On ceasefires
The true audacity of hope
As I am typing this, a ceasefire is scheduled to go into effect in the Gaza Strip after 15 months of non-stop bombardment, displacement, destruction, and blockade of humanitarian supplies. The Qatar-led negotiations between Hamas and Israel finally reached a point of agreement on January 15th, 2025. After delays in the Israeli ratification of the ceasefire, opposed by Netanyahu and the domestic hard right, protests erupted in Jerusalem, demanding a no vote to the agreement that they see as surrender. This is however not representative of the entirety of a country that has grown weary of its Prime Minister, already facing corruption charges; of a genocidal war that destroyed the economy and further ostracises the country from the global rule of law; and of the threats of retaliation already felt from Iran, Lebanon and Yemen. Unfortunately, this dichotomy has had no positive effect on the Palestinian people and their extreme plight in a war of annihilation.
Ceasefire is a broad, umbrella term we understand to be a cessation of hostilities. A cessez-le-feu is a simple order to silence the guns and the bombs so decision makers can talk. Its permanence is dependent on the compliance to its agreed terms, and on the political courage to see it through. It is however not an end; it is a mere suspension. A permanent ceasefire is never fully permanent. The real work begins after: the return of the displaced; the rebuilding of what’s destroyed; and the immense grief that we will need to feel, as an international community, about a number of dead that we know will never be fully and entirely accounted for. Somewhere, in the rubble of Gaza, lies the ideal we forgot we were supposed to safekeep: the right to life, safety, and security of the person, inalienable rights permanently maimed by the moral injury of occupation.
Terms of a ceasefire
The three-phase ceasefire agreement contains a significant amount of caveats, which should not fill anyone with a strong sense of stability and consistency going forward. The announcement itself, however, has been met with large celebrations in Gaza, as large as the number of survivors allowed. As is so often the case when ceasefires are not declared immediate, over 77 Palestinians were killed between the Friday announcement and the Sunday morning hour line. This is not a permanent ceasefire: a 42 day clock starts today after which Israel is allowed to resume military operations.
Throughout phase 1, Hamas agrees to release 33 Israeli hostages, specifically children and those over 50 years old. In a cynically necessary demand for quid pro quo, Israel agrees to release 30 Palestinians currently incarcerated per released hostage; and 50 for every enlisted soldier. As of September 2024, Israeli non-governmental organisation B’Tselem reports 3,340 Palestinians in administrative detention, a number that more than quadrupled after October 7, 2023. The correct term is arbitrary detention: administrative detention is detention without charge or trial, and is largely indefinite. This large scale human rights violation forms part of the assessment of the charge of apartheid leveraged against Israel, granting itself the power to incarcerate without due process, effectively “disappearing” Palestinians without transparent and legitimate rationale. Of those, B’Tselem reports that, by June 2024, 226 of those forever detainees were minors.
It is unclear to those outside the realm of the negotiations how those equivalencies were drawn. More often than not, Palestinian life is disposable. It is summarised in statistics, discussed in terms of load, and approached as quantitative data for the purposes of preservation of an occupation. Yet, those lives now have a chance to be freed, to return to the communities where they belong, and participate in the large scale work of survival and rebuilding that must take place. Even more concerning in those hostage swaps are the consequences of torture - that we know is rife in Israeli jails - and how such experiences and their narrative will shape the future governance of the Gaza Strip.
The Israeli Defence Forces (IDF) will be required to withdraw from parts of the most densely populated areas of the Gaza Strip - those still left - which will likely allow the flow of much needed humanitarian relief to enter. However, from documents currently seen, it is unclear whether any and all convoys will be allowed, or if aid will be drip-fed into Gaza under IDF control, as has been the case in the past. After those 42 days, starts Phase 2, and dependent on a successful hostage swap, a “declaration of sustainable calm” will be made. The language is extremely distant from a cessation of hostilities; nothing indicates an end - as opposed to a suspension - to military operations, let alone engages the notion of peace. The “return of displaced Palestinians” that seemed to provide many with so much hope for a broader right to return appears to be internal displacement. Split in two alongside the Netzarim Corridor, it is still unclear whether such control of movement within Gaza itself will be relinquished. From the Associated Press,
Still, as talks continued Tuesday, an Israeli official insisted the military will keep control of Netzarim and that Palestinians returning north would have to pass inspections there, though he declined to provide details. The official spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss closed negotiations.
Ceasefires hinge on so many external factors that they can only be described as being held together by a thin - and thinning - thread of hope. Yet, they demand constant vigilance as to their enforcement. Often overlooked in current reporting is the position of Morocco. While King Mohammed VI has always claimed his position is one of peace, the Foreign Minister, Nasser Bourita, made one very salient point yesterday:
“In numerous speeches since the outbreak of the crisis, His Majesty has emphasized that the urgent priority is to establish a ceasefire. His Majesty has also specified in multiple statements that this ceasefire must be permanent, monitorable, and lead to a sustainable pathway”.
The monitoring and reporting of peacekeeping will be key to the implementation of a ceasefire. It is a responsibility we must all seize, and seek to see enforced.
Ceasing fire
Today marks the last day of the Biden administration in the United States, and perhaps more ominously, the last day of the Republic as it currently stands. On its way out, Secretary of Defense Anthony Blinken shared many insights into the communications and relations between the US and Israel that do not point to anything as substantial as a permanent ceasefire. One, the extremely undiplomatic retort that Israel should carpet bomb Gaza to their heart’s content, since the US “carpet-bombed Berlin, and dropped the atomic bomb.” While absolutely correct, this definitely harkens back to the concept of infinite impunity loop. Without accountability as a guarantee of non-recurrence, the same absolute end goals will continue to be heralding the end of our civilisation. Second, the admission that the purported legitimate goal of Israel’s operation, “eradicating Hamas”, has not just failed, but in fact made it worse. It was inevitable. It had been predicted. It was shared. It was just never heard.
