In Between

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By Paul AdamsBBC Diplomatic Correspondent

Israel's Prime Minister , Benjamin Netanyahu , has vowed to " change The Middle East . " Joe Biden has said there's " no going back. " But as Israeli forces escalate their attacks on The Gaza Strip and issue fresh, urgent warnings to Palestinians to Get Out of The Way , where is The War going, and what comes next?

After The Horrors of 7 October, Israeli officials keep saying That they intend to uproot Hamas from The Gaza Strip , militarily and politically.

But beyond The application of relentless, overwhelming military might, it's not clear how this unprecedented ambition will be achieved.

" You cannot promote such a historic move without a plan about The Day after, " says Dr. Michael Milshtein, head of The Palestinian Studies Forum at Tel Aviv University's Moshe Dayan Centre.

Dr Milshtein, a former head of The Department for Palestinian Affairs in Israeli Military Intelligence , fears That planning has barely begun.

" You need to do it right now, " he says.

Western diplomats say they're conducting intense discussions with Israel about The Future , but That So Far nothing is clear.

" There absolutely isn't a fixed plan, " one told me. " You can sketch out a few ideas on paper, but making them real is going to take weeks, months of diplomacy. "

Military plans exist, ranging from degrading Hamas's military capability to Taking Over large parts of The Gaza Strip . But those with long experience of dealing with previous crises say That 's about As Far as The planning goes.

" I don't think That there is a viable, workable solution for Gaza The Day after we evacuate our forces, " says Haim Tomer, a former senior officer with Israel's foreign intelligence service, Mossad.

Israelis are all-but unanimous: Hamas must be defeated. The massacres of 7 October were simply too appalling. The organisation cannot ever again be allowed to rule over Gaza.

But Hamas, Dr Milshtein says, is an idea, not something Israel can simply erase.

" It's not like Berlin in 1945, when you stuck a flag over The Reichstag and That was That . "

A better parallel, he says, is Iraq in 2003, where US-led forces attempted to remove all traces of Saddam Hussein 's regime. " De-Baathification" as it was called, was a disaster. It left hundreds of thousands of Iraqi civil servants and members of The Armed forces out of work, sowing The Seeds for a devastating insurgency.

American veterans of That conflict are in Israel, talking to The Israeli military about their experiences in places like Falluja and Mosul. " I do hope they explain to The Israelis That they made some huge mistakes in Iraq, " Dr Milshtein says.

" For example, not to not to have any illusion about eradicating The ruling party or changing The minds of people. That won't happen. "

Palestinians agree.

" Hamas is a popular grassroots organisation, " says Mustafa Barghouti , president of The Palestinian National Initiative. " If they want to remove Hamas, they'll need to ethnically cleanse all of Gaza. "

That Thought - That Israel secretly intends to force hundreds of thousands of Palestinians out of The Gaza Strip and into neighbouring Egypt - is stirring The Most deeply-rooted Palestinian fears.

For a population already largely made up of Refugees - those who fled or were driven from their homes when Israel was founded - The Thought of another mass exodus conjures memories of The traumatic events of 1948.

" Fleeing means a one-way ticket, " says Diana Buttu , a former spokesperson for The Palestine Liberation Organisation. " It doesn't mean Coming Back . "

Israeli commentators, including former senior officials, have made frequent reference to The need for Palestinians to be housed, temporarily, across The Border in Sinai.

Giora Eiland , a former head of Israel's National Security Council, says The only way for Israel to achieve its military ambitions in Gaza without killing a lot of innocent Palestinians, is for civilians to evacuate Gaza.

" They should cross The Border to Egypt , " he says, " temporarily or permanently. "

Adding to Palestinian fears is a line in US President Joe Biden 's 20 October request to Congress to approve funding to support Israel and Ukraine.

It says: " This crisis could well result in displacement across border and higher regional humanitarian needs. "

To date, Israel has not said it wants Palestinians to cross The Border . The Israeli Defense Force (IDF) has repeatedly told civilians only to move to ill-defined " safe areas" in The South .

But Egypt 's president, Abdel Fattah el-Sissi, has warned That Israel's war in Gaza might be " an attempt to push The civilian inhabitants to… migrate to Egypt . "

Assuming there are still Gazans in The Gaza Strip when this is all over, who's going to rule them?

" That 's The Million dollar question, " says Dr Milshtein.

Israel, he says, should support The Creation of a new administration, run by Gazans, with buy-in from local leaders and support from The US, Egypt and perhaps Saudi Arabia .

It should also include leaders from Fatah, The Rival Palestinian faction That Hamas violently ejected from Gaza a year after winning elections in 2006.

Fatah controls The Palestinian Authority, which is based in The City of Ramallah, in The occupied West Bank .

But The PA and its ageing president Mahmud Abbas are wildly unpopular among Palestinians, both in The West Bank and The Gaza Strip .

Diana Buttu says The PA might secretly want to return to Gaza, but not if That means " riding in on The back of an Israeli tank".

And The Veteran Palestinian politician Hanan Ashrawi , who briefly served in The PA in The 1990s, bristles at The Thought That outsiders, including Israel, will Once Again attempt to determine how Palestinians run their lives.

" People who think That this is a chessboard and they can move a few pawns here and there and have a checkmate move at The End . This isn't going to happen, " she says.

" You might find a few collaborators, " she says, " but The Gazans will not take kindly to them. "

Among those who have dealt with Gaza wars before, albeit not on this scale, there's deep apprehension and a sense That almost everything has been tried before.

The former Mossad officer, Haim Tomer, says he would suspend military operations for a month in an effort to get hostages out first.

In 2012, after a previous round of fighting in Gaza, he accompanied The Mossad director to Cairo for secret talks That resulted in a ceasefire.

Hamas representatives, he says, were " on The Other side of The Street , " with Egyptian officials shuttling In Between .

A similar mechanism should be used again, he says, and Israel would almost certainly pay a high price.

" I don't care if we release a couple of thousand Hamas prisoners. I want to see our people Coming Back home. "

Israel, he says, could then decide whether to resume full-scale military operations or opt for a long-term ceasefire.

But short of physically separating The Territory from Israel and dragging it into The Mediterranean , he says Israel is destined to deal with The Gaza Strip indefinitely.

" It's like a bone in our throat. "

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Source of news: bbc.com