October 496

My 308th post on The War

Today’s Image

Meet Ohad Levy, Ohad Ben Ami and Eli Sharabi (from left to right) shown in photos taken before their kidnapping by Hamas and as they were released today. All the living female captives have been released and now the agreement moves into the week of release of the ill and aged male captives. Here in Israel people are comparing their current physical shape to the starvation of concentration camp refugees. So despite the world screaming genocide and the Biden Administration claiming Israel was starving Gaza, the reality is that the Gazans were eating just fine but they were starving the hostages…. Eli Sharabi is a resident of Kibbutz Be’eri. His wife and two daughters were murdered during the Hamas onslaught on his kibbutz on October 7. Until this afternoon be had believed that they were still alive. His brother Yossi, was murdered by Hamas while being held captive by them.

My View - President Trump’s Statements on Gaza

As a disclaimer let me say that I genuinely have no idea regarding the basis and thinking that went into President Trump’s Statements during his Press Conference earlier this week. Moreover, based on commentary in the mainstream Israeli media government officials as well as political pundits were just as surprised as Americans were in the pronouncements that emerged last week. For those of you that were asleep, President Trump made several “out of the box” statements relating to Gaza. First, he proposed that there was no way to rebuild housing structures in such a small space while the Gazans lived in tents. It has been estimated that it would take 10-15 years to rebuild Gaza and there is no realistic way that the Gazans could stay in tents that whole time. So he proposed that most of the Gazans would be moved to other countries during the rebuilding phase. Actually this is a logical conclusion and paints the reality of the situation. Secondly, when asked whether this population move would be permanent or temporary he was a bit vague but seemed to hint that they should be given the choice of whether to return to Gaza or move on to a different country. As follow up to this statement President Trump stated that those who chose not to return to Gaza should be allowed to remain in Egypt or Jordan. When he was told that both Egypt and Jordan objected, he replied that the USA does a lot for both countries and “in the end they will do it”. Since then Egypt, Jordan, many Arab countries, the EU have all publicly reiterated that this could not happen and it would be illegal under International Law. And finally, President Trump pointed out that Gaza is prime real estate property with beautiful beaches on the Mediterranean Sea. He went on to say that the USA might take over the area and develop it into a beautiful tourist destination location. When he was asked who would live there he suggested that the Gazans could return or anybody who wanted to live and work there could. When it was pointed out to him that this might require US Army involvement he replied that it wouldn’t since Israel would turn it over to the USA at the conclusion of this war. Apparently this “Gaza Development Plan” was based on a plan authored and submitted to the Trump Team back in July 2024, long before the Presidential Election. It was submitted by GWU Professor Joseph Pelzman. He actually published it on July 21, 2024. Finally, when asked about Judea/Samaria (West Bank), President Trump announced that his administration would have something to say “about this” in a matter of days.

Needless to say, these remarks are unconventional and causing reactions from around the globe. Here in Israel everyone is trying to figure out what all this means, yours truly included. Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz called a meeting of the top IDF Military brass for the sole purpose of planning for how to enable the mass migration of Gazans out of Gaza. Right Wing Extremist Minister of Knesset Itamar Ben Gvir announced that if the Israeli Government were to commit to the implementation of this President Trump plan it would rejoin the government. His party left the government over its agreement to enter the three phase hostage/ceasefire deal with Hamas. And most every columnist in Israel is quickly publishing their take on what all this means. In the mainstream newspaper Yediot Ahranot, no less than five pundits published conflicting opinions and interpretations of the actual intentions of these announcements - from Avi Issacharoff (producer/director of Fauda and a regular pundit columnist), from Michael Oren (former Israeli Ambassador to the USA), from Giora Eiland (former IDF Major General ), from Itamar Eichler (paper’s Washington Correspondent) and from Ron Ben Yishai (who I often reference in these posts). That these all appeared in the same issue and on the same day, yet often present drastically different interpretations just shows you how little we understand here in Israel about just what all this is really about.

