Children in Gaza celebrate news of ceasefire

“Within hours of the announcement [of a peace deal], videos from across the Gaza Strip showed children dancing in the streets, people cheering and families embracing as the news of a long waited cease-fire spread.” So reported Haaretz newspaper. No wonder, as Israel’s

Celebration in Khan Yunis

genocidal assault on the people of Gaza had made their lives a living hell.

Haaretz quotes English teacher Hana Ghussein: “every time I survived death, I felt my humanity was violated. Every time someone I loved was killed, every time my dignity as a woman and a human being was broken something in me changed. When I saw people torn to pieces in front of me; when I was displaced and lived in a tent; when my sister had to sleep on the street, and she couldn’t find a bathroom; when my brother came out from under the rubble, covered in blood; when I was sick and couldn’t find clean water to drink; or when I went to sleep, crying from hunger, I changed”. Haaretz continues: “her voice falters for a moment before she continues. ‘ Everything changed me. I can’t name one moment. It’s been two full years and no mind can truly comprehend what we lived through.” No wonder children and entire families were dancing in the street on the hope that this long nightmare might be coming to an end, no matter how much they had been “changed”, no matter what might come next.

Trump “peace plan”
Here are some of the basics of Trump’s “peace plan”, to which both Netanyahu and Hamas have agreed:

Israel will institute an immediate cease-fire, which it appears to have done at least for now. During the period of a few days Hamas will release the Israeli hostages that it holds. Israel says that Hamas has 20 hostages still alive and 26 that have died in captivity. In exchange, Israel will release 250 prisoners currently serving life sentences, 1700 Palestinians, who were detained in Gaza after October 7, including 20 minors. Israel has also agreed to transfer the bodies of 360 Palestinian so-called “combatants” it holds in Israel.

In the next stage, Israel will withdraw its forces to retain 53% of Gaza, followed by further withdrawals to 40% and then to 15% of Gaza. Some sort of “security perimeter“ is supposed to remain “until Gaza is properly secure from any resurgent terror threat”. The plan also specifies that 600 truckloads of food and medical equipment will be allowed into Gaza per day.

All of this will be followed and/or accompanied by the establishment of a multinational force of around 200 troops overseen by the US military, which will monitor the cease-fire. The troops making it up is likely to include soldiers from Egypt, Qatar, Turkey, and the United Arab Emirates.

Donald Trump and Tpny Blair. They can be trusted to administer Gaza — in the interests of capitalism (plus their own interests).

There will also be developed a “Board of Peace” to administer Gaza. This board would be led by Trump and former British Prime Minister Tony Blair. According to the plan, the people of Gaza will not be forced to leave, and those that have left will be allowed to return. At least that is what the plan says. Exactly how Gaza will be administered has been left unclear, although one can make an educated guess. Previously Trump openly said that he saw Gaza as prime real estate for development, and there’s no reason to think he has changed that view. So one possibility is the idea of developing Gaza as some sort of glorified free trade zone under the total control of Corporate America along with the capitalist of surrounding countries – the UAE, Qatar etc.

In effect, this “peace deal” is really a surrender not only by Hamas but by the Gazans in general. The question is whether this “peace deal” will hold where Netanyahu brought others to a bloody end, and where this will lead. Let’s start for the present:

Perspectives
According to the deal, Hamas will release all hostages, both alive and dead within a few days, and Israel will release some 200 prisoners, although Marwan Barghouti will not be among them (more about that later). It appears that this part is on track. “the next step will be for Israel to withdraw it forces to control “only” 53% of Gaza, with a phase withdrawal to 40% and then 15%, with a “final stage” of a “security perimeter” that would “remain until Gaza is properly secure from any resurgence terror threat”.

Murderous Israeli settlers planning to steal land in Gaza

It is hard to see how Israel will withdraw forces any more than it absolutely has to, especially with the plans of the settler movement to settle at least part of Gaza. One likelihood would be that as soon as they can settlers would invade as far as possible into that 53% of Gaza where Israeli troops remain. In the West Bank, the Israeli military. has shown no inclination to restrain the settlers, so there is little reason to think they would do any different in Gaza unless Trump intervenes. He has not in any way as far as the West Bank is concerned. With or without the settlers invading, Netanyahu will look for any excuse he can find to delay or avoid any further withdrawal of Israeli troops, and exactly what a “security perimeter” means will be left in part up to his interpretation.