In the early days of the War on Terror, the same naive and destructive speeches about eradications were made. They were a mistake then, and they are a mistake now. There is no such thing; there is no risk zero; there is no possible entire control of a socio-political order that does not require tyranny. The lesson was not learned quickly enough. Guantanamo still holds 15 “forever detainees”. Afghanistan is back to suffering under Taliban rule. Iraq is struggling to emerge from ISIS occupation. More has been destroyed than has been liberated in the pursuit of the impossible. Once again, the lesson was not learned quickly enough. A very conservative estimate of 47,000 dead is not a victory, not or is it in any way, shape or form a guarantee of future safety. The spirit of retaliation will never cease to hover for as long as injustice will prevail. The only safety we can truly hold is one provided by an equal and just governance; through self-determination and the enjoyment of human rights. Further repression after so much destruction will never yield an absence of armed resistance. The question is no longer about whether armed resistance is legitimate. The question is whether Israel is ready to accept that it has birthed its own conflict, or if we will have to continue funding through our tax money the desperate plight of a corrupt despot to find authority.
This ceasefire was borne out of sustained and committed effort. It should not be underestimated; for too long so many thought it was not possible. The number of if’s, way more present than when’s, just serve to underline the fragility of negotiating with a state hell-bent on attrition, and an armed group whose existence is tied to the occupation itself. Without a clear and determined movement to end one or the other, we will continue to have to live through another Gaza war. Another atrocity beamed into our phones. Another crime that shocks the conscience of humanity, without granting humanity the avenue for redress. If nothing else, the work of the ceasefire truly starts now. We are not allowed to let it fail.
Rebuilding
Over the last 15 months, I have kept in touch with a lawyer from Gaza, Adham Madi. Before October 7, 2023, Adham was starting his legal career. He had bought his first car, something that provided him with a sense of pride. Gaza, one of the youngest places in the world, also boosts a high rate of academic achievement. With his career, Adham hoped to be able to provide for his family, and to navigate the international legal circles with human rights advocacy. Today, he spoke to me from under a refugee tent, outside of which he has to boil water and flour to eat. A bag of flour currently runs for $220 and over in Gaza. I asked Adham if the ceasefire provided him with any sense of hope or relief.
What kind of feeling can I describe? They are scattered feelings, intertwined between sadness and joy, but closer to the sadness that suffocates the soul. I want to cry... to unleash every tear I held back in my heart, every pain that tore me apart from the inside and I did not dare to let out. I want to cry until my soul is emptied of this oppression that squeezes me.
Do I rejoice because the blood has finally stopped? Or do I rejoice because my mother and I escaped certain death while death was devouring everyone around us? Or do I cry for my friends who were martyred one after the other? For their faces that I will never see again, and their laughter that has become just an echo in my memory?
Do I cry for my house that has become a wreck... just a memory of ashes and destruction? Or for my office, which held my dreams and years of effort, and which has now become a pile of rubble? Or for my car, which I collected the price of with great difficulty, only to see it crushed mercilessly under the tracks of a tank as if it were nothing?
I cry for my life that was full of beautiful details, that was like a perfect painting, and now it has become just a torn memory! I cry for the pain I lived and did not allow myself to cry at the time, because I did not want to appear weak in front of anyone. Or do I cry because I found within myself a strength that I never imagined? A strength that surpassed all this pain, a strength I do not know where it came from, but it kept me alive.
I write these words with my hands trembling, and my heart beating violently as if it is screaming from within me... Can words describe the magnitude of what is inside me?
Adham before the war, in June 2023
I hope to see Adham in a new life, a different life, a life that sees him benefiting from the same equality rights I can exercise, the same respect for his qualifications all of us can command, and from the same freedom I enjoy living and breathing without fear. The reality of armed conflict is that it steals more than human lives. It takes away with it the capacity to thrive. Recognised as the direct result of peace, equality, and justice, the right to thrive demands self-determination, freedom of movement, and an absence of discrimination. Human rights law acknowledges that life should not and cannot be reduced to mere survival. Social and economic rights, of which Palestinians have been deprived due to the absence of statehood and 77 years of occupation, are the only possibility for Adham, his mother, and his friends to see a peaceful future.
Rebuilding Gaza is an insulting Sysiphean task. War after war, billions are spent rebuilding what the same billions will then be spent destroying years in the future. The World Bank estimated $18.5 billion in damage, and that was just in February 2024. The literal task of emerging from the rubble has already been quantified, of a staggering 50 million tonnes. It will take a generation to remove the consequence of the horror. What can grow? What can rise? Should it be rebuilt if there is no permanent solution to the regular, cyclical violence visited upon Gaza? The caveat of a return to military operations does not fit the sustainable bill of “sustainable calm”. The concern amongst intelligence operatives that the plausible genocide may have in fact provided Hamas with a fertile ground for recruitment was assured within weeks of the October 2023 onslaught.
Peace is so distant. Peace is never entirely close. We too often conflate an absence of violence with peace. Peace does not exist when the ramble of tanks can be heard in the distance. It is not peace if the shadow of the drone is still visible, even if there is no discharge of ordnance. It is not peace if armed troops are patrolling in the streets to ensure that apartheid is maintained at all costs. It is not peace with the practice of torture, indefinite detention, and forced displacement. Peace for Palestine is a blank canvas. It is however not unprecedented. Palestine has known peace. It has known what it is like to thrive from the soil and to tend to a free and fair land. Sometimes the creativity of the law needs to lie in ancestral practices, at times when those weapons had yet to be forged. Justice should always include the possibility of stillness.