No surprise here. What’s the plan of the US and Arab nations to disarm Hamas?
“We have a little situation with Hamas, and that will be taken care of very quickly if they don’t straighten it out themselves, because they’re in violation of the agreement.”
— President Donald Trump
Under the terms of the ceasefire between Israel and Hamas, negotiated by President Donald Trump, all of the hostages murdered by Hamas were supposed to be returned ed by Oct. 13. They weren’t. As of this writing, they still aren’t.
One day, Hamas says it can’t find any more bodies to turn over. The next day, they turn over another body. Besides a ceasefire violation, it’s ghoulish — typical of Hamas.
Under the terms of the ceasefire, Israel withdrew from parts of Gaza to a “yellow line.” Ceasefire means: no shooting from either side of the line. However, Hamas has killed two Israeli soldiers on the Israeli side of the yellow line. Hamas shot over it. Hamas violated the ceasefire.
There were other shooting violations by Hamas, to which Israel did not respond. But it did respond to the killing of its troops. Israel responded with air strikes and a partial closure of a Gazan border crossing.
Perhaps most telling, Hamas, besides denying that it killed two Israelis, said that Israel violated the most important part of the ceasefire: the cessation of firing in Gaza.
By definition, that is certainly integral to he ceasefire. But it is not the essence. The essence is the disarmament of Hamas and the disqualification of Hamas from any governing role in Gaza. Only that will guarantee an actual cessation of firing by Hamas.
Not to mention, Hamas is firing on Gazans. Publicly executing them, no less. (On this, the pro-Palestinian accusers fall silent.)
On Oct. 18, the US State Dept. allowed that Hamas was “planning” attacks on its own citizenry. Actually, Hamas has already attacked Gazans with public executions! (On this, the Hamas defenders fall silent.) Hamas intends to keep governing — by brutality and fear.
We shall see how serious President Trump and all the other credit-takers for the ceasefire deal are about disarming Hamas. So far, we have heard no plan. The default, de facto position seems to be to let Israel risk its own troops to take out Hamas, and bury its own reputation in doing so.
As of this writing, Israel has ceased its military response to Hamas’ murder of its troops and returned to the ceasefire. What now? Statements from Washington and elsewhere are meaningless without a concrete plan to extirpate Hamas.
The plan to extirpate Hezbollah from Lebanon is instructive. The plan is for the Lebanese government to dismantle Hezbollah gradually, with the aid of US supervision. The plan is working, in no small part due to Israel’s military response to Hezbollah’s attempts to rearm. The days of Israel acceding to pressure to look away, are over. The difference in Gaza is that there is no government to work with in order to extirpate Hamas. Which means that the disarmament of Hamas and the establishment of a governing body in Gaza must go hand in hand.
Arab nations seemed particularly interested in helping establish a new government in Gaza. We’ll see whether the lofty talk from a distance will entail Arab nations actually going into Gaza to dismantle the economic-diversion schemes of Hamas: money for terror tunnels, not for Gazans.
Will Gazans themselves successfully rise up against Hamas and help with its extirpation from Gaza?
© IJN 2025