The question of the behavior of the soldiers of the so-called peacekeepers will also come into play. In reality, they will be an occupying force, and they are likely to loot and abuse the people of Gaza just like any occupying force does. This in itself will likely tend to destabilize the entire plan.

As far as the view of the people of Gaza, 972 mag published an interesting article. They report a dual and contradictory attitude that has developed towards Hamas and the very idea of the “armed struggle”. On the one hand they report growing resentment against Hamas including by moderate Hamas leaders. They see the devastation that Israel has wreaked upon Gaza following Hamas’s October 7 adventure. On the other hand, the article reports: “yet at the same time, Israel’s genocide and existential threat of mass expulsion from Gaza has turned some of Hamas’ most adamant detractors into its strongest supporters. There is a widespread fear, even among those critical of October 7, that if Hamas is crushed, Israel will occupy Gaza indefinitely with minimal opposition from the international community. According to this view, only a continued Hamas military insurgency can prevent Israel’s permanent takeover and complete ethnic cleansing of the enclave…. What historically lent the most credence among Palestinians to Hamas’s strategy of armed resistance, was not the appeal to violence or sacrifice, but rather the failure of all other alternatives. Diplomacy, negotiations, advocacy in international bodies and courts, moral persuasion, and nonviolent resistance have all been met by global silence, while Israel continues to kill Palestinians and drive them off their land.… now, however, after the longest war in Palestinian history, Hamas will be asked the same question: what have you achieve from all of this?…. In January 2024, Hanas’ own Saleh al- Arouri acknowledge the failure of this approach in a leaked phone call. ‘ Frankly, armed resistance failed to create change.’”

Haaretz quotes 27 year old Osama Abdul Hadi: “We will need decades to rebuild what was destroyed – not just the buildings and streets, but the spirit and the passion.” The intent is to ensure that that “spirit and passion” does not return.

Stability
The entire plan, however, rests on stability, both within Israel/Palestine and within the region. That stability requires collaboration between Israel and the surrounding Arab capitalist states. It is hard to see how stability can be achieved.

Regional flash points: Israel a “chaos agent”
There is also the issue of Israel’s role in the region, regardless of the situation in the West Bank. Recently, the premier journal for US capitalist strategists, Foreign Affairs, carried an article entitled “the Gaza deal is not too big to fail. How Israel’s military dominance could undermine America’s quest for regional peace.” The article explains the dual but also conflicting goals of the United States and Israel in the entire region, with the US focused on stability, the free flow of oil, along with supporting Israel. On the other hand, Israel’s goal has been the establishment and expansion of its own domination of the region, and if that domination comes at the price of instability and restricted flow of oil, that is a problem for the US. Israeli politics have been increasingly driven by the far right, including the settler movement, has led Israel ever further down that road. The result, as Foreign Affairs puts it, has created “Israel as [a] chaos agent [emphasis added] and the United States, reluctantly following, [this] carries enormous risks…. Israel could drag the United States back into a war that Washington doesn’t want.”

When Netanyahu “awards” a peace prize, you know it is a farce.

Nobel Peace Prize
A parallel goal for Trump was being awarded a Nobel Prize. Had this “peace plan” been arranged in time for nominations, it’s very possible that he would have gotten that award. He and his supporters are complaining bitterly, and Trump may impose new tariffs on Norway as retribution. If and when he does get a Nobel, he will use that to increase his influence both at home and abroad.

One possible war, or at least rising tensions, is between Israel and Turkey, both of whose governments hold competing aspirations for regional domination. Recently Haaretz published an article entitled “Turkey could be next in Israel’s crosshairs after Qatar. The consequences? Catastrophic.” The article cites Erdogan’s open support for Hamas. It points out that Erdogan has allowed Hamas to organize openly in Turkey. Furthermore, “Erdogan has repeatedly casted Hamas not as a terrorist organization, but as a legitimate resistance movement. This support distinguishes Turkey from other governments critical of Israel…. While the Arab league has strongly condemned Hamas’s actions, Turkey, a NATO member, openly supports the terrorist group.” The “vitriol” between Netanyahu and Erdogan is what led to Netanyahu’s recognition of Ottoman genocide of the Armenians during World War I, a recognition that further escalated the rhetoric between the two. It is not just rhetoric, however. The imperialist aims of Erdogan and Netanyahu drives each of them to compete with each other both in Lebanon and in Syria. Until recently, “the prospect of armed conflict between Turkey and Israel… seemed unthinkable.” It is it is not on the immediate horizon but is possible further into the future. And keep in mind that Turkey is a member of NATO. Just imagine the crisis within that body if Turkey actually has an armed conflict with Israel!

