Resuming the Gaza War? - with Nadav Eyal
As we mark the 500th day of the war in Gaza, and 500 days of captivity for the Israeli hostages who remain there, the future of this fragile ceasefire-hostage deal is looking increasingly less stable.
With every day bringing new twists and turns, we turned to a “Call Me Back” regular to help us make sense of where the war stands and where it may be going.
Nadav Eyal of Yediot Ahronot is one of Israel’s leading journalists. Eyal has been covering Middle Eastern and international politics for the last two decades for Israeli radio, print and television news.
Link to the Bret Stephens article mentioned in this episode: https://www.nytimes.com/2025/02/11/op...
Full Transcript
DISCLAIMER: THIS TRANSCRIPT HAS BEEN CREATED USING AI TECHNOLOGY AND MAY NOT REFLECT 100% ACCURACY.
NE: Why should Hamas go through with the release of those hostages that are to be released, another fourteen out of which at least six are supposed to be alive, if it knows that Israel is never going to agree to its existence as a military rule in the Gaza Strip? Why should Hamas go through this? And that's the question that is really very much the question in the Middle East today.
DS: It is 1:00 PM on Sunday February 16th in New York City. It is 8:00 PM on Sunday February 16th in Israel, as Israelis have just witnessed and taken in another release and return of three hostages. Tomorrow marks the 500th day of the war in Gaza and of captivity for the hostages who remain there. After a threat by Hamas to halt this weekend's release of hostages, ultimately three hostages were released. They are 36-year-old Sagui Dekel-Chen, 29-year-old Sasha Troufanov, and 46-year-old Yair Horn. But as hostages continue to be released, the fragility of the hostage deal seems to increase basically from week to week. In a few days, the IDF will present to the government, we understand, its plans to resume the war in Gaza if in fact that is what the government plans to do. And these war plans address a new reality in Gaza and perhaps a new theory for how to defeat Hamas. Yesterday, Secretary of State Marco Rubio arrived in Israel, held a press conference with Prime Minister Netanyahu in a series of meetings as part of an effort as we understand it to advance the second phase of the ceasefire and hostage deal alongside possibly normalization with Saudi Arabia where he'll visit next on this trip in the Middle East, and discussions no doubt about Iran, as they were discussed in their joint press conference. If you are confused by the various mixed messages about the second phase of this deal and where it's going and where the war goes from here, you are not alone. But perhaps the best way to try and make sense of what's going on is to go back to a quote by former Israeli general and defense minister and foreign minister Moshe Dayan, who was once speculated to have said we don't have the exact quote, but I'll do my best here, the paraphrase is from the Hebrew to the English is “in the Middle East there's what you think what you say and what you do, and never the three shall meet.” So as more questions than answers are piling up we turn to Call me Back regular and senior analyst at Yedioth Ahronoth, Nadav Eyal, to help us sort through this. Nadav, welcome back.
NE: Great being here, Dan.
DS: Nadav, if we look at the hostage deal that was implemented back in November of ‘23, which does seem like ages ago, and at the first few weeks of the current hostage deal being implemented, there did seem to be a tempo with that first hostage deal back in late November of ‘23 in terms of the regular release of hostages. I know there was one big holdup and then the deal ultimately collapsed and the war resumed, but at least for those first I think it was eight days there was a relatively predictable tempo to it. Whereas these past few weeks and especially the last two weeks have felt much more wobbly. Like it does feel fragile. Each week we're wondering, is there going to be a release the next week? So how would you describe where we are in the implementation of this phase of the deal and why we feel, I think anyone following this as closely as you and I are, why we have that sense of like the whole thing could fall apart any moment.
