Israel’s massacres and the victory of Gaza.
Israel’s massacres and the victory of Gaza.
By Adem Kılıç, Political Scientist
Following the ceasefire that came into effect after 471 days of massacre and genocide in Gaza, the Palestinians, who are sending a message that they are standing despite all the pain and destruction, will try to build a new life in the almost wrecked Gaza Strip.
When the bombardment began on October 7, 2023, Israel “ordered” the Palestinian population of Gaza to move south. As these ‘evacuation orders’ intensified, it became clear that Israel intended to force the people of Gaza to leave the Gaza Strip in a manner similar to what was done 76 years ago during the Nakba.
Israel initially denied these allegations, just as it denied the existence of Ben-Gurion’s Dalet Plan, which ethnically cleansed Palestine in 1948.
When the expulsion of the entire population failed and Egypt closed the borders, Tel Aviv turned to a strategy of partially clearing northern Gaza, starting from Jabalia.
This so-called Generals’ Plan, if successful, would enable the annexation of Gaza and the occupation of the territory through the so-called settlers.
Names such as Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich and National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir have publicly stated this goal.
But despite the incredible scale of the destruction, resistance continued, and despite “evacuation orders”, most civilians either maneuvered the Israeli army or stayed in the buffer zones instead of moving south. Those who remained in their homes were either forced out of their neighborhoods by tanks or martyred.
Over the past 15 months, Israel has committed genocide in Gaza, dropping over 90,000 tons of bombs on the territory, killing at least 47,000 Palestinians, women, children and civilians. The attacks have been compared to the atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945.
In the end, Netanyahu was forced to sign a ceasefire agreement without achieving any of his war objectives, such as the elimination of Hamas, ending its influence in Gaza, the return of all prisoners and total victory. Israel’s defeat
Over the past 15 months, Hamas has suffered heavy casualties but is still far from defeat, despite Israel’s intense military offensive. Throughout the process, Hamas has changed its tactics, maintaining a presence in areas that Israel has repeatedly declared cleared of fighters and launching attacks on the Israeli army. In northern Gaza, particularly in Jabalia and Beit Hanoun, in the devastated north of Gaza, it killed 16 Israeli soldiers just hours before the ceasefire was announced.
US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken, who said in the early days that “we stand with Israel in the destruction of Hamas”, was forced to declare last week that “Hamas cannot be destroyed by military action alone”. This means that Israel has exhausted all its military options. The fact that they had to reach a ceasefire agreement with Hamas in a war they set out to destroy is the most obvious example of this.
More importantly, the agreement between Hamas and Israel was proof that if the US wanted to stop the Gaza massacre, it could have done so on day one. President-elect Donald Trump, through his Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff, reportedly pressured Netanyahu to accept the ceasefire. The Biden administration, on the other hand, sought a so-called ceasefire for more than a year, but was captive to Netanyahu and the Israeli lobby.
In fact, just 8 days before the end of his term, Biden authorized another 8 billion dollars’ worth of arms shipments to Israel. From now on, despite the unimaginable casualties, Palestinians take solace in the fact that Israel’s unbridled barbarism has created an international mood in favor of Palestine. The massacre has sparked an international movement to bring Israeli war criminals to justice, including Netanyahu and former Defense Minister Yoav Gallant. However, given Israel’s history of violating agreements, one should expect that Netanyahu will do everything he can to break the three-stage ceasefire agreement again. Since some sectors of Israeli society see the agreement as a capitulation to Hamas, Netanyahu’s political survival depends on his strategy of “perpetual war”, which he once called “living by the sword”.
Even if Israel fulfills phases 1 and 2 and all Israeli prisoners are released and the war is declared over, it will resume violations in phase 3 in terms of Gaza reconstruction and governance.
On the other hand, the social reconstruction in Gaza today is reminiscent of what happened after the Nakba. Families were forced out of their homes by Israel and scattered across Palestine and abroad.
At this point, most of the international arena and Israeli extremists recognize that Israel has reached a stalemate in Gaza, that it has been forced to make a deal, and that the Palestinians have achieved a strategic victory.
History has witnessed, as it has witnessed before, in the last 471 days, the saga of those who say “I will die in my land”.
Yes, Israel will eventually break this ceasefire, but this is the first time that modern history has witnessed Israel’s massacres so clearly, and this time, Israel did not only lose on the ground!