The truce is over. Nerve-racking negotiations continued in Qatar on Thursday, after a meagre extension of the humanitarian pause, a mere 24 hours, was secured minutes before the expiry of the previously agreed term.

But on Friday morning, fighting resumed, as the deadline for the pause expired. The Israeli military issued a statement saying that it had resumed fighting against Hamas in the Gaza Strip, accusing the armed Palestinian group of breaching the terms of the truce by firing into Israeli territory. There were reports of explosions and gunfire in the northern Gaza Strip.

The Israeli military has long been advocating for the continuation of war. On Wednesday I explained the thinking of the army’s general staff: unless they are told that the war is over, they assume it is not. Thus, they prefer to continue it as soon as possible, to get it over with as soon as possible, preferably without any stoppages that create indecision and weaken morale.

From the very decision to follow the attacks of October 7 with a hard-armed response, the military approach was advocated most aggressively by Defence Minister Yoav Gallant. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu maintained a hawkish posture throughout the crisis, but he preferred to appear as the overall leader, leaving the strictly military affairs in the hands of the former career soldier.

Gallant, until recently an active general who started his career as a naval commando and led the Israeli invasion of Gaza in 2010, is not known to mince words. Earlier this year he warned Hezbollah that Israel would “return Lebanon to the Stone Age” if attacked.

At the beginning of operations against Gaza, he referred to Israel’s enemies as “human animals”. Members of the military, from top generals down to the last reservist, have little doubt that what Gallant says reflects official policy.

On Monday, the last day of the original four-day pause and before the announcement of its first extension, by two days, he made his desires and intentions clear, telling a group of officers and soldiers that the truce would not last much longer: “You have a few days. When we return to fighting, we will apply the same force and more, and we will fight across the whole of the Strip.”

It can be assumed that Gallant represents and voices the policy of the Israeli cabinet towards Gaza much more accurately and precisely than his troubled and embattled prime minister, who is increasingly merely trying to secure his political survival.

Gallant wants to continue the war because he believes the military can be more successful the sooner the fighting resumes. But he might have other things on his mind: Despite the Israeli political tradition of not questioning national leadership during an ongoing war, Netanyahu is increasingly being grilled by his former associates, not just political opponents.

It is now clear that despite his notorious political wiliness, Netanyahu will have to face responsibility not just for the failure to prevent the intelligence humiliation and security calamity of October 7, but also for his stubborn insistence on politically divisive judicial reforms at all costs, despite warnings that it would harm the country. The writing on the wall is that Israel will finally rid itself of Netanyahu as soon as the war is over.

As a top-ranked member of the Likud party that heads the current coalition, Gallant must be aware that after the political demise of Netanyahu, the party will need a new leader. Israelis often favour former officers, especially if they have a record of success, so he might want to position himself in a pole position for that race, better sooner than later.

Although he was not personally involved in negotiations, as a member of the inner circle of decision-makers, he was certainly aware of all the difficulties in negotiating additional respite from fighting.

The defence minister seemed so certain on Monday that the truce would not last much longer, that he even specified how the renewed attacks would unfold: “They will first meet the bombs of the air force, and after that the shells of the tanks and the artillery and the paws of the D9 [armoured bulldozers], and finally the shooting of the infantry fighters.”

He also announced a further stage in fighting, saying that Israel would fight “in the whole Strip”.

Extending the ground invasion south of the current line of encirclement of Gaza City would signify a dangerous escalation. At least 1.8 million people of Gaza’s 2.3 million-strong population have been displaced by Israeli bombing, a majority of them having moved to the south.

That means the south is now so overcrowded that there is a danger that an all-out ground assault from Israel might leave the people of Gaza with no option but to try to force their way across the border fence into Egypt.

From the beginning of the conflict, Egypt has been warning that it would not accept any refugees, fearful of political destabilisation and security risks. If it is confronted with that reality, it might find itself in the worst-case scenario of having to use force.

Such an intensification would almost certainly draw into the war many armed groups and states that have hitherto shown patience, hoping for a rational way out.

The post Analysis: Why Israel’s military wanted to end the Gaza truce, and what now? appeared first on News Agency nabakhabar.

In many ways, it has been vague, starting with the time it was accepted by all sides – overnight on Wednesday and across 8 hours’ worth of time zones between Qatar, the main intermediary, and Washington, the principal force pushing the Israeli cabinet, with its reluctant and eager ministers, to accept it.

