What a difference an election makes.
Last week the new leaders of Hamas threatened to stop releasing hostages because of imaginary Israeli violations of the cease-fire agreement. When President Trump demanded that all hostages be released by Saturday or “all hell would break loose,” the Israeli cabinet endorsed Trump’s demand. Hamas’s new leaders partially caved in, and the hostage releases continued.
But we shouldn’t send any funds to rebuild Gaza unless the Arab nations agree to Trump’s plan.
This was the first time since Oct. 7, 2023, when Hamas attacked Israel, that a sitting U.S. president pressured Hamas instead of Israel.
Let’s pause here to remember that the Biden administration — again and again — pressured Israel, not Hamas, to begin a cease-fire. Former secretary of state Tony Blinken admitted in January that every time the Biden crew pressured Israel into a cease-fire, the Hamas terrorists pulled back from any cease-fire deal to release the hostages Hamas took on Oct. 7. Blinken and Biden were too stupid to realize that pressure on Israel was counterproductive, yet they pressured Israel again and again.
My Twitter feed is chock-a-block with pictures of hostages taken by Hamas who remain in captivity. Some are babies. It’s about five hundred days that they have been in captivity and many may no longer be alive. The bodies of those murdered in captivity are also being held hostage by Hamas.
Hamas, we must remember, committed enormous and multitudinous war crimes on Oct. 7. Killing civilians intentionally, burning families and raping women are war crimes, not “resistance.” The only Hamas member indicted by the so-called “International Criminal Court” was dead at the time of his indictment. That didn’t stop the ICC from indicting Israeli PM Netanyahu and former defense minister Gallant. (As I’ve written elsewhere, the ICC is a rogue court that operates in accordance with ideology, not evidence.)
President Trump’s plan — to rebuild the Gaza Strip after moving its residents to nearby nations such as Jordan and Egypt — has met with absolute refusals of those nations to take in their “Palestinian” kin. (On his visit to the White House last week, Jordan’s King Abdullah promised to take in about two thousand children from Gaza, but only those who were suffering from life-threatening illnesses.)
Trump’s plan is going nowhere but none of the Arab nations will commit to a better idea. The Saudis have said that any peace agreement with Israel depends on the creation of a “Palestinian” state, an idea that died with Hamas’s Oct. 7 attack on Israel.
As the late Abba Eban said, the Palestinians never miss an opportunity to miss an opportunity. That much is clear from the Palestinian Authority’s plan for the future of the Gaza Strip.
The PA Plan for Gaza
The latest so-called plan comes from the Palestinian Authority’s 89-year old President Mahmoud Abbas and has already been presented to the United Nations Security Council. Abbas has been president of the PA since he was elected in January 2005 and is now serving his 21st year of his four-year elected term.
The PA-Abbas plan calls for the expenditure of $3.5 billion to rebuild Gaza. Where the money will come from isn’t stated. It also calls for the creation of a Palestinian state, an “international commitment to end the Israeli siege” in the Gaza Strip and “longer-term changes.”
It goes on to say that, “The end of Israel’s occupation of the State of Palestine and the achievement of the two-state solution, as outlined in numerous U.N. resolutions as well as the Arab Peace Initiative, is the only [way] forward for the State of Palestine and the State of Israel to live side by side in peace and security.”
Let’s not stop with the obvious fact that there is no “State of Palestine.” Our focus should be on the fact that the October 2023 attack proved forevermore that Israel and the Palestinians can’t live side by side in peace and security.
We’ve already seen hundreds of Hamas fighters coming out of their hidey-holes during the current cease-fire, wearing masks and apparently new uniforms, brandishing AK-47s. Iran and probably some of the Arab states — certainly including Qatar — are still funding and arming Hamas. Hamas was also receiving U.S. funding through a so-called “charity” called the Bayader Association for Environment and Development.
The Bayader Association reportedly received about $900,000 in USAID funding over the past decade. According to the Middle East Forum, “Founded in 2007, shortly after Hamas’s takeover of the Gaza Strip, Bayader operates in close cooperation with the Hamas regime. Its 2021 annual report notes ‘coordination’ and ‘meetings’ with Hamas’s Ministry of Interior, Ministry of Works, Ministry of Social Affairs, and Ministry of Agriculture.”
That’s a small digression but it is of enormous effect. Hamas should be eradicated, as Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu wants to do. It is evil incarnate. But among the population of Gaza there is neither any apparent desire — nor any means — to deprive Hamas’s next generation of commanders from governing the Gaza Strip.
Thus, attempting to eradicate Hamas is a near impossibility. As I wrote last week none of the Arab countries wants to absorb any of Gaza’s population. As long as the Gazans stay in Gaza there will be a resurgence of Hamas. (READ MORE from Jed Babbin: Nobody Wants the Palestinians)
Trump’s plan is never going to work. It may be necessary to clear the Gaza Strip of its residents in order to rebuild it whether it becomes a “Riviera” on the Med or anything else. But there appears to be no alternative to leaving the Gaza population adrift amid the rubble that the Hamas leaders caused them to live in.
A Better Alternative
A better alternative would be for the Arab nations that surround or are very close to the Gaza Strip such as Egypt, Jordan, Saudi Arabia to create a joint working group to pay to rebuild Gaza and to police it to prevent terrorism from arising again.
The Arab nations, especially the Saudis, could easily afford to rebuild Gaza. But to form such a working group would require them and the other Arab nations to actually give a damn about the “Palestinians” in Gaza, which they are not inclined to do. As I wrote last week. the Arabs don’t want anything to do with the Palestinians except to use them as a political tool against Israel.
Hamas terrorists have stolen most of the relief supplies — and probably all the relief funds — in order to rebuild their terror network without benefitting the Gazans one whit.
We, Israel, and European nations will continue to send relief supplies to Gaza. But we shouldn’t send any funds to rebuild Gaza unless the Arab nations agree to Trump’s plan. If the EU nations want to pay for a resurgence of terrorism, we should condemn that practice and sanction them to stop it.
Because the “Palestinian’” war against Israel is based on the intolerance of Islam, Israel cannot live in peace and security with them. The war Hamas began on Oct. 7, 2023 will continue. If the Arab nations were serious about helping the “Palestinians,” they would undertake to rebuild and police the Gaza Strip. They never will.
