Why Israel should NOT have a “day after plan” for Gaza
On the sidelines of the World Economic Forum (WEF) in Riyadh last month, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken and ministers from six Arab countries met to discuss a vision for the “day after” the war in Gaza. Over the past week, Israeli leaders from Defense Minister Yoav Galant to War Cabinet member Benny Gantz have sharply criticized Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for not producing a “day after” plan of his own, and on Tuesday, United States. National Security advisor Jake Sullivan echoed the same criticism. Yet, counter-intuitively, it may be that the best, most strategic and most forward-looking approach at this stage is to not develop a “day after” plan at all.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has expressed a vision of post-Hamas Gaza in broad strokes: like the WEF plan, the Prime Minister’s vision requires participation from Arab states as well as locals in Gaza. However, it is impossible to hold serious discussions with potential partners, whether local or international, until it is certain that Hamas will never regain control of Gaza.
A case in point: in March, Israel and the United Nations attempted to bypass Hamas’s rampant theft of humanitarian aid by instead working via local community leaders in Gaza. Hamas, which habitually tortures and murders those they consider “collaborators,” threatened to “come down with an iron fist” on the local partners: thus creating a terrifying deterrence against this, as well as any future, local partnership.
The same phenomenon plays out on a national level: Hamas has carried out so much agitation in Jordan that its leaders see the terror group as a threat to national stability, meanwhile Hamas poses a constant threat to Egypt’s border and at times to its internally stability as well. In fact, every Arab country has steadfastly refused safe passage or temporary accommodation for Gaza’s civilians, which dovetails with Hamas’s policy of refusing to allow civilians to leave combat zones, and even firing on those who make the attempt.
In short, the world cannot even begin to seriously build a “day after” plan based on meaningful participation from local and international partners until all such partners are confident that Hamas will no longer threaten their safety and survival.
Unfortunately, numerous missteps in recent years have vastly diminished the West’s credibility on questions of personal and national safety. For example, America’s chaotic withdrawals from Afghanistan and Iraq resulted in (respectively) the return of the Taliban to power and the birth of ISIS, both of which were accompanied by the widespread capture, torture and murder of American partners and allies.
For its part, Israel is now fighting its fifth war against Hamas, and after every previous engagement Hamas has remained in power. The October 7 massacre triggered a significant policy shift, with Israel for the first time declaring its commitment to removing Hamas from power. Yet US threats to stop providing military support, tribunals at the Hague, and widespread calls against invading Hamas’s last stronghold in Rafah, send a clear message to Gazans and the Arab world: Hamas might win. Under such a threat, partnership is impossible, and without partnerships, a “day after” plan that actually makes sense is also impossible.
There are relatively few examples of successful post-war reconstruction in history, yet the two most prominent are the rebuilding of Germany and Japan after World War II. In both cases, post-war planning did not begin in earnest until after the prior regimes were fully and reliably removed from power: in the case of Germany, the Potsdam Conference commenced two months after VE Day, and in the case of Japan, two years of war crimes tribunals and other forms of social and political deconstruction preceded the true work of reconstruction. In both Germany and Japan, it was only after total victory that the Allied Powers were able to form the partnerships necessary for a successful transition to reconstruction.
So why was it possible for the United States and Arab leaders to discuss a vision for Gaza at the WEF? Leaked documents indicate that the WEF plan would keep Hamas in power in some kind of political capacity, a move which insulates Arab partners from Hamas retribution, but is a non-starter with Israel. The plan also envisions involvement by the Palestinian Authority (which has been highly supportive of the October 7 massacre) and by Lebanon, which is effectively controlled by Hezbollah: yet another Iranian backed terror group that is openly committed to Israel’s annihilation.
In short, by appeasing Hamas, Arab partners can safely discuss the WEF plan, but cannot develop a vision realistic enough to actually implement. A realistic “day after” plan, one that is safe for Israel, that includes local and international cooperation, and that ends Hamas’s reign of terror, cannot be safely discussed until Hamas is fully removed from power. For that reason, the most responsible path for all parties at this time, is to fully support the completion of Israel’s campaign to end Hamas’s military capacity as quickly as possible, to rescue the Israeli hostages from Hamas captivity, and only subsequently, to build a true plan for Gaza: a realistic vision that will affect the safety and prosperity of all parties and peoples in the region.
Daniel Pomerantz is an expert in international law, an adjunct professor at Reichman and Bar Ilan Universities in Israel, and the CEO of RealityCheck, a nonprofit NGO dedicated to clarifying global conversations with verifiable data. Daniel lives in Tel Aviv, Israel and can be found on Instagram at @realitycheckresearch or at www.RealityCheckResearch.org.
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Thank you for writing such a well reasoned and articulated thought piece on the day after situation.
Listening to President Biden’s speech today commemorating the 80th anniversary of the D-Day landing in Normandy, the disconnect between the rhetoric and current US policy was clear.
Had Biden been President rather than FDR, our policy of “repelling aggression” and making countries safe from a repetition of the Nazi invasions of 1939-41 would have seen our troops stop at the Rhine. By then, we could have said that the Nazi war machine was sufficiently reduced and, since you can’t destroy an ideology, the only result of the deaths of more German civilian casualties would be to create more Nazis.
In the Middle East especially where the Arabs follow the “strong horse” principle in their honor-shame societies, Hamas, much like the Nazis, must either surrender unconditionally or be destroyed utterly. Their movement must be discredited in the eyes of their fellow Arabs before any successful “Day After” can have any hope for success.
The answer, I think, to our half-hearted position on Israel suggests the Administration’s continued support of Obama’s perverse policy of recasting the revolutionary regime of Iran as something it manifestly is not: a rational actor that would work to stabilize the region rather than try to control it.
In a rational world, the U.S. would have told Iran to be prepared to lose both Hamas and Hezbollah. We haven’t and Iran will increasingly become a problem for the West. Here’s an easy prediction: once Iran unveils ballistic missiles capable of reaching London, Paris and Berlin, watch for a major shift of those powers beyond what we see today.