One page contains the plan for a post-war Gaza that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu proposed to his war cabinet. Four and a half months after the start of the war, demand for a more defined vision of the future grew within and beyond Israel’s borders.
In the plan, Netanyahu briefly outlines what the organization of the Gaza Strip should look like for Israel after the war. The listed measures and objectives, with which Israel appears to retain full control, are situated in the short and medium term.
Bufferzones
In the short term, the plan contains few surprises and builds on Netanyahu’s known rhetoric. The release of the Israeli hostages is still the priority. Netanyahu also wants to quickly see a complete overthrow of Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad, an Iranian-backed militant Islamic organization. In other words, Israel must no longer experience a threat from the Gaza Strip.
If Israel then claims victory, the next phase will begin. This concerns various medium-term measures that should guarantee Israel’s security. Netanyahu is planning a buffer zone on the Israeli border in Gaza. Space is already being cleared for this through air raids and demolition works. Operations must be set up at another border, the one with Gaza and Egypt, to prevent smuggling practices. Israel expects American support for this, but the idea of a buffer zone is met with little enthusiasm in Washington.
Complete controle
In addition, Israel would have the freedom to conduct military operations in the Gaza Strip indefinitely. The same goes for the West Bank. Israel is currently on the verge of approving a plan to build more than 3,000 new homes in occupied territory.
These measures, which guarantee complete military control for Israel, are accompanied by objectives for day-to-day administration. “Local professionals with administrative experience” must be responsible for civil affairs and public order. These people may not have ties to “states or organizations that support terror.” According to the plan, UNRWA, the UN aid agency for Palestinian refugees, must resign and make room for a new international body.
A final step that must precede the reconstruction of the area is the “complete demilitarization and deradicalization” of Gaza. For this “deradicalization” measures are being taken in religious education and social institutions. After that, reconstruction can begin, with financial support and under the leadership of countries that Israel approves.
New negotiations
It is remarkable that the Palestinian Authority (PA), which partly governs the West Bank, is not mentioned in the plan. However, the United States has repeatedly expressed its wish to involve the PA in the post-war administration of Gaza. Meanwhile, the PA has also responded to Netanyahu’s plan. According to them, Israel is consolidating its control over the areas. In this way, it “prevents the possible creation of a Palestinian state.”
On Wednesday, the Knesset supported Netanyahu’s view that the international community cannot externally impose a two-state solution on Israel. In Thursday night’s plan, Netanyahu again emphasized that a Palestinian state can only be achieved through direct negotiations between Israel and Palestine, not through international pressure.
In the meantime, international negotiations appear to be getting underway again. On Friday, delegates from Egypt and Qatar met in Paris with an Israeli delegation led by the head of Mossad, Israel’s intelligence service. This meeting should above all revive the peace negotiations, after Israel rejected the roadmap proposed by Hamas more than two weeks ago. That plan included the release of more than 100 hostages and a four-and-a-half-month ceasefire. These same two topics once again form the basis of the discussions in Paris.