Israel, Hamas reach ceasefire deal to end 15 months of war in Gaza

While this is a good development. Everything in this part of the world is on a rinse snd repeat cycle ever since the Assyrians and the Babylonians - it hasn't changed much except maybe its actually a little more humane then it was in the past (which says something). Sorry for the cynical take but this just does a temporary stop.

Gaza is nearly leveled. Thousands have died and millions have been forced to leave. A ceasefire now is simply to relieve some of the pressure both on Netanyahu and Trump. The former wanted for war crimes (luckily the house just passed a bill to protect him) and the latter trying to hold up an illusion of being “America first”, despite having one of the most Zionist cabinets in history (his secdef is quoted saying he wishes to rebuild the third temple).

The next goal is likely Iran. Destabilizing or removal of surrounding Arab countries. Yemen, Egypt, Iraq, Syria, Sudan, Afghanistan - none of these counties pose any real threat to Israel. 50 years ago this was a very different story. We’re watching the clean break doctrine play out.

Their end goal is greater Israel. It’s the only logical explanation for how the Middle East is in the state it is today. Trump is another US politician who sold out to Zionists (check his donors, cabinet, etc). Politicians do not act honestly.

OK since no one else has said it yet, "according to a source familiar with the details"[1] (I know) Trump has basically told Netanyahu to agree to the ceasefire including the return of hostages. Then if they decide to break the ceasefire and go back to relentless bombings, Trump will still continue to support them.

So it could be a tactic to get Hamas to release whatever hostages are still alive, then get right back to the new status quo.

This actually makes perfect sense for Trump. He's only claimed to care about the Israeli hostages. I'm sure he feels great about taking credit for their return.

[1]: https://trendsinthenews.substack.com/p/gerald-celente-on-gaz...

One not particularly obscure theory is that Netanyahu was prioritizing Trump coming to power over a peace/hostage deal and now that Trump has power, Netanyahu seeks to benefit from prioritizing the hostages. Trump is claiming credit for it and probably doesn't care about the timing.

> ostensibly pressures Netanyahu into accepting the ceasefire

There is no evidence of this.

Every single time Trump has blustered about doing something e.g. turning Canada into a 51st, buying Greenland the parties have been concerned but not particularly worried. Because he doesn't follow through.

So the idea that we should credit Trump for his words and ignore the months of diplomacy and pressure from not just the US but Middle Eastern countries is bizarre to me. Ceasefires are always far more complex and nuanced than they look from the outside.

> I also found Trump's signalling in the whole issue odd. His base and his cabinet is full of the most hard-line pro-israel figures imaginable, but then he goes forward and quotes Jeffrey Sachs and ostensibly pressures Netanyahu into accepting the ceasefire.

Trump just wanted a deal - he loves being the "deal guy". Frankly, I'm shocked he didn't push Bibi into waiting until after the inauguration. Guess he felt like it was close enough that he could still take credit for it.

Multiple sources are crediting months of work by Brett McGurk as the lead in this. This is Biden admin accomplishment.

Trump wanted the war to end, and I'm sure Netanyahu was doing his Netanyahu thing.

Posting that video was Trump's way of telling Netanyahu that he will burn him by turning him into public enemy #1 with his base. That's how he got him to agree.

The entirety of Hamas leadership is gone, Hamas will most likely not going to have control in Gaza (still being debated which mechanism will govern, this is part of the deal), the crossing to Egypt will be handled by foreign countries which will prevent weapon smuggling. And in the broader spectrum, hizballah is not more, Assad is no more, all of Iran’s proxies can no longer support Hamas’ ambitions which basically means the “mokawamma” is dead. So in short, the entire Middle East have changed.

> What has really changed that will make a difference in 2-3 years from now?

The whole Iranian anti Israel coalition has been badly beaten!

Hezbollah barely exists anymore. The Assad regime is toppled. Iran itself has learned that Israel can attack them at will. The Houthis are still active, but too far away to do real damage.

Hamas itself still exists, but in a deeply degraded form. Their leaders are dead. Their armed forces have taken huge losses. Their amazing tunnel network is destroyed.

Israel will never again be invaded by surprise.

Hamas will probably start shooting rockets into Israel again, and kill the occasional civilian, but Israel is used to that and can deal with it.

Of any of Israel's wars in recent history none has decimated their regional enemies as much as this. Every way you cut it they are in a much more secure position militarily. Iran (aka Lebanon/Syria) losing so badly is more important than Hamas surviving because that was the cludgle that threatened them from punishing Gaza too harshly (for ex: America pushed Israel very hard not to provoke Lebanon after Oct 7 and we saw how that turned out).

