Israel has 'vested interest' to break off Gaza ceasefire, expert says

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00:00Joining us from Tel Aviv is Alan Pincus, political consultant and Israeli diplomat.

00:07Alan, last week, four female Israeli hostages were released. This week, it's three male hostages.

00:14It's interesting to observe the choice in gender, age. Is there

00:18any insight regarding how they pick the hostages to be released?

00:22Well, at the beginning, there was some kind of a key that had to do with both gender,

00:31age, and whether or not it is military or not, and whether or not the captive

00:39is active military or not. And so according to that key, the four female soldiers were released,

00:47then another female captive who's not a soldier, and now three men. But there are still

00:56not female soldiers, but there are still male soldiers, some elderly, and apparently several

01:01women still being held in captivity. What Israel does not know is, and because Hamas refused to

01:10provide that list, is who is alive and who is not.

01:14And what do we know of the conditions of these hostages being released from more than 15 months

01:21of captivity in Gaza? I can imagine it's a long road to recovery for many of them.

01:26Yeah. Yeah. Okay. There are three ways of looking. I'm not a physician, obviously,

01:30but there are three ways of looking at this. One is the vital data the moment they were returned.

01:41Returned. And all of them came back in good medical condition. The second is the

01:50psychological and mental effects, and that would take many weeks, many months, many years

01:58before that could be dealt with even adequately, or in some cases that may not even be the case.

02:06The third way of looking at it is to listen to their stories and to understand that some of them

02:15were held in complete solitary confinement. Some were denied food. Some were denied medical

02:22assistance. Some were beaten up, although there are no signs of torture, at least on those that

02:30were released in the last three batches. So really, we look at a young woman who's 19 or 20.

02:39She gets off a helicopter after a year and four months in captivity. She's smiling. Her parents

02:45are smiling. Everyone is tearful, and you say, oh, great, she's on her feet and she looks fine.

02:51That doesn't mean anything. Indeed. And just yesterday,

02:56we saw a chaotic hostage handover between Hamas and Israel that briefly delayed Israel's release

03:03of 110 Palestinian prisoners. This exposes the fragility of the ceasefire that began earlier

03:10this month. What hiccups do you believe we'll be seeing down the road?

03:15Many hiccups, but I'll start with your question. The scenes of chaos and mobs almost killing

03:26the two hostages that were released and the Islamic Jihad activists who were supposedly

03:33circling them to protect them, that began as some kind of a symbolic show of force from the

03:41Islamic Jihad, a different militant group than Hamas. They were holding two hostages,

03:49one by the name of Gadi Moses and one 29-year-old woman by the name of Arbel Yehud.

03:56They were released, unlike the other batches, they were released in the southern part of Gaza,

04:01and it was much less orderly than what we have seen in the two or three previous releases.

04:08So in and of itself, those scenes of chaos are not the real challenges to the ceasefire. The

04:16real challenges to the ceasefire are going to be once negotiations begin on the second phase,

04:22and that according to the agreement is scheduled for Monday, the 16th day of the ceasefire,

04:28today being the 13th day of the ceasefire. And that is not only when most of the other hostages

04:36need to be released, but that also includes an Israeli withdrawal from most of Gaza,

04:42including two key passages. And there is a lot of noise and static political

04:49rumblings that Israel has a vested interest in not seeing this through. And Mr. Netanyahu is now

05:01under or is amenable to two kinds of pressure, one from the families and indeed the general public,

05:07who is seeing these releases, who is seeing the photos and the pictures emanating, and the other

05:14is from President Trump, both of which want this deal to be going through. But here's the catch.

05:22It all hinges on the durability of the ceasefire, but any local incident can be

05:28interpreted as a violation of the ceasefire. But even if the talks on the second phase

05:35hit major roadblocks, whether deliberate or not, the release of the hostages needs to continue.

05:43However, if Hamas is under the impression that Israel has no serious intention, and I'm not

05:50saying this is the case, I'm just saying if they have a suspicion that Israel is not going,

05:58does not intend to carry out the next phase, then their incentive to complete the first phase

06:06diminishes, and then the ceasefire could very well break.

06:11And what's at stake here then? Do you think Hamas and Israel will be able to stick

06:16to this ceasefire plan? Will they make it to stage two?

06:24No. I mean, I'm sorry, I'm using just one word and I'm using it categorically with conviction,

06:31but no. I don't see Israel and Hamas moving beyond the 42nd day. By day 42,

06:39Israel is supposed to reduce forces, that is the letter of the agreement,

06:46on the Philadelphia corridor. That's a 14 kilometer or almost nine mile

06:52road stretching from southeast to northwest of the southern tip of the Gaza Strip.

06:59Netanyahu boasted years ago that this is like Normandy or Stalingrad. This has critical

07:08strategic importance. And now he signed an agreement that says that Israel will

07:12reduce forces on the 42nd day and indeed withdraw completely on the 50th day, day 50 of the

07:20agreement. So I just don't see this happening, on top of which, and this perhaps requires a different

07:27discussion between us some other day, on top of which Israel until now refrained from engaging

07:33in any post-war Gaza political framework, which means that Hamas stays in power. It is not real

07:42power. It is residual power. It is not a government. It is what remains of a government. And

07:49Gaza is not Gaza. It is what remains of Gaza and the rubble, destruction, and devastation.

07:54But nonetheless, it contrasts Mr. Netanyahu's statements, dramatic, melodramatic statements

08:02about eradicating and annihilating and total victory and toppling Hamas. That, if you look

08:09at the footage, hasn't happened. That was Alana Pincus for us in Tel Aviv. Thank you for joining us.

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