NE: First of all, Dan, because it can. There is a sense, I think, with negotiators, Israelis and the countries that are mediating this effort, primarily the United States, of course, but also Egypt and Qatar, that at any given point, this moment in which we see hostages returning back home, that this can end very swiftly and that most chances is that it will collapse at a certain point. And let me explain in just a couple of sentences why this is so fragile. Well, first of all, because we're looking ahead into the future to phase two of the deal. And phase one of the deal included about three pages of the agreement signed in Qatar between the sides. Phase two of the deal included about seven sentences. So this gives a lot of room to maneuver to both sides of what exactly would be phase two. Basically, all the hostages, all the live hostages are supposed to return back home at the end of phase two. That also needs to be about 42 days. But during this time, the rebuilding of the Gaza Strip is supposed to begin, and there's supposed to be some sort of a political agreement as to how the Gaza Strip would be managed. And this is phase two. And here there is simply a sea of difference between Israel and Hamas. Hamas sees itself as the ruler of the Gaza Strip. It sees itself as a victor in this war. It thinks it can maintain power and government not only behind the scenes with a bureaucrat government, the model that we spoke about in the past, so the Lebanese model, that they'll be managing the things, having the rifles, having a monopoly on violence from behind the scenes while having some sort of a civilian government. No, Hamas actually thinks at this point that they can run Gaza, that they have won the war. So if you just read what these people or hear what these people are saying, Hamas leaders are saying, and you hear what Marco Rubio has said in his visit to Israel this week, what the prime minister has said, what President Trump has said himself about the role of Hamas historically, you understand immediately that there's such a gap between the sides right now as to an agreement on phase two and why everything can collapse immediately. Why? Why should Hamas go through with the release of those hostages that are to be released, another fourteen out of which at least six are supposed to be alive, if it knows that Israel is never going to agree to its existence as a military rule in the Gaza Strip. Why should Hamas go through this? And that's the question that is really very much the question in the Middle East today.
DS: You know, what you're speaking to, Nadav, is what I've felt from the beginning of this, even from the negotiations back in November of ‘23, there's this structural problem with any negotiations between Israel and Hamas, which is normally in any kind of negotiation, like if you look at, you know, Bagan and Sadat negotiating, you know, the Egyptian-Israel agreement back in the late 70s, it's a cliche to use the term a win-win. I hate to use that term, but in many of these negotiations, there was a win-win. If you obviously fast forward to 2020 and the negotiations between Israel and the Gulf countries that were involved in the Abraham Accords, that too, there was a quote unquote win-win. This negotiation, there is no win-win. Israel wants all its hostages back and it wants the confidence and security to know that Hamas will never be running Gaza again. Hamas wants to retake control of Gaza and each side is entering into these negotiations not imagining a win-win because there's just these outcomes each side is pursuing are a complete conflict with one another. They just each believe that if they do this dance, their outcome will be the one that is achieved. Each side believes we're gonna get what we want and their outcome will collapse. So it really is a zero-sum game. They just each have to believe they're gonna get what they want when in reality, there's structurally no way each side can get what it wants. In the Abraham Accords negotiations there was a way both sides could get what they would want at the end of it. In the Camp David Egypt Israel Negotiations there was a way both sides more or less could get what they wanted. Here there is structurally no way both sides can get what they want, they just have to each believe that they're going to do this dance, fool the other side, and prevail in the end.
NE: True. And this all goes to the basic binary ideas of Hamas. And these ideas are that Hamas wants the destruction of the state of Israel, and it doesn't agree to any agreement that will, for instance, there's the exile issue that at the time we published at the beginning of the war. And this is something that's very much an easy solution for Hamas. Why? Let's say there is an exile and they agree on a thousand people who will be exiled from the Gaza Strip and Israel will be able to say, hey, we won. There's a different government there and the leadership of Hamas is either dead or in exile. Well, Hamas is still going to be a grassroots popular movement, the most popular movement probably in the Gaza Strip. And Hamas could make this argument that, you know, we're still there and very much would be the truth. And for Israel, it's sort of a quick way to say we won. But even to that, Hamas is saying no at this point, Dan, and that's a major problem. Now, having said that, I need to say something about the White House and Steve Witkoff, because as we are talking, news are coming out as to public statements made by Witkoff. And we can see that there is a pressure coming from the White House to go through the second phase, and to have the negotiations with Hamas as to the second phase. To the extent that Witkoffi is saying, we are resolute that this second phase needs to happen. So there's this pressure from the White House saying you need to negotiate. Prime Minister Netanyahu didn't want to actually send a delegation to Qatar to begin negotiations. When he decided that there would be a delegation, it's without the head of the Mossad, it's without the head of the Shin Bet, which means it's a rather low level negotiating team. For him politically, it's political poison to talk about the second phase, but he's being, you know, no doubt pressured now by the US to do so. And on the other hand, it's the same US, it's the same Trump administration who's saying, look, we have a plan for Gaza and this plan for Gaza is, you know, for the Israeli far right and hard right and Likud members, to be frank, and maybe most of the Israelis. This is an excellent dream plan of having migration of Palestinians from the Gaza Strip and then moving to another place en masse. Nobody knows the exact numbers. So I think also the Israeli system is to an extent confused, but generally they shouldn't really because if they listen to the president, the president is saying, get the hostages back. And he's also saying there's this plan, but first of all, Israel needs to take care of Hamas.
