Growing US involvement in the Gaza Strip is stirring growing concern in Israel, where security sources have voiced alarm over Washington’s reported plan to build a large military base in the enclave, a move they say signals “an unprecedented insistence on intervening in Gaza, and in the Israeli and Palestinian conflict.”
According to the sources cited by the Israeli daily Yedioth Ahronoth, the plan “reshapes the map of influence after Israel did everything it could since the 1967 war to limit international intervention in the Palestinian territories.”
Until recently, US military presence in Israel was extremely limited. After the ceasefire agreement was signed, the United States sent about 200 troops to Israel. They are currently operating from an American command center in Kiryat Gat in southern Israel.
The United States also deployed a THAAD missile defense battery during the Israel-Iran war in June to help intercept Iranian missiles.
Yedioth said the planned base forms part of US measures that have already reduced Israel’s freedom of action inside the enclave, particularly with regard to allowing humanitarian aid into Gaza, which Israel had used as a pressure tool on Hamas.
Israeli sources said the US command center in Kiryat Gat is expected to assume full control over the distribution of humanitarian aid, leaving Israel only a marginal role in coordinating government activity in the territories.
Michael Milstein, a Hamas expert at the Moshe Dayan Center for Middle Eastern and African Studies at Tel Aviv University, told The Guardian that the military coordination center in Kiryat Gat will be responsible for most of the activity in Gaza, and Israel’s status as the main player in the enclave will change.
All of this has fed rising accusations in Israel against Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu since the ceasefire brokered by Washington.
Critics argue the Americans have taken the initiative in Gaza out of Israel’s hands.
Netanyahu has been forced to defend himself and his relationship with the United States repeatedly in recent weeks, following Israeli claims that Washington has entrenched its dominance over Israel through a political airlift of senior officials, a military headquarters in the south monitoring Gaza minute by minute, and American drones operating over the enclave.
They say the Americans have prevented Netanyahu and his government from taking action against Hamas or carrying out attacks or even imposing sanctions, have intervened in the search for bodies, brought in foreign teams despite initial Israeli objections, want Hamas members extracted alive from Rafah, and are effectively deciding the nature of the next phase, who will govern the enclave, and who will participate in any international force.
Many Israelis, including politicians, writers, and analysts, say the United States has taken the initiative in the Gaza Strip and is now openly determining Israeli security and political affairs in a way that has turned Israel into a de facto American “protectorate.”
Israeli commentators have written about “Bibi’s guardianship,” “a single deciding party,” the internationalization of the conflict, and “tight American supervision.”
These sentiments intensified with a report about US plans to build a 500-million-dollar military base near the Gaza border to support the ceasefire.
Yedioth Ahronoth reported Tuesday, citing Israeli officials, that the planned US base along the Gaza boundary would host several thousand troops tasked with maintaining the ceasefire.
In recent weeks, US officials have raised the proposal in discussions with the Israeli government and the Israeli army and have begun surveying potential sites around Gaza.
After the ceasefire agreement was signed in the Egyptian city of Sharm el-Sheikh in October, about 200 American troops were deployed in Israel from the central US military coordination center in Kiryat Gat, although Washington stressed it would not send soldiers into the enclave.