I am going to try my best to provide you, my readers, with the spectrum of thinking about all this from various angles here in Israel. But first I feel compelled to provide some overview of what may or may not happen. At the least this is what one might call “out of the box” thinking and has opened a “Pandora’s Box” throughout the Middle East. Ironically, I welcome all this. This conflict has been raging for more than 100 years. Yes, attacks on Jewish residents of Palestine, as it was called during the British Mandate by local Arabs has been going on since the period of the Ottoman Empire, when this area was referred to as the Syrian Administrative District. That’s right when the moslems had control over this area under the Ottoman Empire it was never called Palestine. Throughout much of this period the leaders of Israel, and the pre-state Yishuv, believed that it was possible to compromise and share the land. In the early 20th century the land that the Ottomans called the Syrian District, the British called Palestine and the Jews called Israel was largely depopulated. As the colonial British and the returning Jewish population started investing in “the land” job opportunities availed to enable Arabs from nearby provinces to migrate and have a source of work/income. During this period there were migrations of BOTH Arabs and Jews to the land. In the case of the Jews, this accelerated in the aftermath of WW2 with the influx of refugees from the holocaust as well as more than 800,000 Jews from nearby Arab countries including Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, Egypt, Libya, Algeria and Morocco. In 1947 the UN passed a resolution calling for dividing this land into a Jewish State and an Arab State. The Jews welcomed the plan and subsequently declared their independence in May, 1948. The Arabs neither accepted the plan nor declared a state of their own. That’s right, they had the opportunity to declare their own state and call it whatever they wished. Did you happen to notice that at the Rafah Border crossing between Gaza and Egypt there were signs saying “Welcome to Gaza” but none said “Welcome to Palestine”??

So, it was the misplaced hope of the early Zionists that ultimately there could be an agreement triggered by the idea of “land for peace”. Israel would provide the Arabs the land to declare their state and the Arabs, in return, would declare peace with Israel and stop their more than 100 year long attack against the Jews. This hope led to the Oslo Accords which were signed in 1993, enabling the Arabs to go about building their state in return for renouncing the use of violence and the recognition of the Jewish State. The Arabs, led by Yasir Arafat, never really declared their state during this period. And they did very little to construct an administrative government that could actually govern. Their focus was not on building a state, but trying to destroy ours. They recognized that Israel existed but they did not recognize the “right” of the Jews to have a state. Starting in that year the level of violence continued to increase against the Jews led by terrorist elements within the Palestinian Authority, including Arafat himself. It should also be said that during this period little was being done to unwrap the communities built by Israel in Judea and Samaria. Israel’s view was that any move in this area should come out of the negotiation process, to which both entities were committed by the agreement signed.

With the outbreak of the Second Intifada in 2000 led by Yasir Arafat, hopes remaining within the left leaning Israeli political parties for a “Two State Solution” were dashed and marginalized. It became quite clear that the ongoing curriculum in the Hamas and Palestinian Authority schools still taught that all the land needed to be liberated and the Jews expelled. This is the situation even now.

So while a Western way of thinking would lead logically to a compromise and division of the land between the two groups, such thinking becomes irrelevant in the Middle East. So today a significant portion of the Israeli public believe that two states are not practical and will not bring peace. And another significant block thinks that this is still the right solution but for the time being there is no one to negotiate such an agreement with since the population and leadership are radicalized and taught from an early age to kill Jews. Liri Albag, one of the female hostages released two weeks ago told her family that Gaza has 2 million terrorists as even young children aged 4 would tell them in their captivity how they hoped to grow up and kill Jews. I will not try to estimate the fraction in each Israeli political camp because it changes depending on the current circumstances. But, in the aftermath of October 7 those believing that two states are possible has shrunk substantially.

So, many of us are very open to “out of the box” thinking since the traditional approach of two states seems to have run its course and that course leads to oblivion, a bridge to nowhere.

As in many parts of the world, the aftermath of WW2 led to the de-colonization of what the British called Palestine. There were many other independence movements at that time and not just the Zionist one - for example, India, Kenya, Philippines, Iraq, Egypt, etc. And refugees were created in many places as a consequence. Between 1947 and 1957 more than 1.2 million Jewish refugees were displaced from Europe and the Middle East. About 700,000 Arabs displaced in the Middle East. It is estimated that more than 40 million muslims migrated to East and West Pakistan resulting from the turmoil in the aftermath of the British leaving India. In every place in the world, except for Israel, the refugees were resettled into permanent homes often with the assistance of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees. Only in the Middle East was a special agency created called United Nations Relief Work Agency whose sole purpose was to perpetuate a refugee problem. Israel absorbed refugees from all over the world without any UN assistance, only with assistance from the Jewish Communities around the world.

So President Trump’s statements are welcome as they should hopefully trigger a different way of looking at this problem. If Gazans are refugees then they should be offered opportunities of resettlement just like any other refugee around the world. If they are not refugees, then they have no claim against Israel and they are killing Israelis for reasons other than the “injustice” perpetrated against them. You cannot have it both ways. Either they are refugees or they are not refugees. So moving them out of Gaza during a rebuilding phase and then letting them choose whether to return or not makes perfect sense. And those fighting this idea expose themselves as those that solely wish to perpetuate this problem and not really want to solve it. There is also a logistical nightmare in how one would rebuild in an area with such a large population still living in tents there. And if Hamas remains in power during the rebuilding phase, they will surely build every building from scratch with multiple entrances into terror tunnels and multiple closets for storing weapons.