DS: And, Nadav, to add to these confusing signals, just yesterday President Trump posted on Truth Social, this was after the release of the three hostages yesterday, President Trump wrote, and I'm quoting here, “Hamas has just released three hostages from Gaza, including an American citizen. They seem to be in good shape. This differs from their statement last week that they would not release any hostages. Israel will now have to decide what they will do about the 12 o'clock today, meaning yesterday, deadline imposed on the release of all hostages. The United States will back the decision they make.” So basically, in a sense, Trump seems to be pressuring Israel here from the right. On the one hand, you have Witkoff saying we're going to move to second phase negotiations. And then Trump in his voice is saying, you know, we think all the hostages should be released now. Obviously Israel can do what it wants to do, can negotiate or it can decide to resume war fighting, we the US, or at least President Trump, will back whatever Israel wants to do.
NE: To me, it seems, you know, it's an enigma for Jerusalem trying to understand what Washington is actually saying. But some Israelis think it's quite simple. I just finished a phone call with the former chief of staff, Gadi Eisenkot, who's now a senior official in one of Israel's centrist parties. And what Eisencourt is saying is that, look, we have an administration that wants this deal to go through. This is what they're saying. And our first priority should be really simple. Agree to whatever conditions to get all our hostages back. And then take care of Hamas, because, hey, it's not that President Trump is going to tell Israel after phase two, after we get all our hostages back, now Hamas is immune. He basically is saying, Eisenkot is saying, Hamas is gonna try and destroy us. Hamas is gonna try and rearm. Hamas is never gonna agree to the existence of Israel. So we can resume the war at any point in the future. Right now, it's a priority thing. Get the hostages back. We're hearing the stories from the hostages. Look, we're hearing more stories. Sagui Dekel-Chen returned back home this week to his wife and his kids. One of them is a daughter that was born when he was in captivity. He never saw her. But not only didn't he see his wife and his kids, he didn't know that they survived. So they held from him even that information. Eisenkot is saying, the Israeli society, it's important for it's not for the solidarity, but for the strength, the strategic strength of the Israeli society, get them back home. Don't mess it up. Don't overthink this. And he's saying this as one of the generals in Israel who's considered to be, you know, with a strategic mind, get them back home. Believe me, believe President Trump. He's going to give you clearance if you need and want to fight off Hamas and to destroy Hamas in the day after. Then, Dan, if I continue the conversation, the question is, is Hamas that stupid? Will Hamas be willing to release all the hostages, knowing that actually it's not that Israel is bluffing. No side is bluffing. Hamas is saying we're going to destroy Israel. Israel is saying we're going to destroy Hamas. Why should they return all the hostages? And the answer, and it's a very difficult and harsh answer, is that when I speak with experts and people within the defense apparatus that want this deal to go through, and the second phase, they think that Hamas is never going to let go of the last hostages. Because they know that they are the human shields for their control of the Gaza Strip. Because they know how this shreds the Israeli society. But what they were saying is, yeah, we understand that, but let's get as many as we can out now, possibly all of them, if we can, understanding that it's going to be very difficult. And I can also play the part of the prime minister here.
DS: Which is?
