Israel and Hamas negotiate phased Gaza ceasefire

Israel and Hamas negotiate phased withdrawal without victory date

Can a war be won without destroying the enemy? The agreement Israel and Hamas were negotiating in Doha involves releasing 33 hostages in a first phase, the gradual withdrawal of Israeli forces from Gaza, and swapping Palestinian prisoners, some sentenced to life imprisonment. Diplomatic sources leaking the terms admitted the ceasefire was not signed and details could change. On the table lies an uncomfortable question: if Hamas remains standing and de facto governs the Strip, what has been gained after more than a year of offensive?

What the draft negotiated in Doha says

The text circulating among delegations—with Shin Bet head Ronen Bar and Mossad director David Barnea stationed in Qatar—set a first phase of 42 days. Fifteen days into the truce, talks on subsequent stages would begin, aiming to free all hostages and complete withdrawals. None of the 33 people on the initial list were confirmed dead, though sources believed most, but not all, remained alive. The body of Youssef Ziyadne, recovered by the Israeli military, initially appeared on that list.

The withdrawal would not be total at the outset. Israel would maintain an undefined security perimeter that, according to the same sources, would run the entire length of the Strip, not just the north. Troops would leave the Netzarim corridor, the strip dividing Gaza in two, with unspecified "security arrangements" to control who returns to the north. The formal commitment was not to abandon Gaza entirely until the last hostage was released. For the pact to hold, a cabinet vote and a ruling from the Supreme Court on petitions seeking to block it were still needed.

The narrative of capitulation and its cracks

From there, analysis split in two. One current argues Israel conceded on essential points: full withdrawal, including the Philadelphi corridor, no mechanism to remove Hamas from power, prisoners returning home instead of going into exile, and waiving demands for a prior list of living hostages. In this reading, Trump’s envoy forced Netanyahu to accept a plan he had repeatedly rejected. The harder version adds that US pressure came after elections and that Jerusalem did not choose the timeline.

The opposing view responds with a simple question: if Israel fights, it commits genocide; if it negotiates, it admits defeat. What alternative remained? In this reading, Hamas survives but weakened, Hezbollah took a beating, Iran saw its regional network compromised, and Syria became ungovernable rubble. Enduring is not winning, it is not losing, and a Pyrrhic victory is still a victory. The debate over whether October 7 was a strategic success for Hamas is answered by a phrase attributed to Yahya Sinwar: asked if it was worth 10,000 Palestinians dying, he replied and 100,000 too.

The human cost no figure closes

The material balance is where the official narrative cracks. Tens of thousands of Palestinians dead, many hostages killed during the process, and a Strip turned into debris. The thesis that the offensive saved lives clashes with the one that it razed everything only to negotiate later from a worse position. Children and adolescents who survived Gaza’s flattening will be, in the words of a repeated analysis, the next generation of recruits. This is the classic argument of asymmetric warfare: for Hamas, surviving the siege of a vastly superior force is already a form of victory.

Who pays for reconstruction and who governs

The agreement does not say who administers Gaza afterwards. Nor is there a mechanism to overthrow Hamas, which will continue exercising de facto power. Egypt has tightly closed its border, showing how much Cairo cares about Palestinian fate when passage must open. Qatar and the US sponsor the truce, Turkey appears on the Syrian board, and the Arab community has not backed Hamas even remotely. The rubble is paid for, as always, by those living on top of it.

What remains of Israel's 'never again'

The deal leaves Israel without the result it sold: neither Hamas disappears, nor Gaza demilitarized, nor all hostages returned alive. It leaves Hamas without a state, without significant allies, and with a ruined Strip to manage. And it leaves Trump with a diplomatic success he did not pay for himself. The rest is power arithmetic: whoever signs the ceasefire is usually the one who needs it most.

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In the end, the great defeat of this war has been the word "victory." No one knows anymore who won it, but everyone knows who paid for it.