Stop surrendering over hostages. We need a new policy

Our country is being torn apart by a terrible struggle over something that doesn’t really exist.

A few months ago, one of the American negotiators in the peace process said in a closed meeting that, after 30 years, he had to admit that in fact, there was never a negotiation. According to him, “Israel offered, and Arafat said no. Israel offered more, and Arafat said no. Israel offered more, and Abu Mazen said no.” And he added that, “In fact, there was never a moment when negotiations really took place in the sense that the Palestinians tried to reach an agreed and acceptable result.”

I add that as much as there was a negotiation during the “peace-process” years, it was conducted between the United States (US) and Israel. The US pressured Israel and Israel offered more. The US pressed, and Israel offered more. But in all these years of the so-called “peace process”, we didn’t really bother to find out whether the Palestinians in general accept the most basic condition for any peace solution based on two states – that is that one of the two states is the state of the Jewish people. We assumed that this was what was meant by the expression “two states”, but it was only an assumption on our part. As much as this involved the internalisation of Palestinians who aren’t refugees and don’t have such a thing as “right of return” into the state of Israel, there was never a moment when they were really ready to accept a two-state solution with one of the two being the Jewish state.

That dynamic is happening again now. Apparently, there are negotiations for a deal to release the hostages, and there are outlines and stages, and the Americans are constantly pressuring the Israelis to agree to more, and Israel generally agrees, but there’s really no deal from the Palestinian side. To understand this, you need to listen not to the Americans, not to our people, but to the Palestinians.

If there’s one thing I have committed myself to doing since I realised that the Palestinians don’t lie on the fundamental issues, it’s to listen to them without masking what they say with the wishes of my own heart. For months now, I have been listening to the voices of the immigrants from their side, and through the mask of “negotiations” and flights to Doha and Paris, and Americans saying “right around the corner”. It’s clear that there really is no deal that returns all the abductees.

The colossal failure in conducting the political, diplomatic, and military campaign led to the fact that 11 full months after the invasion and massacre by Hamas and its supporters in Israel, Hamas feels confident enough to insist on exactly the same position it presented after the invasion and massacre: full Israeli withdrawal. Hamas remains in full control of Gaza, including on the border with Egypt, and the billions that are flowing once again for “rehabilitation” – yes, exactly the same rehabilitation of every previous round. Given the lack of symmetry in the goals – this is Hamas’s definition of “total victory”, with all the implications of an overall inspiration to our enemies.

And for those asking, until now, Hamas hasn’t paid a price, certainly not one that it considers a price. Civilian casualties aren’t a price, and the trained killers we eliminated are already being replaced by others. As long as Hamas controls Gaza – and Israel capitulates to bring in regular supplies to Gaza; there is complete blindness to the double game of Qatar and Egypt; and of course, American stupidity/naivety once again – it will be in a position to demand what it demanded the day after the invasion and massacre.

Even for those who say that this deal should be accepted with all its implications, it’s not clear that it really exists either. Because as far as Hamas is concerned, the main thing is to ensure that Israel doesn’t attack again and doesn’t endanger its rule, and to that end, it’s quite possible that it will keep hostages that allows a horrific and continuous trickle in the negotiations to ensure that Israel won’t act against it. The enemy in front of us isn’t stupid. It has studied Israeli society. Talk of “we’ll make a deal, and then we’ll do what we want in Gaza”, shows that we still continue to underestimate the enemy, its determination, and its sadism.

And instead of looking at the terrible management failure of the campaign from 7 October until today and at the determined enemy in front of us, we’re tearing ourselves apart. We blame each other. The families of the abductees who are consumed by worry get bogged down in the discussion of an axis, instead of understanding that we now need leadership that will conduct a campaign and a determined policy – deeds, not talk like sand – that understands the magnitude of the hour and the threat, that won’t lead us to the terrible choice between abandoning the abductees and Israeli surrender, and will produce another, new alternative.

The enormous mistake from the beginning was to assume that the release of the abductees was contrary to the goal of destroying Hamas. It’s exactly the same goal, precisely because for Hamas, keeping the hostages is a guarantee of victory, therefore subduing Hamas is the only way to release the hostages. But the destruction of Hamas relies on a combination of political and diplomatic campaigns, which, first and foremost, will make it clear that Israel has finished giving regular supplies to its enemy while at war, and that, at least on Israel’s part, “nothing goes in until the hostages come out”.

This is a policy that makes it clear that Egypt and Qatar are invited to give supplies to Hamas through the border with Egypt and we won’t prevent it – even if we sit on the border. We have a legal obligation to allow this, but not to do it ourselves and within our borders. As long as the enemy doesn’t surrender and there’s no conquest but only a continuous war, this isn’t our obligation. We need a policy that works to cleanse the north of the Gaza Strip and Gaza City and pushes the population south with a clear statement that we will stop only when all the hostages are released.

We face a bitter enemy, which has believed for a long time that it now, finally, has an opportunity to bring to an end the insane attempt of Jews to have a sovereign state, and is working in the most brutal way towards this purpose. It’s not an enemy seeking to achieve a limited goal of living alongside us in dignity or freeing a few murderers from our prisons. Faced with such an enemy, we must be no less determined.

• Dr Einat Wilf is a former member of the Israeli Knesset and the co-author of “The War of Return: How Western Indulgence of the Palestinian Dream has Obstructed the Path to Peace.”