American Frustration With Israel in Gaza Has Turned Into Anger. Hamas Is the First to Notice - Israel News - Haaretz.com
The speech by U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris on Monday may signal a change in the U.S. position on the Gaza war. It marked the first time that Washington has expressed its view so directly and pointedly.
Harris called for an immediate cease-fire in the Gaza Strip and said a six-week truce would lead to the release of the Israeli hostages while emphasizing in detail Gazans' growing suffering. The Palestinians there, she said, are suffering a "humanitarian catastrophe" and that Israel must back increased aid, with "no excuses." She asserted that there is a concrete deal on the table and called on Hamas to agree to it.
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The vice president's lengthy and detailed remarks reflect the two sides to the U.S. government's position. The first, President Joe Biden and his aides are stepping up pressure on both sides of the conflict in the (diminishing) hope of reaching a deal that includes a cease-fire and the freeing of the hostages before the start of the Ramadan month in less than a week.
The second, after five months of war, American patience with Israel is decreasing. Washington is struggling to identify any Israeli strategy for the war beyond Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's quest for political survival. Washington is angry at the Israeli government's (and in some cases the defense establishment's) slow response to the growing humanitarian crisis in Gaza. It is concerned about the consequences of the ongoing entanglement in Gaza on the regional situation and on Biden's run for a second term.
A key event in this matter was the disaster that occurred in Gaza City last Thursday, when more than 100 Palestinian civilians were killed in rioting that erupted after the arrival of a convoy of trucks delivering food aid. Some of the civilians were trampled to death trying to loot the delivery; others (only a few, according to the Israel Defense Forces) were killed by soldiers fearing for their lives.
This has not been the only Israeli contribution to the disaster. The trucks enter Gaza from the south and in some cases travel north to bring supplies to the approximately 300,000 civilians who remained in northern Gaza even after the IDF invaded the area at the end of October. The army coordinated the arrival of the trucks with private Palestinian contractors, who brought the deliveries over several nights. The undertaking was not coordinated with Hamas, and the convoy was not protected by any armed guards. When the rioting broke out, the truck drivers tried to drive away, injuring some of the people trying to loot the goods.
Palestinians in Gaza storm aid trucks, on Thursday.Credit: IDF Spokesperson's Unit
The aid delivery system was fundamentally flawed, adopted only out of necessity. Not surprisingly, the IDF is concerned that similar incidents may occur if the modus operandi doesn't change.
The incident shocked the world, but in Israel it was looked upon with indifference. The only official figure to relate to it was the IDF spokesman, Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari, who presented the media with the army's preliminary findings. Because no good deed goes unpunished, Hagari was subjected to a hatchet job full of deceptive facts and outright errors on the Netanyahu Channel 14 house organ, perhaps in order to show the generals that they shouldn't get too many ideas about having their own information policy.
In the West, even in Washington, the leeway that Israel is being given to conduct military operations as it sees fit is shrinking, at least for the month of Ramadan. After the aid disaster, the United States dropped food packages onto Gaza by air for the first time and plans to continue to do so. Israel has, meanwhile, enabled more aid to reach the Palestinians. The United Nations asked and received from Israel permission to bring communications and navigation equipment into Gaza (reportedly satellite phones and GPS gear) to enable better communications with the aid convoys. On Friday night, the European Union resumed financial aid to UNRWA, which had been suspended after Israel revealed intelligence showing that some of the agency's Palestinian staff had participated in the October 7 massacre.
Aid is air-dropped over Gaza, amid the ongoing the conflict between Israel and Hamas, in Gaza City, on Friday.Credit: Kosay Al Nemer/ Reuters
The first one to read the new situation and act on it was Hamas. It seems that the organization is again toughening its stance in the hostage talks, based on the assumption that time is working in its favor and that the Israeli threat to invade Rafah isn't real, certainly not for now.
As for the negotiations themselves, significant gaps in positions remain. The key ones relate to Hamas' demands for guarantees that after the last of the hostages have been released, in two stages, the war will be brought to an end and that civilians will be allowed to return to northern Gaza (at the moment, the IDF is blocking the northward routes, through the corridor it holds south of Gaza City). The question is whether the pressure the Americans are exerting, through the Egyptian and Qatari mediators, will be enough to force Israel and Hamas to agree on terms anytime soon.
The food convoy incident has aroused fear in the West that Somalia-style chaos will spread across Gaza. Israel is less concerned. In many of the discussions with Israeli officials, the Americans have been told by political figures that Hamas' continued rule in Gaza would be worse than anarchy. Without a deal, the risk is that the fighting will continue together with more civilian deaths ("too many innocent Palestinians have been killed," Harris said Monday) amid a growing humanitarian crisis.
With Ramadan on the horizon, the result could be another perfect storm: The images from Gaza could inflame the masses across the Arab world and trigger a new wave of anti-Israeli demonstrations and riots, posing a danger to friendly regimes. One can assume that Minister Benny Gantz is hearing about all these things this week in Washington, in his talks with senior U.S. officials. It is doubtful whether Biden's people hold out any hope that they will be able to convey messages through Gantz to Netanyahu. The prime minister is too busy pretending to be offended, claiming that the Americans bypassed protocol when they invited Gantz without his approval.