ABC | Riley Stuart and Orly Halpern in Jerusalem | 28.11.23
After seven weeks of bloodshed, the past few days brought some heartwarming moments.
A fragile ceasefire in the Israel-Gaza war has, mostly, held since Friday.
In that time, videos of Israeli hostages and Palestinian prisoners hugging loved ones and celebrating their new-found freedom signalled a significant change from the death, destruction and desperation so rampant since October 7.
Don’t get used to it.
Israeli Defence Minister Yoav Gallant has made it clear this war is going to go on “with intensity” for a long time — at least two months.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu continues to declare his country’s goal is to “eliminate Hamas” and release all of the hostages (of whom there are an estimated 200 of still in Gaza).
Meanwhile, Hamas, for its part, has given no indication it plans to stop shooting rockets into Israel whenever the ceasefire ends.
It was due to finish 7am local time (4pm AEDT) Tuesday, but late Monday, it was extended for two days.
Children caught up in the war have provided some of the most powerful reunions since the pause was declared.
When nine-year-old Irish-Israeli hostage Emily Hand was released Saturday, the first hug she had with her father — who was told she had been killed in Hamas’s attack — went viral.
In the West Bank, video of Ahmed Numan Abu Naim receiving a hero’s welcome when he left a prison bus and stepped onto the streets of Ramallah did the rounds online.
The 17-year-old Palestinian from one of the most tense villages in the territory had been locked up for a year for throwing rocks and “an incendiary device” — something he pleaded guilty to but denies doing.
The next few months are likely to be very different viewing.
IDF likely to isolate specific areas
The IDF began its invasion of the Gaza Strip in the northern half, cutting it off and instructing civilians to move south.
Much of its efforts were focused on Gaza City, the territory’s largest population centre and the location where Hamas’s leadership is based.
Out of a total population of 2.5 million people that were once spread over the Gaza Strip, now some 2 million are crowded in the southern half.
The density of the population makes it more difficult for the Israeli army to make massive aerial attacks as it has in the north.
The Israeli army has operated in the northern Gaza Strip according to a three-phase plan: penetration, “combing” and “spot cleansing” as Israelis have referred to them: first D-9 bulldozers, tanks and then infantry fighters enter accompanied by massive fire from fighter jets, helicopters, attack drones, and artillery.
Then that area is “combed” through using the same resources. And finally, any surviving militants, hidden shafts, and weapons stockpiles are located and killed or destroyed.
This will be harder to accomplish in the south with the density of the population now there.
Yaniv Kubovich, military affairs correspondent for Israel’s oldest newspaper, Haaretz, told one of the publication’s podcasts this week he expected areas like Khan Younis and Rafah could be the next locations the IDF focuses on.
Israel has already dropped flyers over Khan Younis, telling residents to leave.
“So what will happen, actually, at least from what we understand, is that they’ll [IDF] be isolating areas, meaning if they decide to go for Khan Younis, so essentially you are isolating Khan Younis,” he said.
“You aren’t isolating the whole southern part of the Gaza Strip, you are isolating Khan Younis. That means they [the IDF] will send them [civilians] a little bit more west, towards the coast.”
US officials have said that Israel needs to make a plan that takes civilians into consideration before attacking the southern Gaza Strip.
“At the same time, while that raises the burden on the Israeli military to conduct this fight and go after Hamas, it does not diminish their obligation to do so in a way that distinguishes between civilians and fighters,” Jon Finer, the White House’s deputy national security adviser, told CBS earlier this month.
“We have had many direct conversations with the government of Israel on that topic and will continue to do that.”
The Hamas-run Gaza health ministry says more than 14,000 people have been killed in the territory since the war began.
Both Hamas and the IDF will use the temporary break in hostilities to rest their fighters.
That’s probably something more important for the IDF, which is asking its soldiers to travel and engage in a ground offensive in hostile territory.
Violence not seen in decades
The ceasefire has been a temporary relief, rather than a total cessation, of hostilities.
It’s technically held, but not without accusations from both sides that the other had broken it.
While Israel’s aerial bombardment of Gaza has stopped, in the West Bank, the Palestinian Ministry of Health said that on Sunday the IDF had killed eight people in the previous 24 hours.
Five of those were allegedly in Jenin, where soldiers had been arresting a man the IDF said it suspected of killing two Israelis earlier in the year.
According to United Nations figures, about 200 Palestinians have been killed by the IDF or settlers in the West Bank since October 7, while four Israelis have been killed by Palestinians.
The town where ‘all’ your friends go to prison
This 17-year-old Palestinian boy got out of jail on Friday as part of a deal between Israel and Hamas, but in the West Bank town he’s from, prison is the norm and celebrations about the release are muted.
The West Bank is outside the ceasefire’s parameters, and violence there is at its highest levels since the Second Intifada. That’s not helping delicate negotiations between Hamas and Israel that could see more hostages freed.
Meanwhile, Palestinian militants in the West Bank city of Tulkarm — who are not linked to Hamas — said they executed two men believed to have collaborated with Israeli authorities that led to the deaths of other Palestinians.
Unverified video of their corpses being displayed has been circulated online. Deadly public recriminations for Palestinians accused of helping the IDF have been seldom seen in the past two decades.
All that happened while the heartwarming moments took centre stage.
If this is what an easing of hostilities is supposed to look like, then strap yourselves in.