LOS ANGELES.–Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, 75, paused the long-awaited cease fire agreement with Hamas, citing technicalities with a prisoner exchange requiring Israel to empty out Palestinian terrorists from its jails. Hamas as the ruling authority in Gaza has not said whether they would leave the Gaza Strip after the current ceasefire agreement is implemented exchanging all prisoners. Netyanyahu and others familiar with Hamas know that the 1987-based terror organization, committed to destroying Israel, can never get their hands on any donor cash earmarked for Gaza’s reconstruction. Hamas has a 20-year history of looting the Gaza Strip since seizing it June 7, 2007 from the Ramallah-based Palestinian Authority. Hamas leaders have amassed appalling wealth by stealing donor cash, making millionaires and billionaires out of Hamas leaders.
When Hamas leader in exile was assassinated by Israel July 31, 2024 in Tehran, he was worth $4 billion dollars, a staggering sum from piracy and larceny. So, when it comes to any long-term plans in Gaza, how can anyone trust Hamas to do anything but rearm and start a new war with Israel at its own discretion? Remember, Hamas considers any crime against Israel, any murder, rape, torture and kidnapping an act of “resistance,” the legitimate rights of a displaced people. Ironically, without the 1967 Six Day War and 1973 Yom Kippur War there would be no land to give Palestinians, despite all their fraudulent claims of sovereignty. Palestinians or Arabs living in the Holy Land, lived for over 500 years under Ottoman and British control until the U.K. deeded the British Mandate of Palestine to Israel in 1948. Palestinians only started to revolt when Jews declared statehood in May 14, 1948.
Palestinians, led by Yasser Arafat’s Palestinian Liberation Organization [PLO], waged war against Israel in 1967, lasting only six days but resulting in Israel annexing Egypt’s Gaza Strip and Sinai Peninsula, Jordan’s West Bank and East Jerusalem and Syria’s Golan Heights. Arabs living in the Holy Land, called Palestinians by Arafat in 1964, never held one inch of sovereign land. Israel returned the Sinai Peninsula to Egypt for a peace treaty in 1979 under President Jimmy Carter’s Camp David Accords but retained the Gaza Strip. Israeli President Ariel Sharon ceded the Gaza Strip to Palestinians in 2005, where the current war started by the Oct. 7, 2023 massacre, killing 1,200 Israelis, taking another 250 hostage. Netanyahu faces a dilemma making concessions to Hamas, jeopardizing his fragile coalition in the Knesset to deliver on his promise to get all hostages out.
Whatever eventually happens in the Gaza Strip now, Netanyahu knows the President-elect Donald Trump has his back, should things change with Hamas after the current ceasefire agreement unravels. Hamas leadership cannot be trusted for anything certainly, not managing reconstruction funds. “We wanted to have an engagement with Prime Minister Netanyahu, which Steve [Witkoff] went to Israel to do, came back to [Doha]. I think that was . . . quite effective an unnamed Biden official said. “Witkoff worked with State Department special Mideast Envoy Brett McGurk, an experienced hand at negotiations. “I don’t believe it will stop the deal, we’re not there,” said an unnamed Israeli official. “It’s being worked out as we speak, home, hopefully soon we’ll have 100%. Netanyahu would benefit politically with certain leftist groups getting the hostages returned.
Trump wants a Nobel Prize for his peace efforts in the Middle East, continuing where he left off in 2020 with the Abraham Accords, now getting Saudi Arabia to join into a formal peace agreement with Israel. Saudi Leader Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman wants to see a two state solution eventually but that may be hard to achieve without Hamas out of the picture. So far, Hamas has refused to get out of the Gaza Strip and has instead started to rearm in parts of the territory presenting more problems for Netanyahu. With Trump in power, Netanyahu will have the authority to do whatever he wants with Hamas, after the initial phase of the ceasefire deal releasing what’s left of Israeli hostages. Trump has unfinished business in the Mideast, wanting to create the deal of the Century to get Saudi Arabia and more Arab States like Kuwait and Qatar to join the pact.
Trump looks ahead to getting things done where the Biden White House floundered for years, at times pressuring Netanyahu to make concessions. Biden was never in the picture because of his well known cognitive challenges but his underlings like Secretary of State Antony Blinken and National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan were in over their heads. Without real presidential leadership, little could get done in the Mideast other that watching more crises and wars. “President Trump is very interested and focused on what he would like to call the ‘deal of the century’ in the Middle East, which is normalization between Saudi Arabia and other GCC states with Israel,” said Firas Maksad, senior fellow at the Middle East Institute. Whether admitted to or not, Trump has already done more to bring about the current ceasefire than anything done by the Biden administration.
About the Author
John M. Curtis writes politically neutral commentary analyzing spin in national and global news. He’s editor of OnlineColumnist.com and author of Dodging The Bullet and Operation Charisma.