And why would any government or aid agency consider investing in the rebuilding of Gaza with Hamas or the Palestinian Authority in control?? With either entity in charge attacks on Israel will continue until a point is reached when the IDF must enter and destroy arms and tunnel infrastructure. This is not just going on in Gaza. Just last week the IDF had to enter Jenin, in northern Samaria (West Bank), which is a hotbed for terror activity. They have been finding tunnels and arms manufacturing facilities there for some time. Jenin falls under the security jurisdiction of the PA. The radical elements of both Hamas, PIJ and other terror groups operate freely in Jenin. They provide a threat not only to Israel but to the authority of the PA as well. Yet, the PA has been unable, and at times unwilling, to eliminate the terror threat. So the IDF has had to go in frequently over the past year. Just last week the IDF blew up several buildings in Jenin and Tulkarm that were housing arms manufacturing facilities and entrances to tunnels. Tulkarm lies right along the border of Israel. Its downtown is only 300 meters from the border. It was the first time this level of destruction was applied there, but it sent a message that needed to be sent. So if this is the future of the PA and Hamas led areas, why would any right minded entity fund the reconstruction of Gaza?? They wouldn’t. The only exception might be Qatar as they have surplus money and are committed to the Moslem Brotherhood.

So, it is time for some out of the box thinking regarding this situation. And, if nothing else, President Trump’s comments are likely to lead to a consideration of different approaches.

In focusing on Egypt and Jordan, President Trump made the comment:

They will do this. They get a lot from us.

He is right about this. Both countries are fundamentally insolvent. Egypt survives off of loans that never get paid from the IMF. Ordinarily their economy barely survives off of: Suez Canal transit fees, tourism and bribes paid for smuggling into Gaza. Right now they are hurting from the lack of income from all these previous sources of income. Egypt’s population stands at 113 million, doubling in the last 25 years. Jordan’s population is 11.5 million and has doubled in the last 25 years. Two thirds of the population in Jordan came from Judea/Samaria (West Bank) up through 1967. So, in a logical way of thinking, what does another 1 million change in Egypt or 0.5 million in Jordan? Earlier this week Egypt has threatened that should Gazans be forced on it, it might blow up its Peace Agreement with Israel. But, the reality is that Egypt would lose much more from doing that than Israel. Nonetheless, the Egyptian Army has been in violation of the Peace Treaty for several years as the deployment of troops in the Sinai Peninsula exceeds that identified in the Agreement between the two countries. There are some in the security establishment within Israel warning that an attack by Egypt is not ‘out of the question”.

Now, I will attempt to provide some of the different theories being floated here on what is really behind these comments as well as pointing out some of the different views on what all this might mean. Remember, we are just as surprised as most of you.

1. A Saudi Arabia Feint

   As you might recall, prior to the Abraham Accords back in 2020 the Israeli Government announced its intent to annex the Jordan Valley. This is the area along the border with Jordan that is largely unpopulated, strategic militarily and consists mostly of farms operated by various Israeli Communities. But the UAE interceded and announced that if Israel shelved this idea (I think that Israel agreed to not reconsider the idea for a long period of time, perhaps 20 years) it might be possible to arrive at peace agreements. So Israel shelved the idea in exchange for arriving at a genuine peace agreement under the Trump Administration with key help from his son-in-law Jared Kushner and the USA Ambassador to Israel David Friedman. So in this line of thinking a provocative move is proposed to enable Saudi Arabia a similar justification for entering an agreement with Israel by saying that it stopped the mass migration of Gazans. But, if this is the idea it is not showing signs of encouragement since Saudi Arabia announced earlier this week that it would not consider normalization with Israel without a Palestinian State. It is not clear from their comments if the demand is that a state exist prior to an agreement OR if there must just be a promise of a state. I do not think that this theory will stand the test of time.

2. Help Keep Netanyahu’s Coalition Together

   Negotiations over Phase 2 of the current hostage/ceasefire agreement were supposed to start this week. At this point Israel has sent a delegation to Doha, but they have no instructions on the limits during negotiations. Prime Minister Netanyahu seems to be switching leadership in this role to his trusted advisor, Ron Dermer. Dermer is currently with the Prime Minister in the USA at the moment. This theory contends that by raising the movement of Gazans out of Gaza, at least during rebuilding, and then allowing them to choose whether to return or not throws a carrot to the extreme right wing factions of Netanyahu’s coalition. There is no way they could leave the government with the possibility that at the end of the war, most of the Gazans would be moved (permanently or temporarily). So this is a means for helping Netanyahu to get through Phase 2 of the deal without having his coalition crash. I put little credence in this theory. US Presidents are not going to create significant international policies just so they can help the leader of an ally hold together his political constituency.