This is just one of the very many flashpoints that exist throughout the region, with Israel being involved and most if not all of them.

What is never considered
Let us return to that 972.mag article. It concludes “two years into the genocide, what remains is not conviction, but collapse: of language, hope, politics, and every appeal Palestinians have made in the face of their annihilation.” The article reports asking a top EU leader what he thinks the Palestinians should do. “After giving it some thought, he resigned in his chair in despair. ‘there is nothing Palestinians can do,’ he admitted. ‘ They tried everything.’ The article concludes: “At best, Trump‘s latest plan will end the war, but what will endure is not a roadmap, but a political void. And in that void, Palestinians will be left to grapple with the heaviest truth of all: but no matter which path they choose, quiet, negotiation, or armed defiance, the world has already failed to prevent the genocide of their people. That is a fact that cannot be undone.”

Note that when the EU official talks about having “tried everything” and when the author of the article talks about “the world” there is one potential force that never is considered, neither by the capitalist strategists nor by the left which supports Palestine. That is the potential force of the united working class playing an inde pendent role. On every continent, it is difficult to see that potential, and nowhere is in more difficult than in the so-called Middle East. There European and American imperialism and Zionism have played a devastating role, not only economically, but also in working class politics. As long ago as the 1920s, Zionism, resting on the British colonial masters, linked the Jewish working class to the Jewish capitalists. This drove the Arab working class into the arms of the Arab capitalists and land owners. The working class was subjugated to the capitalist class. Today, 100 years later, that subjugation of the working class, Jewish and Arab alike, remains. How can that subjugation be broken so that the working class can potentially play its rightful role?

Iran revolution
Iran may be the key:

Just three years ago, the masses of Iran rose up in the women, life, freedom movement. It met with brutal repression, including the execution of several of its activists and leaders. The bombing of Iran by Israel and the United States further strengthened the regime, enabling it to increase its repression of the people of Iran. Yet the movement lives on with workers strikes going on. There is also another consideration: an important part, possibly the central part, of the movement in Iran is composed of the Kurdish people, and those people occupy major parts of Iran, Syria, and Turkey.So if for no other reason than the role of the Kurds, a successful revolution in Iran would be met by a movement in those other two countries. It would be especially important for the struggle for Kurdish rights to link up with the struggle for democratic rights for all, which includes workers rights, as well as to link that up with the struggle against the capitalists themselves. That would tend to draw in the wider working class of both Syria and Turkey, which would tend to lead to a renewed “Arab Spring” but on a more clear class basis.

For up-to-date news and analysis, we highly recommend the Facebook page of Iranian refugee Siyâvash Shahabi as well as his excellent blog site The Fire Next Time 

Iran revolution: No illusions in Putin or Islamicism
The people of Iran will have no illusions in either Islamicism or the role of Putin. And given the long history, as well as the US’s most recent attacks, the Iranian people will also have a few illusions in US and western imperialism. Furthermore, unlike the rule of Assaad, who masqueraded under the name of “socialism”, there is likely to be less prejudice against socialism in Iran. Therefore, the Iranian revolution has the potential to draw around it a working class revolutionary movement throughout the region. We emphasize “potential” because nothing is guaranteed. One stumbling block is the divisions between the people of Iran and Syria. Yet they have much in common. That division can be overcome.

Inside Israel even today there have been protests against Israeli genocide by Israeli Jews and Arabs. The protests have been small, it is true, but they have existed under the most difficult circumstances. A layer of Israeli youth and even workers would tend to be attracted towards a regional, working class revolutionary movement that made concessions neither to Israeli racism nor to Islamicism.

Every single capitalist regime throughout the world would do its utmost to divert, destabilize, and crush such a movement. But the more they try to do that, the more such a movement would find support and inspire a working class movement around the world.

Some will brand this perspective as dreaming. “We have to be realistic,” they will say. What is “realistic”? Everybody, from Hamas to the people in Gaza in general have admitted that every other approach has failed. A working class movement and socialism is never “realistic”… until it is. Working class-oriented socialists must keep that potential in mind and continually look for the connections, the openings, even the smallest beginnings of working class rebellion and independence, and we must try to learn from and connect with those developments.

Further reading:
slideshow & article Palestine, the Arab Spring and the Iranian revolution

What is Hamas? How did it originate? Should socialists give it any support?

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