NE: The prime minister would say, look, there is a dynamic in the Middle East. If we agree now to stopping the war, we will be pressured to maintain that position. We will allow Hamas to control the Gaza Strip for another 42 days. And then there's phase three, another 42 days. There will be a status quo and we lose our ability to change and to actually make sure that they are no longer a threat to Israel. And we simply cannot reach an agreement on phase two. So even if I sort of heed the advice of Eisenkot, we'll never agree because they are so vigilant that they'll never recognize Israel and they're never willing to, for instance, demilitarize the Gaza Strip, which is a key demand of Israel. So we need to make sure that the area is changing. He just said that-
DS: He said this at a conference of Presidents of major Jewish organizations, which I guess is in Israel right now, and they met with the Prime Minister.
NE: He said we have an opportunity here to change the face of the Middle East and we shouldn't miss it.
DS: Yeah, look if we're speaking in hard cold terms of reality, I'm not saying I agree with this point of view or disagree with it. I just you're laying out Netanyahu's argument I would add one other layer to it, which is as time passes, even if Israel decides it's going to go back into Gaza and obliterate Hamas, after it gets most of its hostages out, basically the Eisenkot plan. And it's not just him, a number of people have made this argument. The longer Israel is out of Gaza, the harder that becomes to do militarily, right? Israel has made certain strategic and tactical gains that enable IDF operations against Hamas, less challenging than if Israel's out of Gaza for a long period of time and Hamas has time to get reorganized. And is there a cost in terms of military lives, Israeli military lives, that is higher if Israel goes back into Gaza under the Eisenkot plan after a lot of time passes rather than going in now. So then you're getting into this discussion again, this is why these are such brutal choices, right? Is like, so you get the hostages out or you risk more Israeli lives when the fighting resumes. How do you calculate the trade-offs of that?
NE: Yeah, you could ask this question about the first phase of the deal. Because Israel surrendered to Hamas, then its Netzarim Corridor. You know, people died, soldiers, Israeli soldiers died in the Netzarim Corridor less than two weeks before it was evacuated. I remember my conversations with the army generals and I remember the kind of stories that appeared in the Israeli press and I wasn't part of this kind of trend saying Israel is there to stay. Do you remember that, Dan? Israel is building the corridor in order to remain there for the settlements that one day will be built. And I think this somehow transpired to international press. And I remember speaking both with Israeli generals and negotiators and politicians, by the way. And they all told me the same thing. They said, look, when we're in Gaza, we're in Gaza forever, but we can decide not to be in Gaza and we'll be out tomorrow. But we need as an army, we need to calculate our actions according to the assumptions that if we're there, the government will want us to stay there. Maybe we don't know. It's an indefinite time. And then we can always leave. And it's all about getting the deal. And by the way, I heard that not only from our army generals, I heard that from the government. And in the end of the day, this was proven correct because Israel did leave the Gaza Strip. It wasn't an idea of ethnically cleansing the north and the center of the Gaza Strip. It was the idea of fighting there and probably using this as leverage in order to get the hostages out. You know, it was just proven true. And the sacrifices that Israel will need to make and that it has made for the return of the hostages are just immense. And you look at the families, the reason I spoke with EIsenkot is that this is day 500 of the war. Eisenkot lost his son, Gal Eisenkot, a soldier, a reserve soldier who died in Jabalia in battle. He died during a mission to retrieve the bodies of five hostages that died during the war while captive by Hamas.
DS: When was his son killed?