3. Red Herring

   This theory promotes the idea that this was just a test balloon intended to stir up the pot and telling the world that things are not going back to the way they were. It forces the UN and the powers to be to look at the situation and reach the conclusion that to continue to pursue the same old policies doesn’t lead anywhere good. Egypt, Jordan, Lebanon, Iraq, Syria, Saudi Arabia, etc. are all complicit in the creation of this problem They told the Arab residents to leave in 1948 so they could come in and annihilate Israel. They forced the creation of UNRWA and the perpetuation of their refugee status. Unlike Israel which absorbed all the Jews escaping the Middle East they refused to absorb any of the refugees created by their own actions. So maybe the time has come, after more than 77 years that they own up to their problems and start absorbing some of these refugees. And if they are not refugees, then they shouldn't be called refugees.

4. Threaten Hamas

   During the IDF operations in Gaza they secured an incredible amount of intelligence gleaned from documents and hard drives confiscated in the tunnels of Gaza. In one such set of documents Hamas officials are expressing their concern that the Gaza population might start accelerating their already ongoing emigration from the strip due to the unbearable conditions they bear while living under Hams rule. Here is a summary of that report. Without a population living under the poverty line they have no one to prey on and recruit for their holy army. And without a large population the amount of aid they can confiscate declines dramatically. So Hamas is genuinely afraid of a proposal that actually moves the Gazans out of Gaza for even a temporary period. I am betting that this is part of the reason for floating these ideas by President Trump.

5. Make Gaza Appear Valuable

   President Trump sees himself as the ultimate deal maker. He throws out what appear to be extreme positions on an issue with the expectation that it will lead to earnest negotiations to achieve something he really wants. This strategy worked in getting NATO countries to increase their defense budgets. It recently worked to bring Mexico to the table and actually do something about the gang warfare and drug smuggling along the border. And it also brought Canada to the table for discussions. Being the real estate developer he is, he recognizes that Gaza is actually a gem of a location with absolutely beautiful beaches, a great climate and a strategic location between Europe, Africa and Asia. It also has likely gas reserves off its shores. So despite the fact that BOTH Hamas and the PA have turned the place into a living Hell, it has actually incredible opportunities. So maybe, just maybe if President Trump publicly recognizes the incredible opportunities of the location, someone might come along and show genuine interest in assuming control over the area and actually helping the population rather than turning them into cannon fodder. It is hard to see the USA taking on that role but perhaps other Middle Eastern countries?? I am betting that this is part of the reason for floating these ideas by President Trump.

And just to prove my point about Theory #3 & 5, here is an idea floated by Dr. Einat Wilf who I have cited in previous posts. As you might recall she was involved in the Oslo Peace Accords negotiations and learned a great deal from that period. She falls in the left political spectrum. In her x.com post she suggests that Jordan should jump at the opportunity and agree to absorb Gaza into Jordan and grant all the residents citizenship. Also, absorb and offer citizenship to the Arab residents of Judea and Samaria. In return demand that Israel permit two dedicated rail lines be built coming from Jordan to Gaza so people and goods can move back and forth. Jordan gets beach front property and a port on the Mediterranean out of the deal. Pretty valuable to a country whose only outlet to the world is in Aqaba on the Red Sea.

But despite these creative ideas and the attempts to “think outside the box” I am not optimistic that any Arab country would come along to seize the opportunity. They are all content on propagating the problem they created without offering any real solutions.

Casualties

Since my last post the IDF has announced that four IDF soldiers died: Sgt. Major (Reserve) Abraham Tzvi Tzvika Friedman - 43 (Z’’L), Sgt. Major (Reserve) Ofer Yung - 39 (Z’’L), Staff Sgt. Nachman Rafael Ben Ami -20 (Z’’L) and Sgt. First Class (Reserve) Nadav Cohen - 21 (Z’’L). Friedman and Yung were killed in Samaria (West Bank) during an unusual attack on their army base. Ami and Cohen died in the Gaza buffer zone when high winds caused a crane to fall on their improvised base.

