Gaza peace proposal: 'It's not as much a plan. It's a sketch.'

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00:00Do you think that peace may be upon us?

00:05We're not there yet, but I think we can get a little bit of clarity

00:09out of all the events that Noko Tonopolsky was describing. I think, first of all,

00:16you have a clarity on the Hamas side. Despite these reports of the division,

00:20the fundamental here is that the political leadership has made a calculated response.

00:26And the calculated response is, look, we're ready to negotiate on the basis of this 20 point.

00:32It's not as much a plan, it's a sketch. We're ready to negotiate on the basis of that. And

00:37that includes, we're ready to negotiate on the basis of releasing all the 20 remaining hostages,

00:44all the 28 bodies that we hold. But that release takes place when we have an established ceasefire.

00:53It doesn't take place before you have that established ceasefire. And that established

00:58ceasefire has to be part of agreements across other areas. And I think there's two key areas

01:05where Hamas has staked out its ground. The first is they want clarity on the extent of the Israeli

01:13withdrawal. The sketch is very vague about that. In contrast to a plan that Benjamin Netanyahu rejected

01:20only a month ago before his attack on the Hamas negotiators, which defined where the Israelis

01:28would go to, which is along the Gaza-Israel border and the Gaza-Egypt border. Secondly,

01:33Hamas is going to want clarity on the timing of any disarmament. They're not going to disarm before

01:39the other conditions. The Israeli withdrawal, the restoration of aid, the governance arrangements are

01:45established. Now, I think if you get those two key points established, then we may be on the way to

01:52get a lasting ceasefire. But this throws it back to Israel, where we do have the uncertainty.

01:57Yeah. And as I understand it, sorry to interrupt, Scott, but as I understand it, Hamas is interested,

02:04interested, considering disarmament in terms of giving up its offensive weapons, but maybe not its

02:09defensive weapons. And if we do take that possible division between Hamas's political and military

02:16wings into account, what could happen? Is there a chance that Hamas could turn in on itself,

02:23turn against itself?

02:24No, I honestly don't think so. I mean, I think the Israelis are playing up that possibility to buy

02:30some time, to be honest with you. Because here's the issue in Israel, and that is that the Netanyahu

02:36government was surprised that Donald Trump so quickly welcomed the Hamas response. The Netanyahu's

02:43calculation when he went to that press conference with Donald Trump, where the sketch was announced

02:48was, was that Hamas would reject. And then when Hamas rejects, he can continue and indeed expand

02:55the military operations to overrun Gaza City, to overrun the rest of the Strip, and to establish an

03:00Israeli occupation. Hamas called his bluff. And that put Netanyahu in the position of either

03:06he has to respond favorably and give up on the idea, which is favored by his hard right ministers,

03:13of this long-term occupation, or he has to snub Donald Trump and keep the war going.

03:20Neither one of those are good options. So his office has said overnight to Israeli outlets,

03:25we are reluctantly, reluctantly agreeing to negotiate. So that does mean, as Nogatana Polsky

03:32said, there will be these negotiations in Egypt, possibly from tomorrow. But that gets us into

03:38the tricky phase. And that is, what demands will the Israelis make? Will they make, in other words,

03:45that Hamas may find unacceptable? In contrast, what demands could Hamas make that the Israelis

03:50would find unacceptable? So I want to try to hold on to hope, but we have to be very cautious here.

03:55This is only the start of a possibility. And if indeed it is Ron Dermer, who was Netanyahu's

04:03right-hand man, who leads the Israeli negotiating team, as Nogatana said, that is not a good sign.

04:09Dermer is very, very hard-line. He has very, very much been pushing Israel's maximum demands.

04:15And that would play against the idea, we're going to get the necessary compromise.

04:18Yeah. And also just curious what it means for, in the meantime, on the ground in Gaza,

04:23after Trump told Israel to stop bombing the enclave, Israel bombed the enclave heavily overnight,

04:30according to the Gaza Civil Defense Agency. Today, the Israeli military is saying, no,

04:34we're now in a defensive position. But I think a lot of Palestinians in Gaza, they're concerned

04:40that Netanyahu would either change this peace plan to make it unacceptable,

04:46or withdraw it altogether, and that the fighting will continue.

04:49Right. And I think that's a justifiable concern. Let me just make two points. The death toll since

04:56yesterday, the number of Gazans killed since yesterday, is still more than 65. Since this

05:04morning, when we supposedly had, you know, the Israelis going into defensive operations,

05:09there have been 20 Gazans who've been killed. So the operations may be reducing, but they haven't

05:14stopped yet. Secondly, when Netanyahu agreed overnight, okay, at least I'm going to go ahead

05:20and go into negotiations. I'm not going to reject Hamas's statement out of hand. Two ministers were

05:26not present in that meeting. They happened to be the far-right ministers, Mr. Smotrich, the finance

05:33minister, Mr. Ben-Havir, the internal security minister. Those happened to be the two ministers who have

05:39said we will not accept anything less than an unconditional Hamas surrender. Now, in other

05:45words, Netanyahu's caught. He's caught. If he's going to proceed with this, he's got to defy those

05:51two hard-right ministers. But if he brings them into the talks, they probably don't go anywhere.

05:56Right now, let's be honest, he's playing for time. The Israelis now, not Hamas, are playing for time.

06:01How much time can they get before we get a clarity in terms of where they're going to go?

06:05Yeah, and a lot of concerns about, like you said, the word you're using, sketch, that's probably

06:11quite appropriate because so many of the details we don't know yet. But on Friday,

06:15UN legal experts said the plan does not respect international law. They raised questions over the

06:20right of Palestinian self-determination. They also pointed at the temporary transitional government

06:25that does not represent Palestinians or not representative of them. They raised 13 other

06:30points as well, Scott. Famine and genocide have already been declared in Gaza. So,

06:35should this plan move forward if it is a best chance for peace, even if it's inconsistent

06:41with international law?

06:42Well, I think you put the phrase there, isn't it? Is there a chance for peace or at least a

06:49permanent ceasefire if we have this plan? I agree with a lot of what the experts say in terms of the

06:54details. You know, this international board, which Donald Trump declares he's going to be the chairman of,

07:00this is the plan of the former British Prime Minister, Tony Blair, and there's no Palestinian

07:05involvement in that board. So, is it the board that has the ultimate authority? Secondly, okay,

07:10the board oversees a transitional government, which oversees day-to-day administration of Gaza,

07:17all right? Which Palestinians are going to be allowed onto that transitional authority? Now,

07:22Hamas will not be allowed on. We know that. Israel's indicating it will not accept anybody from

07:27the Palestinian Authority. So, who are the Palestinian technocrats, the Palestinian activists,

07:32who will be acceptable? No clarity yet. And thirdly, let's be very clear here. When Benjamin Netanyahu

07:39stood up with Donald Trump and said, okay, yeah, yeah, yeah, we'll agree to this sketch.

07:44Within hours, he turned around, made a video in Hebrew, which said not only will the Israeli defense

07:49forces continue to occupy most of the Gaza Strip. He said there will never be a Palestinian state.

07:56But of course, the intention of most countries in the United Nations now, including France's,

08:01that there will be a Palestinian state. So we need much more detail on the day-to-day governance,

08:07the day-to-day security, and also whether we establish the principle of a two-state resolution of

08:13what has been such a costly and deadly mass killing inside Gaza.

08:19Yes. And in the meantime, of course, any new attack risks undermining this whole process altogether.

08:25Scott, thank you very much for your time. Professor Scott Lucas, joining us from Birmingham.

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