Analysis
Biden’s ‘non-starter’ Gaza ceasefire deal only
demonstrates his lack of influence
Julian
Borger
in
Washington
The US president’s announcement on Friday suggested a
ceasefire might be close, but Benjamin Netanyahu’s rebuke was swift and
decisive
Sat 1 Jun
2024 20.15 CEST
The latest
peace plan for Gaza was given a launch worthy of a historic turning point, with
the US president delivering remarks directly to camera from the White House
state dining room, declaring it finally “time for this war to end”.
Yet even as
Joe Biden spelled out the proposal – leading in theory to a permanent end to
hostilities, large-scale food deliveries and the start of reconstruction, there
was clearly something awry.
If this
plan was an Israeli proposal as Biden claimed, why was it being launched by
Biden in Washington? There had been no word from Israel. By the time Biden
began his remarks, it was already Friday night in the Middle East, the sabbath
was under way and government offices closed.
When the
prime minister’s office did produce a statement in response, it exuded all the
reluctance and irritation of a politician roused from sleep. Yes, Benjamin
Netanyahu had “authorised the negotiating team to present a proposal” but it
was one that would “enable Israel to continue the war until all its objectives
are achieved”.
A second
statement issued after daybreak was even blunter. Any plan that did not achieve
Israel’s war aims, including the destruction of Hamas’s military and governing
capacity, was a “non-starter”.
US
officials argued the deal would fulfil Israel’s essential security requirements
so there was ultimately no conflict, but there was no getting around
Netanyahu’s choice of language, which made it clear he was not the author of
the new plan, but a grudging participant. It also appeared designed to
humiliate Biden. An experienced communicator like Netanyahu would know that the
phrase “non-starter” would appear in the morning’s headlines alongside pictures
of the president making his bid for peace.
By now,
Biden is used to humiliation at Netanyahu’s hands. In early May, he warned that
if the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) went into Rafah: “I’m not supplying the
weapons”. Three weeks on, Israeli tanks have rolled into central and western
Rafah, Gaza’s southernmost city, which has been a refuge for more than 1
million displaced Palestinians. Nearly a million have had to flee for their
lives once more.
Biden has
not delivered on his threat to curb arms deliveries, which would have triggered
outrage from not just Republicans but pro-Israel Democrats. Administration
officials have instead sought to parse what “going into Rafah” means. When he
issued his ultimatum a month ago, Biden had suggested it meant the IDF
advancing to the city’s “population centres”. That has clearly already
happened, but US officials are now arguing the forays so far have not been
“major operations”.
It was left
to the administration’s head of international aid, Samantha Power, to point out
that even with supposedly limited operations, the humanitarian impact was just
as bad and that “the catastrophic consequences that we have long warned about
are becoming a reality”.
As for the
proposal itself, there is a lot of old wine in the new bottle. Phase one
involves an exchange of wounded, elderly and female hostages for Palestinian
detainees during a six-week ceasefire, the same basic plan that collapsed at
talks in Cairo just under a month ago after months of haggling.
Getting to
phase two in the new plan involves the same sort of wishful thinking as the old
plan – that carefully chosen words could bridge the divide between Hamas’s
demand that the cessation of hostilities be permanent, and Israel’s insistence
that the war must continue up to Hamas’s destruction.
Biden’s
claim to be presenting a new plan did have some substance. A week ago in Paris,
the CIA and Mossad chiefs, William Burns and David Barnea, met the Qatari prime
minister, Mohammed Bin Abdulrahman al-Thani, and made progress on a revised
framework.
Barnea
offered some Israeli concessions. They would accept fewer hostages, there would
be an agreed target for the level of humanitarian assistance (600 trucks a
day), and the right of displaced Gazans to return to their homes right across
the coastal strip was underlined. Just as importantly, Israeli negotiators
accepted that even if the parties had not reached agreement on the conditions
for phase two to begin after the six weeks of phase one, the ceasefire would be
extended as long as talks continued, so an impasse would not trigger renewed
bombing.
According
to news website Axios, Netanyahu initially rejected the new proposal, but
relented under pressure from the military and intelligence chiefs and the other
members of the war cabinet. That would explain why he left it to Biden to
unveil the plan, and his less than half-hearted response.
That
response was a reminder to the US president of the limitations on his influence
in the region. Netanyahu, who on Saturday accepted an invitation to address a
joint session of Congress in coming months, has the power to do further damage
to Biden’s frail election campaign.
Biden
cannot do the same to Netanyahu. The Israeli prime minister’s political career
rests instead in the hands of far-right members of the coalition, who say they
will walk out if he agrees a ceasefire deal.
For its
part, Hamas responded to Biden’s announcement by saying it was ready to respond
to the proposal “positively and constructively”. But it has a record of
changing its position radically in the course of negotiations, and for failing
to come up with basic requirements for a deal, like the list of Israeli
hostages it would exchange.
The new
peace plan faces the same fundamental problem as its predecessors. On Friday
Biden talked about the thousands of lives lost on both sides, but those lives
are not a priority for either side.
The Hamas
leader in Gaza, Yahya Sinwar, was ready to see it burn in the hope that it
would bring the region down in flames and leave Israel in ashes. For Netanyahu,
political survival and insulation from looming corruption charges depend on the
war continuing.
At least
the ceasefire talks will start again, bringing a small measure of renewed hope,
but if they are to succeed, it will have to be in spite of the leadership on
both sides.
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