NE: His son was killed in action in December 2023. And for these families, he says, the consolation that I have is that I see the hostages returning. For many of the families of the soldiers who died, they're saying, what did they die for? This is the most concrete thing that they can see. You know, beating Hamas or eradicating Hamas, these are concepts. But seeing Ohad Ben Ami return back to his kids, seeing the hugs of a person like Sagui Dekel-Chen with his wife on these helicopters back home, that's exactly the, you know, the Jewish expression, kolam itsil nefesh chat, kilu itsil ulam umloh. So this is something that Israelis are uniting around. And it's 70, 75% who want the hostages to keep coming back home. There's something addictive in seeing those images of people returning. They are returning not from danger, they are returning from death. It's like seeing people who, for all intents and purposes, were seen almost as dead on the first day. By the way, this is a point made by the prime minister attacking his adversaries in the Knesset. He said, the first deliberations of cabinet, right after October 7, there were people, the higher echelons of Israel's military, that said, you won't be able to bring them back. And let me tell you, Dan, what the Prime Minister said is true. And I checked it out in the conversation with Eisenkot. He confirms that indeed this was the case, that senior officers said we should sort of set this aside, the hostage issue, and really focus on beating Hamas. So to see them coming back home is on the verge of unbelievable and is an amazing experience for the Israelis. And on the other hand, there's these two feelings, sentiments that I think that every Israeli has and everyone who loves Israel has when he hears those stories of the hostages being tormented the way that they have been tormented by Hamas. The first sentiment is we need to get them all back home. We simply cannot remain quiet. We need to do everything to get those young men now, that are in the hands of Hamas, some of them physically chained to the wall as we are speaking now, Dan, get them back home, no matter what, and then worry about other stuff. The other sentiment is there's no way we can live with Hamas across the border. It's never going to happen. We cannot. We simply cannot do that. You know, there was supposed to be Tu Bishvat planting of trees.
DS: Jewish holiday that's right now or just, just occurred.
NE: Yeah, the holiday that celebrates nature and there was supposed to be, you know, planting trees and new forests in the communities in the southern communities, near Gaza, and parents, bereaved parents were invited there of soldiers who sacrificed their lives during the war and they had to cancel because of security issues. So the war has not been won. Hamas is still there. This Osama Hamdan is saying, as I quoted at the beginning, we're going to, you know, we're not going to live with Israel. We're not going to agree to having a different government in Gaza. You see those blackouts that they have when they release the hostages. We are the day after. Just in broken English, we are the next day. Right? So they're writing in broken English, we are the next day. But they mean we are the day after. They're saying this in Arabic, in English, in Hebrew. And the main thing is in Hebrew so that Israelis understand their messages. And I think that this is a consensus with Israelis. It's a consensus with this American administration. I think to an extent, a consensus with Americans in general, or 60, 70% with Americans, Hamas cannot control the Gaza Strip. It cannot be just over the fence, just waiting and planning for the next massacre, even if it will happen in 100 years from now. So is this a valid argument? And also is this a real thing? Because, you know, many of the adversaries of the prime minister would say, no, it's about politics, about Smotrich and Ben Gvir wanting to sabotage the deal. As far as they are concerned, you know, Ben Gvir is a man who voted against getting the Israeli children out of Gaza back in November, 2023. And we released, we didn't release any one terrorist with, you know, with blood on their hands back in November. This guy voted against getting our kids back home in a deal in which there was no convicted terrorist, murderer, Palestinian that was released in return. So you can see the type of political resistance that Israel is experiencing. Like many problems during this war, it's a problem from hell.
DS: Nadav, there was what seemed to be a significant interview given by one of the members of the hostage negotiating team of the Israeli team that's been directly involved with the hostage negotiations. It's the first time, I think, that one of these negotiators has spoken on the record very directly to the Israeli press. This interview just aired. Can you tell us a little bit about what we learned from that interview?
