What post-war future can Israel prepare for the Gaza Strip?

Israel intends to solve the Gaza Strip problem in three stages. Two of them relate directly to military operations and the liquidation of the Hamas group and its infrastructure, and the third concerns the future of the enclave and solving the problem of the threat emanating from it after the completion of the Iron Swords military operation. This was stated by Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Galant on October 20, while receiving members of the Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee of the Knesset (parliament) in Tel Aviv, the press service of the country’s defense department reported.

According to him, after the group’s targets are destroyed by air and artillery strikes, and then the ground operation and clearing of the enclave begin, the third stage will be “the creation of a new security regime in the Gaza Strip.” “The third stage will be to remove Israel’s responsibility for life in the Gaza Strip and create a new security reality for Israeli citizens,” Galant concluded.

A day earlier, on October 19, Reuters, citing sources in Israeli and Middle Eastern elites, reported that Israel had planned an “unprecedented in ferocity” ground operation in Gaza, which it had been preparing for two weeks, since the Hamas attack from the enclave on the morning of October 7. In particular, the IDF intends to destroy the group’s infrastructure, including underground tunnels for weapons smuggling on the sector’s border with Egypt, regardless of civilian casualties. But at the same time, according to the agency’s interlocutors, the Israeli leadership does not understand what to do with Gaza after the operation is completed, and they “have no strategy for the day after tomorrow,” which is what their main ally, the United States, is especially concerned about.

On October 20, the Israeli ambassador to Moscow, Alexander Ben Zvi, said that Tel Aviv would not supply water to the north of the Gaza Strip, and in this regard, among other things, called on the residents of this part of the enclave to go to the southern part. At the same time, the Palestinian Ambassador to Russia Abdel Hafiz Nofal told the agency that Israel’s decision to launch a ground operation in the Gaza Strip is a big mistake, and the Palestinians, despite statements about the start of Israel’s ground operation, do not intend to leave their land. Nofal also threatened that it is highly likely that Egypt, Jordan and Lebanon will be drawn into conflict once Israel launches a ground operation.

According to the Palestinian Ministry of Health, based in the West Bank, as of October 20, the number of victims in the Gaza Strip and the West Bank during the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, which escalated after the Hamas attack on October 7, including the attack on Al-Ahly hospital on October 18, reached 4,137 people , more than 13,000 were injured. The Israeli Ministry of Health reports 1,400 dead and 4,834 injured. Hamas holds 203 people hostage in the Gaza Strip.

Israel has been exercising a multi-stage form of territorial control for several decades in the West Bank, a closed territory of Palestine that, unlike Gaza, does not have access to the sea. This system represents three degrees of control by zone: “Zone A” (17.2% of the territory) is under the full control of the Palestinian National Authority (PNA). “Area B” (23.8% of the territory) – under civilian control of the PNA (PNA civil authority and PNA responsibility for public order), but under Israeli military (security) control. Finally, “Area C” (59% of the territory) is under full Israeli control.

At the same time, the total population of the West Bank is comparable to the population of the Gaza Strip (2.3 million people according to Hamas as of January 2022): 2,949,246 people (according to CIA estimates as of July 2021). Of these, more than 80% of the population are Arabs, and the rest (about 670,000) are residents of Israeli settlements, which the UN considers illegal. The number of the latter has doubled since 2000.

The northern Gaza Strip, from where rockets were launched towards Tel Aviv and Ashkelon and from where the latter, along with Sderot, became the target of a Hamas ground attack, may be in the zone of direct military control. But at the same time, such a measure will still not solve the problem of the southern part of the sector: this will again be a temporary solution that could theoretically “freeze” the problem for some time, says Lyudmila Samarskaya, junior researcher at the Center for Middle Eastern Studies at IMEMO RAS.

According to her, the permanent military presence of the Israeli army in this territory is guaranteed to be carried out with significant casualties, and although at this stage Israeli society has rallied, the rating of the current political leadership has fallen.

“Even if Israel acts by analogy with the West Bank, then in this case the territory will remain a source of instability and terrorism, as has been the case for decades in the case of the eastern part of the Palestinian area,” concludes Samarskaya.

The fact that the Israelis do not demonstrate details of the plan for a “new reality” in the Gaza Strip does not mean that they do not have this plan, but rather indicates that they have not yet been able to persuade neighboring Egypt to agree to it, says an expert from the Russian Council on International Affairs Affairs Kirill Semenov. This plan is to make Gaza practically empty, pushing its population onto Egyptian territory, which Cairo frankly does not want for both humanitarian and political reasons, as well as because of security threats.

“According to opinion. Israel, the “Hamas problem” can only be solved by solving the “Gaza problem.” The goal is to clear everything, leaving a small number of potentially loyal residents – say, about 100,000, transfer them under the formal control of the PNA from the West Bank, and even begin to build Israeli settlements in the enclave,” Semyonov believes.

In his opinion, this is indicated, in particular, by the ultimatum at the end of last week to 1 million residents of Gaza to move from the north of the enclave to the south. “The question is how to persuade Egypt and the international community to present this,” Semyonov concludes.