Gaza deal reportedly ‘within reach’, report calls ‘Trump effect’

Shortly before the inauguration of the future US President Donald Trump, a deal for a ceasefire in the Gaza Strip and the release of hostages held by the Islamist Hamas is reportedly within reach. “We are close to an agreement and it can come about this week,” said Jake Sullivan, security advisor to US President Joe Biden, who will leave office next Monday. According to the US broadcaster CNN, the last remaining questions will be clarified today in Qatar’s capital Doha. On the same day, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken will present a plan for the reconstruction and management of the largely destroyed coastal area after the end of the war, according to the US news site “Axios” in Washington.

According to local media, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu also wants to meet relatives of the hostages today. “The reports suggesting a possible agreement on the release of our relatives are a glimmer of hope, but we remain cautious,” said the Hostage Families Forum.

Sullivan said: “I’m not making any promises or predictions, but it’s within reach – and we’ll work to make it happen.”

According to Israeli media, a three-stage plan for a ceasefire was drawn up in Doha. An agreement could be announced today. There was no official confirmation of this. According to the Israeli TV station Channel 13, the plan calls for a 42-day break in fighting in the first phase. During this time, 33 hostages will be released, most of whom are still alive, while the bodies of the others will be handed over, it was said. The Israeli side will not know which of the hostages will come back alive until they are released. These are women, including soldiers, two children, people over 50 as well as the injured and sick.

In return, 1,000 Palestinian prisoners should be released from Israeli prisons, it said. Israel’s army will also gradually withdraw from populated areas of the Gaza Strip and eventually from the Philadelphia Corridor along the border with Egypt. Furthermore, the residents who fled to the south of the sealed-off coastal strip should be allowed to return to their residential areas in the north under international supervision. According to US media reports, Israel will initially maintain buffer zones along its eastern and northern borders with the Gaza Strip.

Negotiations on the second phase – intended to end the war – would begin on the 16th day of the agreement’s implementation, CNN reported. Hamas has made an important concession by accepting verbal guarantees from the USA, Qatar, Egypt and Turkey that Israel will continue negotiations, the Wall Street Journal learned from mediators. According to Israeli media, this will also involve the withdrawal of the army from all of Gaza. The third phase of a possible agreement should ultimately provide for the reconstruction of the largely destroyed Gaza Strip and an alternative government without the participation of Hamas.

As the US news site Axios reported, citing three US officials, the US post-war plan calls for a governance mechanism with the participation of the international community and Arab countries. They could also send troops to Gaza to stabilize the security situation and provide humanitarian aid. In addition, the Palestinian Authority (PA), which governs the West Bank and is led by Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, must be involved in a government. According to the wishes of the USA, the PA should be reformed beforehand.

Hopes of a final agreement on a ceasefire have been repeatedly dashed in the tough negotiations. But now the “Trump effect” is having an impact, the Wall Street Journal quoted an Israeli official as saying. The US president-elect said last week that if the hostages are not free by his inauguration on January 20, “all hell will break loose” in the Middle East, and that will not be good for Hamas, and it will – “Frankly speaking, it’s not good for anyone.”

Biden’s security advisor Sullivan said in Washington that hell has actually been breaking out on Hamas “for 14 months.” He raised the question of what it actually means to further increase military pressure on Hamas. “The Israelis have dismantled their military structure, eliminated their top leadership and significantly destroyed their military capabilities,” Sullivan said.

However, according to information from the Wall Street Journal, Mohammed al-Sinwar is said to be in the process of rebuilding Hamas in Gaza. He is the younger brother of the Hamas chief in Gaza, Jihia al-Sinwar, who was killed by Israel’s army on October 16. The war has created a new generation of willing fighters and littered the Gaza Strip with unexploded ordnance that could be converted into improvised bombs, the report said.

Hamas, under the leadership of Mohammed Sinwar, is reestablishing itself faster than Israel’s army is wiping it out piece by piece, Amir Avivi, a retired Israeli brigadier general, told the US newspaper. “We are working hard to find him,” a senior Israeli operational command official in Gaza was quoted as saying.