Leaders still believe there is more to gain by fighting on
With the most recent round of talks over, hopes of a ceasefire in Gaza in the immediate future look to have been dashed. Further discussions assisted by the US secretary of state, Anthony Blinken, were expected to be held this week, but it felt like a desperate attempt to keep the process alive.
It is not the first time there has been disappointment. A dozen or more rounds of mediated negotiations, a UN resolution, pressure from Washington and other powers, and much else have failed to push the leaders of Israel or Hamas to make the concessions needed to stop the war.
Days of argument over the exact parameters of any agreement obscure the fact that a deal can be done only when the most influential decision-makers on each side believe that the time is right.
Despite the immense damage done to Israel’s international reputation and its relations with Washington, its 300-plus military fatalities and the seething anger in the occupied West Bank, Benjamin Netanyahu seems convinced that more is to be gained from continuing the offensive than halting it.
After a slow start, Israel has killed a significant number of senior Hamas military personnel in the territory. This has hurt Hamas badly, and gone some way to mitigate the fear and trauma in Israel after the surprise attacks of 7 October.
Military experts – some in Israel, plus many in the US and elsewhere – now advise ending the operation and bringing back the 100 or so hostages who are still being held in Gaza as soon as possible. This would achieve at least one of Israel’s war aims and allow its armed forces to face other threats, most notably that posed by Iran, which blames Israel for the assassination in Tehran on 31 July of Ismail Haniyeh, Hamas’s political leader. Hezbollah, the Iranbacked militant Islamist movement in Lebanon, poses another danger.
But Netanyahu is in no hurry to do a deal. One factor may be the prospect of the collapse of his ruling coalition as rightwingers opposed to concessions peel away. This would leave him potentially facing prison if continuing corruption trials end badly for him.
Another may be Israeli public opinion. Polls show Netanyahu remains deeply unpopular. But the ratings of his Likud party have ticked up again in recent weeks. If Israel managed to kill Yahya Sinwar, the architect of the 7 October attacks, the political and legal prospects of the prime minister would brighten still.
Sinwar does not appear to want a deal either. His 40-year career within Islamist militancy has been marked by unremitting dedication to the eventual destruction of Israel.
Now believed to be hiding in a tunnel under Gaza, Sinwar was picked this month to succeed Haniyeh, a relative pragmatist, at the head of Hamas. The choice consolidated the authority of the most intransigent of senior officials of the fractured organisation and one close to Tehran. Few observers think this improves the chances of a ceasefire deal.
Sinwar now appears to believe that Hamas is in a strong position in negotiations, with civilian suffering in Gaza increasing international pressure on Israel.
According to a June report in the Wall Street Journal, emails to other Hamas leaders in Doha earlier this year reveal Sinwar’s belief that even hundreds of thousands of civilian deaths are a “necessary sacrifice” and his commitment to “move forward on the same path we started” whatever the cost.
The key to any deal would be finding a formula that would allow Sinwar and Netanyahu to claim victory. This is very hard, but not entirely impossible.
Last Friday, a White House statement signed by co-mediators Qatar and Egypt described a new proposal that “builds on areas of agreement over the past week, and bridges remaining gaps in
[a] manner that allows for a swift implementation of the deal” as early as this week. That is very optimistic. But in the circumstances, anything suggesting possible progress is welcome.
The key to any deal would be finding a formula that would allow Sinwar and Netanyahu to claim victory