NE: First of all, I need to say that this is the second interview. The most important interview was an interview that was given by Gallant about these negotiations. He gave an interview to you, Dan. He gave an interview to Channel 12. He gave an interview to me and Yedioth Ahronoth. And that's the most high ranking level that spoke about the negotiations towards a deal. Oren Setter was the head of the negotiating team at the headquarters that is responsible to return the hostages. And he's a lieutenant general and he gave an interview to channel 12. And this interview is actually an indictment. And his indictment is that he thought that there were opportunities missed, at least two opportunities. And to quote him, the price was the lives of hostages. And he's also saying that unlike what some officials in Israel quoted as saying, unnamed officials, is though the government didn't know that they are tortured. He contradicted that in the interview and said, we have presented to the prime minister, to the prime minister details, exact details on the harsh conditions in which part of the hostages are held. And, you know, this is just one interview out of many that makes things that have been published in Israeli press, for instance, by myself or by Ronen Bergman and others, were published off the record and have now become on the record. Together with the Gallant interview, Gallant basically saying that not only was the deal sabotaged in the past, it was sabotaged through a leak of a state secret made to Bezalel Smotrich- hard right, far right minister. He also said that Israel, as a result of that leak and as a result of the duration of time, released 110 more murderers than it expected to do a few months earlier. And it also got less live hostages because some of them were murdered. So he said that on the record. And together, this creates an environment, a very critical environment, as to the prime minister. And of course, I need to say that the prime minister totally rejects these accusations and specifically rejects them in reference to Gallant. What they're saying also, off the record, officials are saying that these people were responsible for the leaks from the negotiating team that jeopardized the return of the hostages to begin with. So these are like unnamed accusations against the people who are giving interviews right now. And the prime minister is also saying in his response to the Oren Setter interview in Channel 12, that it was because of him and his insistence that more live hostages came back home and that the previous deal included less commitment to live hostages.
DS: In the interest also of just full balance, this characterization is being contradicted by Brett McGurk, who was the most senior official in the National Security Council in the White House for Middle East policy. And he was the point person for the White House for President Biden on hostage negotiations. He recently just gave an interview on his way out of office where he was doing an interview with PBS on the most recent hostage deal where he said the negotiations fell apart last summer. Again, don't want to, it's worthy of a whole separate conversation about, but he pins it squarely on Hamas. He believes that the deal fell apart because ultimately Hamas was not serious about doing a deal. You know, again, I'm not, you know, mediating all these different-
NE: Yeah. You know, I know that there are many people hearing us who think that there is like a specific creed of Israelis that are obsessive about Netanyahu and criticize Netanyahu anyway. Right. So maybe they count me in to that group. I don't know. But I want to say that it's Ben Gvir and Smotrich who say, and this is a quote people can check it out, Google it out, that what they're saying is they credit themselves for blocking a deal because they thought it's difficult. They're saying, we pressured Netanyahu and we managed to block a deal, which I would say sabotage the deal, of course. So you don't only have Galant and Oren Setter saying this. And of course, stories that were published there, you have the Israeli hard right inside the government that is saying that they managed to block a deal. And everyone can find their own narrative there that they connect to, although, you know, this seems quite verifiable that Israel at certain points didn't want a deal, you know, at the terms that are the Netanyahu, the Biden proposal of April, May 2024.
DS: Nadav, I want to talk about this issue which we've touched on but I want to get back into it on what it would mean if Israel were to resume war fighting in Gaza now, assuming there's no, if there is no phase two. And as I mentioned, the IDF has put together plans for how we could go back into Gaza. I guess my question is based on what you know, what is the theory of the IDF plans for going back into Gaza? Because if it would be reasonable for Israelis to ask if you didn't destroy Hamas in 16 months of fighting, what would you, the IDF, do differently now?
NE: First of all, think the idea, the basic idea is for the IDF to use much more of its divisions Because in the previous time that they entered Gaza, and this is a new entry to Gaza, right? Because most of Gaza has been turned over back to the Palestinians, actually back to Hamas. So the first time you had many IDF divisions that were up north because of the fight against Hezbollah, right? And now you can divert much more forces into the Gaza Strip. And instead of working your way from north to south, which is basically what Israel did in its battle plan at the beginning of the war, you can move in a synchronized manner. Generally speaking, I'm not making any suggestions to the IDF and I'm not exposing any plan of the IDF right now. But theoretically, the IDF can move in a synchronized manner, both north and south and center of the Gaza Strip, using a lot of its divisions entering the Gaza Strip at once. I suspect that the Israelis, if they go into this battle plan, they're not going to accept the idea that they need to supply humanitarian assistance to all parts of the Gaza Strip. This is what the government is basically officials are saying. We are going to say that these areas are dangerous because we're fighting in these areas. All the Palestinians need to evacuate to a specific area. In this specific area, we will supply or we will allow the supply of humanitarian assistance, but all the rest of the Gaza Strip is a battle zone. And we're not going to supply humanitarian aid to the northern parts of the Gaza Strip or other parts in which fighting is underway. And it is not our obligation internationally after the population has been evacuated as a result of this being a military zone, a war zone. So, you know, this is just part of it. And then of course, there's the Trump plan. And a question there is whether or not the Trump administration is going to come over with sort of, hey, we have an agreement with, I don't know, Morocco or Jordan or Egypt or Somaliland or anything like that. And then the Palestinians and that enclave, the humanitarian enclave will be allowed to immigrate if they want to. I somehow don't see this exactly happening as the plan is, but generally I just laid out principles that echo what Israel intends to do if negotiations fail at phase two. And I wouldn't take off the table the possibility that all of these plans are made in order to be used as leverage on the Hamas leadership to agree to terms. And by terms, mean terms of surrender or something that Israel will be able to label as a surrender.
