Gaza peace plan makes no mention of dissolving Hamas

Gaza: Trump's peace plan leaves Hamas undissolved

A Palestinian technocratic committee, an international security force and a Peace Board chaired by Donald Trump with Tony Blair as one of its members. That is the skeleton of the proposal the White House presented to Netanyahu for Gaza, which according to published reports Hamas was inclined to accept, with its response still pending. On paper, Israel neither occupies nor annexes the Strip. In practice, the text distributes power without saying who disarms whom.

The first point of the document defines Gaza as a "deradicalized, terrorism-free zone that poses no threat to its neighbors." The second deals with redevelopment. Among the twenty points, point 14 tasks regional partners with ensuring that Hamas and other factions meet their obligations. The word dissolution does not appear.

What the plan says and what it doesn't

The absence of that term is the detail most repeated in the analysis. Governance would rest with a temporary transitional government of Palestinian technocrats that would provide everyday services to the population, overseen by the Peace Board, with funding for redevelopment until the Palestinian Authority completes its reform program. Israel would retain, according to the reading circulating, the capacity for control on the ground.

Some argue the omission is deliberate and that dissolution will be forced later through police or military means. Others read it the opposite way: without explicit mention there is no enforceable obligation, and the agreement is born lame. The difference between these two readings is the difference between a ceasefire and a change of scenery.

The problem with the stubborn word

The skepticism comes not only from the fine print. It comes from the track record. The Oslo Accords are invoked as a precedent for toilet paper, in a formulation that sums up the general mood: signing is not complying. The distrust is symmetric. It is argued that neither Israel nor the United States is reliable, and neither is Hamas. With that starting point, any text is read as cosmetic.

The strategic calculation that keeps coming up is another one: if Hamas hands over the hostages, hands over its weapons and accepts blue helmets while its infrastructure is destroyed, it has little room left to renege. That is the thesis that the plan works through strangulation, not conviction. And also the reason why some believe it will never truly accept it.

Plan B is already written

If Hamas refuses, the argument is served: the refusal authorizes continuing the offensive. If it accepts, the path of supervised reconstruction opens up. In both scenarios there is a clear winner at the negotiating table, and that is why the proposal reads more as a framework for surrender than as a treaty between equals.

The question of sovereignty remains up in the air. The proposal talks of neither occupying nor annexing, but also of an international Board that decides and funds. Between not occupying and not governing there is a space the text does not clarify, and that is exactly where the future of the Strip will be decided.

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The jarring detail is not in the twenty points. It is in the timeline: some argue that the bombing of Gaza continued on the very day of the announcement and in the days that trinc, according to the records cited. The truce, on paper, had not yet begun.