Neither Demilitarization Nor Victory: The 'Absolute Gamble' in the Gaza Roadmap
El Alamein has become the site for the Gaza war-ending 'roadmap'. While the plan mandates the transfer of governance to a new Palestinian body, critics warn of massive loopholes regarding Hamas disarmament and verification mechanisms.
Of all the places in the world, it was El Alamein that was chosen as the hub for conducting the negotiations that concluded the 'roadmap' for ending the war in Gaza. The place where one of the decisive battles of World War II took place hosted a different kind of struggle this time: not over the movement of armor in the desert, but over the difference between 'demilitarization', 'decommissioning', and 'storage'. Not over who captured which hill, but over who will move the stones marking the yellow line back by a few hundred meters.
In the dead of night, the mediators on behalf of Hamas, Husam Badran and Zaher Jabarin, officially announced that the movement accepts the outline. From the perspective of the Peace Council — and this is also reflected in President Donald Trump's tweets — there is no need at all to receive Israel's approval, because these are matters concerning only Gaza, and the things Israel is required to do now have already been agreed upon anyway.
A Path to Where?
On paper, there is a historic event here. Hamas agrees for the first time to transfer to another Palestinian body all the functions of civil and security governance in Gaza, not to interfere in its work, and to subject the Strip to the principle of 'one authority, one law, one weapon'. The weapon production sites and tunnels are supposed to be exposed, destroyed, and sealed. The heavy weaponry is supposed to be transferred to storage under the control of the National Committee for the Management of Gaza.
'I don't know of many other situations where an Islamic terrorist organization announces that it is giving up its weapons,' said a senior official associated with the Peace Council.
From the Council's perspective, Israel must not give up on what it calls a 'historic achievement' because of what is termed there 'moving the yellow line markings back about 400 meters'. An expression that tries to attribute insignificance to the territory that Israel captured in Gaza west of the agreed yellow line, and is now required to withdraw from.
The Fine Print and the Burden of Commitment
The burden on Israel is greater. The first 'fine print' is that the document does not start with what Hamas needs to do, but with what Israel needs to do. Before the process of decommissioning heavy weapons begins, Israel is required to complete 'without delay' its obligations from the Sharm el-Sheikh agreement: to stop military operations and targeted killings, to return to the agreed yellow line, and to reactivate the humanitarian protocol.
The second 'fine print' is that this is a framework outline for an agreement, and only within 14 days will a schedule for its implementation be decided. In these two weeks, they are supposed to define what is heavy weaponry, what is personal weaponry, how to disable a rocket, who checks the tunnels, and what happens when one side claims the other is cheating.
The document discusses 'decommissioning' — neutralizing or taking out of service Hamas's heavy weapons, and in practice storage rather than destruction. The weapons will not be handed over to Israel, will not necessarily leave the Strip, and will not be transferred to international forces. They will remain in Gaza, in the hands of a Palestinian body whose ability to stand against Hamas has not yet been tested even for one day.
