavily on the Gulf states and especially Saudi Arabia. But it is not at all clear that Riyadh will provide a major bulk of the billions of dollars needed for reconstruction if the Netanyahu government remains unwilling to contemplate a Palestinian state existing alongside Israel.
Absent Gulf funding, it is hard to see how normal life can be restored to Gaza. The new Trump Administration is inclined to spend less money on overseas activities, not more, while the European Union will be strapped for funds if it increases its defense spending while struggling to maintain its decades-long commitment to social services.
Israel and Hamas must first complete the second phase of their agreement. Negotiations for that phase have been scheduled to begin on February 3, according to the agreement, and most observers appear to believe that that phase will be increasingly difficult to implement.
To begin with, Jerusalem harbors suspicions, not without justification, that Hamas will not live up to its commitments even in the first phase of the agreement, much less the second. Hamas may find an excuse not to release the remaining thirty hostages that are meant to be freed over the course of the first six weeks of the ceasefire. Hamas could continue to fire rockets at Israel, for which Jerusalem no doubt would retaliate, allowing the terrorist group to back away from any further hostage releases.
Hamas would likely argue that it is not responsible for any attacks on Israelis during those first six weeks. Hamas might blame Islamic Jihad, its terrorist partner, or the smaller Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine for the rocket attacks, while arguing that it is living up to the terms of the agreement which Israel has violated by striking new targets in Gaza. For its part, Jerusalem would probably stop withdrawing its forces to Gaza’s borders, especially retaining its hold on the narrow strip of land on the Gaza/Egypt border called the Philadelphi corridor.
Even if the first phase goes smoothly, and all thirty-three hostages return home, it will be exceedingly difficult for the Netanyahu government to agree to withdraw all forces from Gaza, as provided in the second phase. Similarly, Hamas will be reluctant to give up its primary source of leverage by releasing all the remaining hostages.
It is true that Netanyahu no longer must accommodate Itamar Ben Gvir, the leader of the extremist Otzma Yehudit party, who withdrew from the government coalition out of opposition to the agreement with Hamas. The Prime Minister still has a majority of four in the 120 seat Knesset. Nevertheless, he cannot afford to lose the support of Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich’s Religious Zionist party, which would result in the collapse of the government.
Smotrich, whose party’s base has a heavy settler component, also opposed the deal with Hamas but changed his position at the last moment. Perhaps he did so because his ally, Defense Minister Israel Katz, announced that he would free all settlers that had been detained for alleged terrorist acts against Palestinians on the West Bank. Whether Smotrich would continue to support the remaining phases of the Hamas deal is very much an open question that Netanyahu would rather not contemplate.
Despite these contingencies and uncertainties, the three-phase ceasefire agreement may well come to fruition. Donald Trump appears determined to ensure the return of all hostages, both living and dead, and a complete end to the war, if only because it would strengthen his case for the Nobel Peace Prize that he openly covets.
For that reason, should Hamas attempt to rupture the agreed timetable for hostage release, or launch new attacks on Israeli territory, perhaps via Islamic Jihad, Trump could act on his repeated threat that Hamas would have “hell to pay.” He could order American forces to provide unfettered military operational support to Israel; he could offer Jerusalem a totally free hand in resuming military operations in Gaza; and he could seek legal remedies against Hamas’ external supporters.
For his part, Netanyahu may try to avoid any commitment on Gaza’s future—he bitterly opposes its takeover by the Palestinian Authority—or he could stall on the withdrawal of Israeli troops, especially from the Philadelphi corridor that he claims is vital to Israel’s security.
Netanyahu would do so at his peril, however. Trump could retaliate against Israel in a host of ways. He could, for example, slow or even cut off military assistance to Israel, terminate American military support in the eastern Mediterranean and the Red Sea, or no longer support the Jewish state in a hostile United Nations.
Netanyahu runs an additional, even bigger, risk were he to stonewall negotiations on the remaining phases of the agreement or to fail to implement all its terms. With a few exceptions, most Republicans in Congress would be unlikely to challenge Trump should he choose to pressure Israel to implement all three phases of the agreement. Moreover, they could well be joined by the growing number of Democrats who have become critical of Israeli operations in Gaza and have little love for Netanyahu. The prime minister would thus have created a powerful bipartisan coalition that is hostile to an Israeli government in place of the nearly unconditional and long-standing near unanimous congressional support for the Jewish state.
Netanyahu and Trump are not as personally close as once was thought. As he made clear in his Inaugural Address, in which he mentioned the hostages but not Israel, the president’s primary concern is America First, as he defines it, which includes an aversion to foreign entanglements. Netanyahu would do well to bear that in mind as the first phase of the ceasefire plays itself out and negotiations for the second phase are about to commence.