The deal’s designation is vague, possibly deliberately: The official statement from Qatar calls it a “humanitarian pause” but media in the Arab world and Israel seem to prefer “truce” or “ceasefire”, as does world media. Apart from the difference in meaning between those terms, this reflects how sensitive the weeks-long indirect negotiations must have been.

True to the uncomfortable and nervous relationship between Israeli and Hamas negotiators, even the duration is vague: Leaks during the last days of the indirect talks have ranged from three to five days. In the end, the span is in the middle, four days but, to add vagueness, the deal allows for the extension by one day for each extra batch of 50 captives Hamas releases.

The final ambiguity is when this difficult deal will come into force – that will be announced by the end of Wednesday.

Yesterday, I analysed what Israel has to gain and lose from the deal. The slight change now is that Netanyahu earned some brownie points with the Israeli public by presenting the Israeli cabinet with the deal, which he was most likely arm-twisted into by Joe Biden. Still, his political survival after the fighting in Gaza stops for good is far from being assured.

His initial public opposition to the first mentions of a deal indicated the opinion of the Israeli extreme right wing, politically mostly directed by Jewish settlers in the occupied West Bank and their patrons in the Knesset and cabinet. To them, Hamas are terrorists to be killed, eradicated and expelled from the Gaza Strip with captives being released either voluntarily or by force, and they took any suggestion of negotiating with Hamas as an insult and an offence.

Having become the party that negotiates with the State of Israel, even if through intermediaries, Hamas gained political acceptance in the international community. In just six weeks since October 7, its status changed from “terrorists with whom any negotiations are unacceptable” to “an organisation that has control on the ground”.

Even though Israel and the United States continue calling it “terrorist”, a term that usually connotes “people we do not negotiate with”, they have recognised reality and accepted the Palestinian organisation as their opposite side in negotiations.

To be sure, Hamas and Israel have negotiated truces in the past, always through third-party mediation, usually that of Egypt. But those were tactical battlefield issues rather than full-fledged international agreements involving several states.

Hamas scored an important psychological, political and strategic victory: The Israeli cabinet and the US president have negotiated with Hamas, reached an agreement and said publicly they intend to honour it. Two months ago, today’s reality would have been unimaginable.

But, on the military side, Hamas has little to gain from the pause/ceasefire/truce. As I explained yesterday, it is militarily very convenient for Israel but makes no real difference for Hamas, despite fears voiced by the Israeli public that it would use the opportunity to regroup.

Unlike Israel, which has a conventional army that fights on the ground and whose progress can be easily followed by plotting the positions of its armoured formations on commercially available satellite photos, the Qassam Brigades are almost untraceable from the air.

They move lightly, on foot aboveground, or underground through the network of tunnels crisscrossing the Strip. Their weapons, apart from multiple-rocket launchers, are small and portable, so they can be moved via the tunnels.

By keeping the uniformed fighters and their easily movable weaponry underground, Hamas largely stays beyond the reach of most conventional means of detection. Hamas command centres are under the ground, Hamas armouries are below the surface, and Hamas tunnels connect those with almost every point in the Gaza Strip – so why would Hamas need a pause in the fighting to regroup if it can do so anyway?

Certainly, it will exploit the four quiet days, if they indeed happen, to its military advantage, but that is an opportunistic, tactical chance rather than a strategic necessity.

If the ceasefire holds, Hamas will be able to reduce the number of fighters on lookouts, in ambushes and on operational readiness, giving its fighters some much-needed rest and a possibility to dash for a brief reunion with their families wherever in Gaza they may be.

Both militaries will need to be on alert during the pause as the realities on the ground are often much different than the beliefs and expectations of those who imagine the battlefield from afar and negotiate from secure offices and comfortable international hotels.

In most wars that I witnessed, ceasefires were broken, often by unpredictable and uncontrollable events on the ground. The shortest internationally brokered ceasefire I remember, in Bosnia-Herzegovina, lasted a full one minute and 17 seconds if my memory serves me right.

Any hothead with a gun, and there are more than 50,000 such potential own decision-makers, can decide that he has a reason to take any of his grudges to his enemies. If just one soldier lets off a few bullets, he may jeopardise all hopes of four days with nobody getting killed, some civilians getting to safety, much-needed aid coming in, restoration of some civilian infrastructure and freeing of captives and prisoners.

Having surmounted all the difficulties to clinch the deal, the world can now just pray that the commanders on both sides can, for 96 hours, exercise full and effective control of their forces. Down to the last fool!

The post Analysis: A pause in fighting – what’s in it for Hamas? appeared first on News Agency nabakhabar.