By Wednesday, Hamas had been stalling for four days to prevent Israel from pushing it to extend the hostage and ceasefire deal.
Phase one began in mid-January, a day before the inauguration of US President Donald Trump, and was successful. It saw 33 Israeli hostages and five Thai hostages released by Hamas. However, the deal ended on March 1, and since then, the terror group has demanded Jerusalem advance to phase two.
Some Israeli leaders have opposed the second phase from the moment the ceasefire kicked off. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and other officials rejected the idea of ending the war and pulling out of the Philadelphi corridor in southern Gaza.
However, officials are also unclear on when and if they will return to fighting in the enclave, so Hamas now believes its long-term strategy has been successful.
It thinks it could stall for long enough and call Israel’s bluff about having the “gates of hell” open if Hamas doesn’t buckle. The terror group also believes the Trump administration will not let “hell break loose” in Gaza.
Hamas doesn't feel pressured
This begs the question: Why is Hamas so optimistic? It suspects the Jewish state doesn’t really want to return to fighting and knows the Trump administration has told the country it can do whatever it wants.
The question, though, is what does Israel want? Netanyahu and other officials say they want total victory and to see Hamas’s military and governance capabilities defeated. They also say they want the hostages returned. However, there isn’t a clear strategy when it comes to Gaza.
Therefore, Hamas believes it will be able to keep long-term control of the enclave. It said it won’t hand over its weapons or give in to the new Egyptian-led proposal. It also rejected Trump’s relocation idea.
Hamas also thinks Israel is bluffing about returning to war, and it knows that Jerusalem doesn’t want the Palestinian Authority to run Gaza. It knows that if there is a vacuum there, it will fill it – as it has done for the last decades.
A recent article from Ynet noted, “Mediators have informed Israel that Hamas is refusing to show flexibility or engage in talks based on the framework proposed by the US envoy [Steve Witkoff] to the region. While fighting in Gaza could resume as early as next week, officials in Jerusalem hope that a series of measures currently under consideration will ultimately push Hamas toward compromise.”
WHY IS Hamas being inflexible? Because it doesn’t feel pressure. It can read the reports that say it could take days for Witkoff to return to the region, and it knows Israel is saying it may seek another week before returning to fighting.
The terror group likely consults with Qatar, where its leaders reside, and also probably speaks to Iran, Turkey, and Russia, countries it has good relations with. Hamas knows Moscow may be seeking to speak with Washington about a new Iran deal. Meanwhile, the Trump administration is focused on Ukraine and closing a deal with Russia regarding the war there.
Hamas likely thinks it can benefit from all of this and hopes that Moscow, Doha, and Ankara will put in a good word for it with Trump. What if Russia offers the Trump administration a grand bargain to end the Ukraine war and bring a new Iran deal, and as part of that, Hamas remains in power as well?
Every day that goes by that Hamas doesn’t see Israel return to fighting leads to it feeling more empowered to be more stubborn.
On December 1, 2023, when Hamas didn’t fulfill the first ceasefire deal and refused to hand over more living female and child hostages, the Jewish state immediately resumed fighting. It did not do so on March 1.
What Hamas learns from this is that Jerusalem is not going to quickly return, this time, to fighting.
Hamas also believes that it got a de facto ceasefire in March for Ramadan and hopes it can achieve the same thing this time. For instance, it doesn’t seem worried about Israeli airstrikes.
New IDF Chief of Staff Lt.-Gen. Eyal Zamir assumed his position yesterday. Zamir wants to see the military victorious. His predecessor, Lt.-Gen. Herzi Halevi appeared haunted by the military’s failures on October 7, as he didn’t seem to come up with a clear plan to eviscerate Hamas in Gaza.
In fact, back in early 2024, the assessment put out by the IDF and Defense Ministry to the media was that most Hamas battalions had been defeated. Halevi was quoted saying the military faced a “Sisyphean” task in Gaza, going into areas, clearing them, and then going back.
This sounded a lot like US “search and destroy” missions in Vietnam. Those missions didn’t work. The US military also tried to measure the defeat of the Vietcong via body counts and never succeeded. Hamas can read Israeli media and knows the IDF believed it had already won back in February or March of last year. However, the terror group was never defeated in many parts of Gaza.
Hamas thinks it understands the Israeli feedback loop of constantly declaring victory and looking for confirmation bias of that victory. All Hamas has to do is stay silent for a while and return to power.
Hamas’s long-term strategy is to cling to power, and it will use the hostages to do so. It may agree to a new hostage deal and try to drag it out for months, assuming Jerusalem will get tired of dealing with Gaza. For Israel to defeat the Hamas plan, it must change this equation.