(I deleted the first six paragraphs as they were so much in contradiction to what follows them. Look them up yourselves if you're curious.)
There are some people in Israel who see Trump far more accurately than virtually any American does, and how Trump is in league with Netanyahu, Ben-Gvir, Smotrich, in their Greater Israel/genocidal agenda, saying that with full knowledge of how horrific Biden was. But all that Biden did was simply carry Trump's programs forward, though never to quite the same degree as Trump had with Israel, as we will shortly find out, notwithstanding all the duplicitous obfuscation going on by Trumpite loyalists, as I just heard in another pro-Trump LaRouchite presentation in which negative foreign policy history only began under Biden.
In making such claims they ignored actual historical facts, such as their Leader asserting, it seems, all the escalation of nuclear weapons development and First Use doctrine is attributable solely to Biden, in spite of all the contemporaneous evidence that while Obama began the "Modernization of Nuclear Weapons," it was Trump who accelerated and escalated it. While he was simultaneously withdrawing the U.S. from the only Arms Control Treaties left, after Republicans Bush/Cheney began the process of withdrawing from Arms Control Treaties. Little wonder Russia had such suspicions of the U.S. during and after Trump's reign, as shown by their responses to Trump's escalation of hostilities against them, notwithstanding ignorant or duplicitous journalists saying the opposite. I don't say that in defense of Goldwater Democrats like Biden, but just in stating actual historical fact.
You won't read that about Trump on Quincy Institute's Trumpite Republican Statecraft, at least not of Trump's role in that. But here is some factual history about Trump and his love of Nuclear Weapons, rebutting what was said by the LaRouchites on nuclear arms, and below, is the same regarding the ceasefire:
BLUF: "Apparently, president Trump has demonstrated to be completely ignorant on this topic when saying, during an interview on 23rd February 2017, that the US “has fallen behind in nuclear weapon capacity”.
. . .
"This interview had immediate consequences: Russian politicians showed reactions of alarm at Trump’s comments. According to the president of the Committee for International Affairs of the Russian parliament, if Trump was to promote a strong increase of the nuclear arsenal to reach a position of supremacy, this could start a new arms race, as seen in the fifties and sixties. Paul K. Martin, Political Affairs director at Peace Action, states that expressions like “at the top of the pack” pass the message that the US are still investing enormous amounts of money in its nuclear arsenal. He concludes that “declarations have consequences, as well as budgets have consequences.”
The agreement may reduce the intensity of Israel’s killing spree, but it is likely to usher in a grueling new phase of ethnic cleansing with Trump’s full support.
President Donald Trump and King Salman bin Abdulaziz Al Saud sign a Joint Strategic Vision Statement, May 20, 2017, at the Royal Court Palace in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. (Shealah Craighead/Official White House Photo)
But the president-elect and those he surrounds himself with have also made it clear that they intend to make Netanyahu’s cooperation worth the trouble. If the Israeli prime minister sees the ceasefire through even just its first stage, he will expect a return on his investment — and his price will be further mass displacement of Palestinians from both Gaza and the West Bank.
A ceasefire gift bag
Still, we shouldn’t give Trump too much credit. Little fundamentally changed when it came to the leverage he was willing to use to influence Israel’s conduct. As far as we know, Trump never threatened to condition military aid to Israel. Nor did he indicate that he would reconsider his predecessor’s practice of ignoring international law in order to shield Israel from accountability on the world stage.
Some will argue that Trump’s threats and the collapse of several resistance fronts across the region forced Hamas to make concessions in the negotiation process. But it wasn’t Hamas that needed convincing — they had already agreed to earlier ceasefire proposals that were largely indiscernible from the current deal, going back to May 2024. In the end, it was Israel that needed the push, and Witkoff likely signalled to Netanyahu that despite not sharing Biden’s blind fealty to Israel, Trump would actually do more to reward cooperation.
The fact that Netanyahu has so far decided to refrain from scuttling this ceasefire agreement shows that he is confident he can gain something significant in return. The Israeli media is already reporting that Trump’s ceasefire “gift bag” to Netanyahu could include a long list of treats, from lifting sanctions on Israeli NSO Group’s spyware Pegasus and on violent Israeli settlers, to giving Washington’s blessing to major West Bank land theft or outright annexation, and permitting or even facilitating a direct attack on Iran.
But it’s not just about what Israel is getting in return for a ceasefire. It’s also about what it has already received.