Rockets & Missiles & Drones

There have been no aerial explosives directed at Israel for the past 21 days

Lebanon Front

Thursday night the IDF conducted fighter jet strikes against Hezbollah arms storage facilities near Baalbek along the Syrian border. This is about the tenth such attack since the ceasefire was reached at the end of November, 2024. In addition, IDF ground forces in Southern Lebanon continue to uncover large caches of arms stored there by Hezbollah over many years. The new deadline for the ceasefire has been set to February 18. It remains to be seen if the Lebanese Army can take control of all Southern Lebanon or not.

And according to this report from Lebanon, Syrian Army Forces have also engaged in active battles with at least two large clans (Hamoulas) along the border between the two countries.

Syria Front

In what I believe is the first of what might become routine, Syrian Army Forces from the newly constituted government launched an incursion into Lebanon in order to confront Hezbollah forces there near its border. In this report from The Media Line describes a military confrontation between the Syrian Army and Hezbollah forces at a border town, Haweek. This area is rampant with arms smuggling routes, tunnels, manufacturing/assembly facilities and bases used to bring in Iranian arms to its proxy Hezbollah. The Syrians have a long memory and recall the ruthlessness applied by Iranian backed Hezbollah forces in putting down the rebel forces in the civil war. It appears that Hezbollah managed to capture members of the Syrian Army forces and the Syrian Army managed to capture Hezbollah members. The size of the operation is not clear, but it does not look like it was something major.

Yemen Front

There have been civilian protests in the Yemeni Capital of Aden due to the lack of electricity. There has been an ongoing issue of fuel to run their power plants and this has been exacerbated by the IDF strikes against their facilities.

Iran/Jordan/Egypt/Iraq/Turkiye Fronts

Iran’s Supreme Leader just welcomed visits by Hamas leadership from outside Gaza to Tehran. He praised them for their glorious victory against the Zionist entity. These fanatics have an interesting criterion for declaring victory.

Aid

The amount of aid entering Gaza has increased substantially as a result of the hostage/ceasefire agreement. In the two weeks of the ceasefire 8,400 trucks bearing aid entered Gaza, or roughly 600 trucks of aid per day. This is about 4X the daily average through the conflict.

Hostage/Ceasefire Agreement

We are now finishing the third week of the hostage/ceasefire deal, the half way point. As of now 16 hostages have been released, 8,400 trucks of aid have entered Gaza, some 470 Arab prisoners have been released (about 100 serving life sentences), 9 living hostages remain as well as 8 hostage bodies. The Israeli government has dispatched a team to Doha to start Phase 2 negotiations but at this point in time they do not have a mandate to negotiate. This mandate is waiting for the return of Prime Minister Netanyahu from the USA and the convening of the Security Cabinet early Monday morning. It is expected that at the end of business on Monday, the negotiating team will receive a mandate. To the best of my understanding, as long as negotiations are being conducted in earnest the ceasefire will be maintained. However, without a weekly release of hostages I doubt that the Israeli Government will be able to contain a full ceasefire.

It is my view that one of the most contentious aspects of the hostage/ceasefire deal is the number and nature of the security prisoners that Israel must release in order to secure the release of the hostages. Despite what you hear in the Western Press many of these prisoners are terrorist, murdering, rapists:

• At this web site you will see a list of some of them along with the crimes they committed.

• And here you will see how much money they receive from the Palestinian Authority in return for the murders they committed. The more Jews you kill the more you receive. And those are your tax dollars paying these murderous thugs.

IDF/Government

In the aftermath of the Prime Minister’s visit with President Trump, the President alluded to his preference to negotiate a “deal” with the Iranians regarding their nuclear program. This formalized an approach that the President hinted to in the weeks preceding the meeting. But, the Iranian Regime has made clear through its own media outlets that it has no interest in negotiating with the “perfidious US Government”. Without doubt this was a subject raised during the Prime Minister’s visit as it preventing the Islamic Republic from securing nuclear weapons and the means to deliver/detonate them is a high priority here in Israel.

And In Your Copious Spare Time…

• Very few people here have any respect for the Red Cross. They did nothing during WW2 and never once tried to investigate what was going on inside the crematorias. Eretz Nehaderet, an Israeli Satyrical Comedy TV Show, published this video making fun of the Red Cross. You should watch it.

• Here is a short video of several Gazan residents telling the reporter what they think of their future in Gaza. All this is anecdotal and it is really hard to know what the residents really think as long as Hamas is around threatening them. But their own polling suggests that about ½ of them want to leave permanently.

• And you should read this opinion piece by former Israeli Ambassador to the USA, Michael Oren, appearing in The Free Press, entitled “Trump Takes a Wrecking Ball to the Middle East Status Quo”