By the end of the week, 50 days will have passed since Hamas launched the Al-Aqsa Flood operation, and Israel responded with a devastating attack on the Gaza Strip.
While war is not over yet, all indicators suggest that the future of Gaza is being discussed in the corridors of major powers, to determine the shape of what has become known as “the next day.”
But what do we know about the scenarios being drawn for Gaza’s future?
The Defeat of Hamas
Western countries are drawing their scenarios based on the “inevitability” of the war ending with the defeat of Hamas and the movement’s failure to return to ruling Gaza again.
An informed Western source said that the major capitals are convinced that the clashes will not end before Hamas is defeated militarily, while acknowledging that this Palestinian movement is not only a military power, but also an “ideology” that cannot be eliminated by only using force.
“We know that [Hamas] is also an idea, and an idea is defeated by another,” the source remarked, adding that eliminating the group militarily without defeating it as an idea could “make us win the battle and lose the war.”
While the Israeli army penetrated deep into northern Gaza, Hamas, as well as the smaller Islamic Jihad group, are still daily announcing a series of operations, ambushes, bombings, and rocket launches, which means that they are able to continue confronting the invasion, at least, in the foreseeable future.
Hamas and Islamic Jihad fighters are holed up in a network of tunnels that extend under Gaza City and its suburbs.
However, the prominent Western source does not seem convinced that Hamas will hold out for long in northern Gaza.
“Israel is now preparing to launch its expected attack on Khan Yunis,” he said, which means that the goal of eliminating Hamas militarily is not only limited to the northern Gaza Strip only, but will extend to the south as well.
This matter must raise fears of a huge wave of displacement towards the border with Egypt. It is known that Khan Yunis currently houses hundreds of thousands of Palestinians who were originally displaced from northern Gaza, the focus of the current Israeli attack.
Who will fill the void?
If the scenario of “defeating Hamas” is achieved - as Israel and Western countries hope - a problem will arise about who will fill the vacuum after the fall of its rule, which has continued since 2007.
The Western source said that the current focus is on a role for the Palestinian Authority in governing the Gaza Strip, which the Palestinian leadership in Ramallah linked to a broader agreement that includes “ending the occupation” and implementing a political solution that ends with the establishment of a Palestinian state in the West Bank, East Jerusalem, and the Gaza Strip as well.
While the authority of President Mahmoud Abbas refuses to return to Gaza “onboard an Israeli tank,” the scenarios being discussed by Western diplomats place this matter at the top of the possible options in the next stage.
The informed Western source noted that among the possible options is the training of some members of the Palestinian Authority in Gaza in order to manage the Strip in a future stage, noting that the PA is still paying the salaries of thousands of Palestinian employees, who remained in the Strip after Hamas took control of it in 2007, following a short war that ended with the defeat of the PA security forces.
It seems that the bet on the Authority’s new role in managing Gaza came after Western powers failed to convince Arab countries to assume part of this role by sending forces to the Gaza Strip. The prominent Western source acknowledged that the relevant Arab countries categorically rejected this proposal.
Their refusal is seemed to be linked to the conviction that the priority was to stop the war and help the residents of the Gaza Strip humanitarianly, before thinking about “the next day” and who will rule Gaza if Hamas is defeated.
Reviving the “two-state solution”
In light of the Arab refusal to send forces, and the rejection of the Palestinian Authority to assume a role outside the framework of a comprehensive solution, it seems that the Western focus in the next stage will be on reviving the peace process in order to reach the implementation of the two-state solution.
According to the Western source, the United States is telling its interlocutors that it is determined to launch a major effort to implement the two-state solution, based on its conviction that defeating Hamas militarily is not enough, and that the Palestinians need a state that represents them and lives side by side next to Israel.
He added that the Americans publicly announced their rejection of the Israeli re-occupation of Gaza Strip, as well as any idea of changing its current borders, noting that Washington considers that the features of the solution are defined in the establishment of a Palestinian state on the 1967 borders, with a “land exchange” between the two parties, in reference to previous understandings and discussions on this matter between the Palestinian Authority and Israel.
Nonetheless, Egyptian President Abdel Fattah El-Sisi said on Friday - as he welcome the Spanish and Belgian prime ministers in Cairo - that reviving the two-state solution path was an exhausted idea, stressing the need to move “to recognize the Palestinian state and bring it into the United Nations.”
Regardless of the Egyptian position, the US effort to revive the two-state solution could face more than one obstacle in the next stage.
First, there is the “Israeli obstacle”. Benjamin Netanyahu’s government includes some extremist settlers who reject the establishment of a Palestinian state, and who insist on expanding settlement in the West Bank, which they call Judea and Samaria, according to the biblical name.
Pushing towards the formation of a Palestinian state will undoubtedly portend the fall of Netanyahu’s government and the holding of new elections, in which right-wing extremists may achieve significant results.
Second, the Biden administration will face another domestic obstacle, represented by a difficult electoral campaign against a stubborn opponent, Donald Trump, whom opinion polls give him a significant lead over his Republican rivals, and also over his Democratic opponent, Biden.
If Trump wins, he will not hesitate to provide greater support to Israel, and won’t be enthusiastic about the establishment of a Palestinian state on the lines demanded by the Palestinian Authority.
A third point must be solved before discussing “the next day”, which is the “Hamas” obstacle. All the scenarios presented are based on the fact that the movement will be defeated militarily and its rule will end. But that has not been achieved yet. Pending its realization, the West Bank and the Lebanese border fronts may explode, and the confrontation between the US and the pro-Iranian militias may expand in both Syria and Iraq, and perhaps in Yemen as well.
