The entire world is watching the Israel-Hamas war. One question has been on everyone’s mind since Israel carpet-bombed Gaza in response to the attack on October 7 in an attempt to destroy Hamas: what is Benjamin Netanyahu’s ultimate goal for the strip?
Netanyahu’s plan has now been revealed in an internal document that was leaked.
What does it say, though?
Let’s investigate more closely:
The 10-page document, according to The Times of Israel, proposes that Gaza’s population be relocated to Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula.
There are over two million people living in Gaza.
According to The Cradle, it was also published by the Israeli culture magazine Mekomit last week.
It was assembled by Israel’s intelligence ministry, which, according to The Cradle, carries out research but does not establish policy.
Studies and policy papers are independently produced by the junior ministry and forwarded to security and government organisations.
According to NDTV, the plan calls for Israel to give the order for residents of north Gaza to relocate south before the offensive.
This has previously taken place.
Israel has begun military operations inside Gaza’s north and will work its way south.
The Egyptian Rafah crossing will remain open in the interim.
“It is important to leave the traffic lanes towards the south usable, to allow the evacuation of the civilian population towards Rafah,” document reads.
“Gazan should be told “Allah made sure that you lost this land because of the leadership of Hamas – there is no choice but to move to another place with the help of Your Muslim brothers,” it added.
The plan calls for Gazans to initially be kept in tent cities in northern Sinai. Ultimately, permanent cities would be constructed and a humanitarian corridor opened.
Additionally, the document asks for the creation of a several-kilometer-long “buffer zone” inside Egypt to prevent civilians from settling along the border with Israel.
The plan outlines two additional options: either assisting a local government or granting the Palestinian Authority control over the Gaza Strip.
In the end, though, the document rejects both options as unrealistic due to a number of factors, including their inability to prevent future attacks.
A week-long war in 2007 that saw Hamas take control of Gaza resulted in the expulsion of the Palestinian Authority, which the document claims would be “an unprecedented victory of the Palestinian national movement, a victory that will claim the lives of thousands of Israeli civilians and soldiers, and does not safeguard Israel’s security.”
The plan asks for creating a security zone inside Israel to prevent Palestinians who have been displaced from returning.
What would happen to Gaza after its population is expelled was not mentioned in the report.
The report, according to Vice, recommends framing this as a “humanitarian approach” to the issue of civilian casualties.
The document admits that this proposal “is liable to be complicated in terms of international legitimacy” at first glance.
“According to our assessment, civilian casualties from fighting would be lower if the population remained evacuated than if they remained.”
According to the plan, Israel should concurrently call on Arab and Western countries to grant refugees entry.
According to the document, Egypt, Turkey, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates will support the plan financially or by accepting the displaced Gaza residents as refugees and eventually as citizens.
The document goes on to say that Canada could be a target for resettlement due to its “lenient” immigration policies.
An intelligence ministry official, as reported by The Cradle, attested to the document’s authenticity but noted that it wasn’t intended for media viewing.
Nonetheless, it cited a right-wing activist who claimed that the purpose of the document leak was to gauge public support for the proposed plan.
According to The Times of Israel, Hezbollah would be warned that Jerusalem might do the same to southern Lebanon if there was a similar civilian transfer.
Downplaying the document, Egypt remains unmoved
There was no meaningful discussion about the document with security officials, according to an Israeli official who is familiar with it. It is also not legally binding.
The Intelligence Ministry’s report was downplayed by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office as a “concept paper” and a hypothetical exercise.
“The issue of the ‘day after’ has not been discussed in any official forum in Israel, which is focused at this time on destroying the governing and military capabilities of Hamas,” the prime minister’s office said.
But earlier, in an interview with Al Jazeera, Israel’s deputy foreign minister Danny Ayalon raised the possibility of creating makeshift tent cities.
The plan has brought back memories of the Palestinian people’s greatest trauma, which was the forced uprooting of hundreds of thousands of people from their homes during the fighting that preceded Israel’s creation in 1948.
Nabil Abu Rudeineh, the spokesman for Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, responded to the report by saying, “We are against transfer to any place, in any form, and we consider it a red line that we will not allow to be crossed.”
“We won’t allow what occurred in 1948 to occur again.”
It has also validated Egypt’s long-held suspicion that Israel seeks to make Gaza a source of trouble for its neighbour.
A request for comment on the report was not immediately answered by Egypt’s Foreign Ministry.
However, Egypt has made it very evident that it does not wish to accept a large influx of Palestinian refugees during this most recent conflict.
Egypt has long been concerned that Israel intends to use force to drive Palestinians from its territory permanently, just as it did during the conflict that surrounded Israel’s independence.
Between 1948 and 1967, Egypt governed Gaza; Israel subsequently annexed the region, the West Bank, and east Jerusalem. The descendants of Palestinian refugees who were uprooted from what is now Israel make up the great majority of Gaza’s population.
Its President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi has repeatedly rejected such an idea – even temporarily.
On Sunday, El-Sisis said Egypt “has not and will not allow the displacement of Palestinians from Gaza to Egyptian territories.”
El-Sissi earlier said a mass influx of refugees from Gaza would eliminate the Palestinian nationalist cause. It would also risk bringing militants into Sinai, where they might launch attacks on Israel, he said. That would endanger the countries’ 1979 peace treaty.
He proposed that Israel instead house Palestinians in its Negev Desert, which neighbours the Gaza Strip, until it ends its military operations.
Yoel Guzansky, a senior fellow at the Institute for National Security Studies in Tel Aviv, said the paper threatened to damage relations with a key partner.
This is a serious error if the paper is accurate. It could lead to a strategic divide between Egypt and Israel, according to Guzansky, who has previously provided consulting services to the ministry.
“It seems like ignorance or the intention of someone to harm Israel-Egypt ties, which are crucial at this point,” he added.
According to him, Egypt is an important ally that works with Israel covertly. It could be “devastating to its stability” if it is perceived as openly supporting an Israeli plan such as this one, particularly one that involves the Palestinians.