Israeli soldiers operating in Beit Lahiya in the northern Gaza Strip, November 28, 2024. (Oren Cohen/Flash90)
In the eight months since Israel first rejected an almost identical deal, to which Hamas had agreed in principle, its army has slaughtered tens of thousands of Palestinians and decimated large swaths of the Gaza Strip. This was the price of Israel achieving its true objectives: not eliminating Hamas or securing the release of hostages — many of whom were killed while Israel stalled on a ceasefire — but the destruction and “thinning out” of Gaza and the reshaping of the Middle East.
The facts on the ground in Gaza today paint a picture that we cannot yet fully comprehend. Israeli forces have demolished entire neighborhoods in order to widen the buffer zone that encircles the Strip, expand the Netzarim Corridor that bisects the territory, and ultimately carve up the enclave for a future of perpetual control. In doing so, they have seized over 30 percent of Gaza’s pre-genocide territory, while rendering much of the rest of it uninhabitable.
Meanwhile, Israel has largely completed the so-called “General’s Plan” — the ethnic cleansing of the entirety of northern Gaza above Gaza City. Beit Hanoun, Beit Lahiya, and Jabalia, cities that were once collectively home to over 300,000 people, have been reduced to rubble, as part of a campaign to depopulate the area and entrench Israeli control while laying the groundwork for building Jewish settlements.
Elsewhere, Israel closed its front with Hezbollah, and the fall of Assad allowed it to seize more land in the Golan Heights and the eastern slopes of Mount Hermon/Jabal A-Shaykh. Meanwhile, in the West Bank, state-backed settler attacks on Palestinians have increased in frequency and brutality, while the Palestinian Authority serves as a full partner in the Israeli army’s intensifying crackdown on resistance in Jenin, Nablus, and Tulkarem.
Clearly, Netanyahu allowed the ceasefire agreement to move forward knowing that the stage is set for Israel to turn its attention to annexing the West Bank, confronting Iran, and solidifying its future as an embattled fortress state.
Cementing a new reality
Even if the ceasefire agreement does not survive past the initial 42-day period, it will no doubt save countless lives and give Palestinians a chance to breathe, eat, grieve, and receive medical treatment. Yet while the phased approach to the agreement is supposed to make reneging difficult for Israel, that depends on enforcement. Right now, the only thing standing in the way of the resumption of the annihilation once the ceasefire starts to take hold is an international community that has abandoned Palestinians for more than a year.
Key members of Netanyahu’s far-right coalition have already warned that they will not accept anything less than a continuation of Israel’s assault on Gaza after the first phase of the agreement is completed, even at the expense of the remaining hostages. And after taking credit for achieving the ceasefire in the first place, there is no indication that Trump will hold Israel accountable or pressure Netanyahu to follow through with the second and third phases of the agreement.
Palestinians mourn the death of loved ones killed in an Israeli airstrike, Nasser Hospital, Khan Younis, southern Gaza Strip, September 21, 2024. (Abed Rahim Khatib/Flash90)
While the ceasefire may halt the immediate bloodshed, it also cements a new reality: Gaza as a fragmented, uninhabitable prison. The vast majority of Gaza’s population has been forced into highly securitized and surveilable concentration camps in the south and center of the Strip, where their survival is determined by Israel’s whim.
Genocide is not carried out with bombs and bullets alone, and it does not end when the guns fall silent. Disease, malnutrition, and trauma — untreated by a healthcare system turned to rubble — will continue to claim lives for years to come, while making the land liveable again after the devastation and toxification will take decades. And Israel is not finished: it has created the conditions for the complete and permanent ethnic cleansing of Gaza, guided by the century-old Zionist ethos of “maximum land, minimum Arabs.”
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This ceasefire will reduce the intensity of Israel’s killing spree, but it is likely to usher in a grueling new phase of this ongoing genocide that we have yet to fully grasp — one that is fully supported by the incoming Trump administration. The ethnic cleansing of Gaza might not be carried out in one go, but rather in a piecemeal process that takes shape as we take stock of the extent of Israel’s systemic destruction of all things that sustain life in the Strip.
Regardless of what the future has in store, we should hold on to the words of the late Refaat Alareer: “As Palestinians, no matter what comes of this, we haven’t failed. We did our best. And we didn’t lose our humanity … We didn’t submit to their barbarity.”
This article was published in partnership with The Nation. Read it here.