DS: What is Hamas's theory of future war fighting, based on what, the IDF is doing their scenario planning, they presumably, they're doing scenario planning from Hamas's perspective. What will they, what do they tell you, is Hamas's theory of the war going forward?
NE: So first of all, I don't speak with the Hamas sources. We do have journalists that do that from time to time, Israeli journalists in my newspaper group. So what I'm saying is an analysis of the Israelis sort of intelligence and what they expect the Hamas to do. They expect Hamas to have a guerrilla warfare. They're not going to want to have big battles with the IDF across the Gaza Strip as they didn't want to have those in the previous operation. What they do want to have is to give the IDF an impression that they got a hold of the Gaza Strip and then start fighting. Operation Defensive Shield against the Palestinian terror at the beginning of the 2000s during the second Intifada, it took about two and a half months. Fighting against suicide bombers took three years, at least. So that's one of the problems of this theory of let's take the Gaza Strip and have a military rule there. As you know, Dan, and you know this, you know, with your history in Iraq, these things take time, they take a lot of money, energy and sacrifice, your soldiers sacrificing their lives, and they don't have an assurance of success. And this is one of the reasons I think that the Israeli defense establishment is extremely hesitant as to this. Although there is a change now, there's a new chief of staff, there's new chiefs of staff in general, and the prime minister has just congratulated the new chief of staff, Eyal Zamir, and he said he has an offense-related perception of warfare. And you could hear the criticism there saying that he has an offense perception is actually a criticism of the current chief of staff, Herzi Halevi, which is perceived by large sections of the Israeli right wing, including the prime minister, as not being offense centered enough. Meaning Israel wasn't as aggressive as it should have been in the Gaza Strip in other places. You know, my perception of this as an analyst and commutator that covered the war, spent some time, I don't think that this is the case. I don't think that there's a lot of difference between Eyal Zamir and Herzi Halevi in that sense. And I say this to the credit of both of them. I think both are extremely aggressive officers in their perception. Herzi Halevi is much more focused on, you know, he was the commander of Sayeret Matkal, so he's much more focused on special operations. Eyal Zamir came from tank brigades. He's much more focused on, you know, force in general between them, but there are high hopes in the government that these new chiefs of staff will bring a new perception into the discussion as to the future of the Gaza Strip, and maybe bring about what the prime minister has just doubled down on just today, the absolute victory. He said this again today, you know, the absolute victory that Israel is looking for in the Gaza Strip. Again, this also can be used as leverage in order to prevent a war, or another cycle of this war, you need to have a reliable threat.
DS: And I would say what Trump has been saying, apropos of the post I read earlier in this conversation, only helps in that regard, is projecting. One of the problems I think with the previous US administration, there was this sense often, not always, but there were often these moments, periods of daylight between Israel and the US, and I think there was a perception among enemies of Israel in the region, not just Hamas, that Israel would or could be restrained by the US and that there was pressure mounting on Israel from the US and so the things Trump are saying I think only amplify the point you're making that Israel's projecting not only can we go back in and go back in big but we have the US backing us. Which then brings me to my last question, and I won't hold you to your answer to this question, but can you imagine a scenario where Israel doesn't go back in war fighting anytime soon that it's basically the period we're in right now is basically where everything settles, that war fighting is over, and you can never say in the Middle East that war fighting is over long term or permanently or even medium term, but let's just say near term, that this is for the foreseeable future, what things look like. It just kind of winds down.
