What a truce in Gaza means for the war

In Gaza, the logical way to neutralise Hamas’ uniquely large network of tunnels would be to flood them with sea water.

Hamas and Israel just agreed to pause their fight in Gaza for at least four days so they can exchange hostages for prisoners and allow access for humanitarian aid. For the alleviation of suffering among Gaza’s civilian population, that could not be more welcome or necessary. But for those doing the fighting, a pause will matter little beyond providing both sides with an opportunity to regroup.

That, at least, was my conclusion after speaking to specialists in the kind of urban warfare that’s been underway in Gaza. War is politics, and a short break will satisfy neither the Israel’s aim to eliminate Hamas, nor Hamas’ aim to extend the war until others join in or the international community pressures Israel to stop. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu described the very idea that the pause might mean more as, “nonsense.’’

Under the deal mediated by Qatar, Hamas is supposed to give up at least 50 of the 240-plus hostages it seized on Oct. 7, with the focus on women, children and the possibility of a further 10 for each day there is an extension of the truce. For them and their families, the importance of the deal can’t be overstated. Israel is to give up 150 Palestinian prisoners in exchange, again mostly women and children. It would also, according to Hamas, allow hundreds of aid trucks into Gaza, halt most flights over the territory and pledge not to make any arrests.

In military terms, though, it would take the release of virtually all Israelicaptives to be a true game changer for the Israel Defense Forces, as they face the prospect of having to clear hundreds of miles of tunnels as deep as 70 meters below ground to eliminate Hamas’ ability to fight. That’s a lot easier without having to worry about the presence of hostages.

Tunnels are a horrific environment for any soldier, says John Spencer, a former US Army Major and current chair of Urban Warfare Studies in the Modern War Institute at West Point. Most military technology simply doesn’t work underground, he said. Night vision goggles don’t because there is no ambient light, and most robots don’t because there are no viable radio signals. Communications between troops — even visual — also don’t work. It's hard to see or breathe. Even bomb sniffing dogs have to be specially trained to work underground in the dark.

So from time immemorial, armies have used tunnels and their opponents have tried to neutralise them without actually having to go in. The means are as gruesome as they are effective. In 1982, Hafez al-Assad — the father of Syria’s current president — had his troops pour diesel fuel into tunnels that Muslim Brotherhood fighters were using as part of their defenses in the city of Hama. In Ukraine, Russia has used thermobaric weapons to kill urban defenders underground, where bombs can’t reach them, by sucking the air out of their shelters and collapsing their lungs.

In Gaza, the logical way to neutralise Hamas’ uniquely large network of tunnels would be to flood them with sea water, according to Spencer, yet that isn’t currently an option because the few hostages Hamas already released made it clear they were being held in those same tunnels. Releasing 50 of these human shields should ameliorate the problem in mathematical terms, but it still leaves about 180 in the hands of Hamas. So without knowing where they are, the reduction in number changes little.

More broadly, though, such a short pause can’t achieve the political aims of either side, and the main challenge will be for the combatants to stay protected while observing it — one reason even temporary ceasefires tend to be volatile. The IDF’s task is to eliminate Hamas’ military capabilities, and that job is far from complete, making it unlikely that Israel would allow the pause to extend to a more permanent truce. Hamas might like that to happen, but assuming it doesn’t, a short pause hardly advances its goal of extending the war and its attendant suffering until either Hezbollah, Iran or the international community intervenes.

“I don’t think this is militarily important,’’ David Betz, a professor of war in the modern world at King’s College, in London, told me about the truce. “I don’t think the IDF will stop until they have wiped out Hamas, with the obvious question being: What will be left of Gaza when they are done? And the answer is nothing that two million people can go back to.’’

The IDF has been making better progress on the ground while suffering fewer casualties among its troops than other instances of urban warfare might suggest. That may be because it has approached its task methodically, first surrounding Gaza City and then driving to key centers such as al-Shifa hospital, to ensure it can’t go on being used by Hamas in the information war that forms such a large part of this conflict. So the big door-to-door, tunnel-to-tunnel fight needed actually to eliminate Hamas could be still to come, or it’s possible that the organization just doesn’t have the means to resist a force on the scale of the IDF.

Either way, both sides will use the lull in fighting to rest their forces, resupply, plan and gather intelligence, Mick Ryan, a retired major general in the Australian army wrote in a blog  post on Wednesday. The IDF can also use the opportunity to move more civilians out of the way and prepare to extend the war into the southern part of the Gaza Strip.

As civilian casualties continue to mount, Betz’s question was the right one. And it’s worth asking another: What would be the ideal use of this pause, beyond the vital business of returning hostages to their families and getting as much food, water, medicines and fuel to Palestinian civilians as possible? As unlikely as it is, the answer would be for Qatar and its interlocutors, including Iran, to persuade Hamas that no cavalry is coming to its rescue and that the group’s leaders should negotiate its terms of surrender, giving up weapons and hostages to spare what remains of Gaza. Hamas, after all, began this war on Oct. 7, by killing more than 1,200 Israelis, and Hamas also has the ability to can stop it.

Israel, meanwhile, could demonstrate its goal is not collective punishment, by making room for the compromises that would be needed for such a surrender and for a longer-term arrangement in Gaza other than re-occupation. It could also, as Ryan put it, get what it’s doing on the ground in line with a strategic plan — currently missing —  for what happens afterward.

But don’t hold your breath, given the maximalist goals on both sides. Even assuming this halt in hostilities can last its intended duration, expect more war.

Marc Champion is a Bloomberg Opinion columnist. Views do not represent the stand of this publication.  

Credit: Bloomberg