The Security Cabinet and the War Cabinet are expected to discuss the day after on Tuesday.
By TOVAH LAZAROFFUpdated: JANUARY 2, 2024 09:18 Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu leads a government conference at the Kirya base in Tel Aviv on December 31, 2023(photo credit: MIRIAM ALSTER/FLASH90)
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is holding discussions about a ‘day-after’ plan for Gaza, in advance of a possible visit by US Secretary of State Antony Blinken.He discussed the issue with the Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee’s sub-group on intelligence and secret services on Monday, the details of which are confidential.The Security Cabinet and the War Cabinet are expected to discuss the day after on Tuesday. Parliamentarians will also hold a conference to discuss day-after plans in the Knesset that same day.
According to KAN, the IDF has a first phase plan by which portions of Gaza where Hamas is no longer present will be governed by local Palestinians who would also help oversee humanitarian aid distribution. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu visits IDF soldiers in northern Gaza, December 25, 2023 (credit: GPO/AVI OHAYON)It put forward the plan just as the IDF began to transition from a high-intensity to a low-intensity phase of its military campaign to destroy Hamas, which has forcibly ruled Gaza since 2007.Netanyahu has been clear that Hamas can no longer be allowed to govern or even exist in Gaza and that Israel must maintain security control of the enclave.The United States wants to see the Palestinian Authority govern Gaza, while Israel has insisted that only a newly formed Palestinian government that does not support terror – such as the existing one – can rule the enclave.“It is very important” for Israel to put forward its plan for the day after, Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee Chairman Yuli Edelstein (Likud) told The Jerusalem Post.“If we do not come with plans of our own, then someone else, maybe the Americans, will come forward with their understanding of what should happen,” Edelstein said.
“I am not sure” that those proposals would “necessarily coincide with our views,” he said.The Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee is the first forum in which the issue was raised, including talks with the National Security Council and Netanyahu, he said.This was in the very early stages of the war, he added.“The first time we mentioned the necessity to start discussing it was before there were boots on the ground in Gaza,” he said. There was also a discussion about it last week with the National Security Advisor Tzahi Hanegbi.Edelstein spoke globally about options that could be put in place, such as placing the Gulf states in charge of reconstruction.But any possible scenario, including local Palestinian governance, can only occur if Hamas is truly ousted from Gaza, he said.Any potential Hamas replacement would have to believe that the terror group has left the enclave and would not be revived, he explained.“We have to be accurate and persistent here because we can not let Hamas infiltrate this new structure in any way,” Edelstein said.
The White House said President Joe Biden, currently vacationing in St. Croix, and Vice President Kamala Harris spoke with national security officials on Monday by secure phone about the latest developments in the Middle East.
In the Knesset on Monday, far-right members of Netanyahu's coalition continued to discuss day after option that in the past have been sternly rejected by the United States and the international community, including regional allies such as Jordan and Egypt.
At an Otzma Yehudit faction meeting in the Knesset, National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir called for the relocation of Palestinians from Gaza to other countries.
"We have to advance a solution to help the residents of Gaza emigrate," Ben-Gvir said, adding that there were partners in the international community who could help Israel with such a plan, but he did not elaborate as to who they were. He said that only an emigration plan would allow for Israeli residents of southern border communities to return home safely and for the reconstruction of the Gaza settlements that were destroyed in 2005.