NE: My assessment, Dan, is that we're looking at another round of fighting in the Gaza Strip. I didn't change my assessment from the previous chapter in which we spoke about it. But if you're asking me if I see this as plausible, of course. And it's a decision to be made by the US president, the president of the United States. It's Donald Trump who's going to make a decision. Is he going to hold Netanyahu to the general commitment of Israel and go to a second phase and sort of adopt the idea, you know, tackle Hamas later on and get as many hostages as you can right now? Or is he going to say, you know, it's your decision and we're going to back you if you're going to go back to the war? Which is another signal coming from DC even right now as we're speaking. It's going to be the decision of Trump and I'm not going to predict Trump because nobody can predict the president or prophesize on the intentions of the president. I do think that he has a line and I think that the line is very clear. The president wants to see a change in the Middle East and in the perception as to Gaza and he wants to see the hostages back home. Doesn't think that Hamas can control the Gaza Strip. I do see a scenario in which the president vetoes an Israeli full-scale incursion to the Gaza Strip if he thinks that there is still a chance to get the hostages or get another agreement. The reason I think that is simply because the president is so focused on getting agreements. He's the dealmaker in chief, to quote the spokesperson of the White House, if I'm not mistaken. And I think that if he thinks that there is a good deal to achieve there, he might say to the prime minister, hey, you know, go get this deal. But as far as the Israelis are concerned, I have no doubt whether or not we get a deal right now, the second phase, or we don't. Hamas is not going to stay like it is right now in the Gaza Strip, having their parades and celebrations. Look, when you're hearing the torture and the torments of the Israeli hostages, think about this in terms of the message that the public gets. It blows your mind. On the one hand, you say, get the hostages out. But on the other hand, long term, you think this can happen to me too. So this sentiment that we spoke about in this conversation, getting them back and destroying Hamas, it's not only about, you know, what you want, it's also about your fears. You imagine yourself there, you want them to get them out, you imagine yourself there, you're saying, hey, you know, I'm willing to take that risk with my kids just living across the border with people who are willing to do these things, who are still saying on the record that they are to destroy us, to annihilate us. And because of that, I think that this story, and I'm going to be insistent on that, and I am going to sort of anticipate, prophesize on that, the story of Hamas in Gaza, to quote Bert Stevens this week in his article in the New York Times, I think, needs to end. And the Israelis will not rest until it ends in the form of a military rule of the Gaza Strip. It doesn't mean that Hamas supporters are not going to be there, but they cannot control the Palestinian community in the Gaza Strip because if they will, it's a serious and perceived as an existential threat to all Israelis and Israelis are simply not going to live with it. Brett's column, which we can link to here, he basically says Israel and the US either needs to get Hamas out of Gaza, whatever it takes to get them out of Gaza or the Palestinian, quote unquote, civilian population needs to get out of Gaza along the lines that Trump is talking about so Israel can actually really go in and just obliterate Hamas. It's one or the other. And it's a piece that is a implicit defense. I think even in his closing line, it's an explicit defense or case for the Trump plan in that regard, that Trump is onto something. You either got to get the population out so you can fight Hamas or you get away to get Hamas out. But there's no world in which
both the civilian population and Hamas remain in Gaza. Nadav, we'll leave it there. Thank you for this, as always, and I look forward to being with you soon again.
NE: Thank you, Dan.
DS: That's our show for today. You can head to our website, ArkMedia.org. That's A-R-K, ArkMedia.org, to sign up for updates, get in touch with us, access our transcripts, all of which have been hyperlinked to resources that we hope will enrich your understanding of the topics covered in the episodes on this podcast. Call Me Back is produced and edited by Ilan Benatar. Additional editing by Martin Huergo. Rebecca Strom is our Operations Director, research by Stav Slama and Gabe Silverstein, and our music was composed by Yuval Semo. Until next time, I'm your host, Dan Senor.