Any future Hamas actions will inherently be less secure as their external help is now crippled.

Honest question, but why haven't there been "I will sacrifice everything to wipe [country]" generations sowing havoc on neighbors after Dresden, Nagasaki, Nanjing or others?

Gaza is completely unlivable and more Palestinians can be "persuaded" to move abroad now that they literally have no infrastructure to survive.

Realistically, West Bank will be gone (totally settled, all Palestinians removed) in 15 years. Gaza will further be ghettoized and, pessimistically, will be basically gone in 50 years or so.

Gaza has changed.

> What has really changed that will make a difference in 2-3 years from now?

The Tel Aviv regime used to pass as a liberal democracy. After 14 months of a genocidal livestreamed campaign, its colonial apartheid character was laid bare.

100% support ceasefire. 100% agree Israel overdid it. 100% support Hamas must cease to exist. Don't leave that last part out

I don't mean to be pessimistic, but how sure are we its over? They're still bombing as we speak - and yea, I know the cease-fire doesn't come into effect sunday, but doesn't that signal something? Many times Israel has said something in these scenarios they've changed their minds. Cease-fire is not "peace," either. I think for some unfortunate people that survived this, the nightmare may just be beginning. I truly hope I am wrong. We live in dark times.

Yup and even after the UN accepted it US media still refuses to use the g word. It's a genocide not a "war". And it has been for decades now

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Hamas has been considerably weakened. Their arsenal of rockets and weapons is depleted. At the beginning of the war thousands of rockets were being shot into Israel and now there are very few and the ones that are are quite crude. Hezbollah entered the war immediately and said the only way they would exit is if Hamas exists. Israel retaliated, killed their leader, decimated their forces, and negotiated a ceasefire that got Hezbollah to back off on their original terms. Lebanon just elected an anti-Hezbollah President.

During all of this, Assad was deposed. Israel's main adversary is Iran. They are the ones who fund and supply Hamas and Hezbollah, and were the key ally of Assad. They attacked Israel multiple times during the war and Israel responded in kind, the assesments seem to be that Israel's responses were quite strong.

So prior to October 7, Iran had strong proxies and allies all over the region. They are now either in shambles or deposed.

The goal of the war for Israel is to prevent another October 7th style attack from occuring. I'd say they have made significant steps towards accomplishing that from a military perspective.

Israel is definitely more secure, because of the on front confrontation with Iran and its proxies.

1. Hezbollah suffered heavy blows and lost significant political and military power in Lebanon. Didn’t retaliate nearly as heavy as feared.

2. For the first time Israel struck with its military directly in Iran and showed real abilities by destroying most of Iran’s air defenses.

3. As a result of the two points above and other reasons, there was significant shift of powers in Syria which led to Assad regime collapse (significant amount of supplies to Iran’s main proxy Hezbollah went through Syria), but the affect of the regime change in Syria is yet to be determined.

By conservative estimates (see the 2024 Khatlib paper in the Lancet), roughly 7--9% of the population of Gaza will perish as a result of the actions of Israel on the strip. Many more will flee. According to UN, clearing the rubble in Gaza will take 15 years. That's just clearing the rubble, not rebuilding the damaged buildings, which is about 66% of the total.

There are some clear indications that the intention of the Israeli government is to destroy in whole, or in part, the Palestinian people, for example by killing members of the group, or inflicting upon it conditions calculated to bring about the destruction of the group.

There's a wealth of quotes from high ranking officials, going all the way up to the Knesset, stating almost exactly that. One quote I think of from time to time is "Erase them, their families, mothers and children." given in a motivational speech directed at the IDF.

Given that this is their intention (and I have every reason to believe it is), I'd say that this has been a pretty successful affair for Israel. Sure, Jews worldwide (including Israel) are much less safe now than they were two years ago, but the Israeli government does not give me the impression that this is at all their goal.

That (security) was never Hamas' intention; they were worried about being forgotten, after Israel and KSA were close to normalizing relations, and now they've managed to gunk up the gears of any peace process, at the cost of 40,000 Gazan lives. So... a victory for Hamas? They've never been interested in peace anyways.

There is an argument to be made that Iran and Hezbollah have been degraded, which makes the entire region safer. I'm not going to claim this, as I'm no expert, but there is a an argument to be made.

For the Gazans, the next months and years will be more determinative. Will they get the support and aid they need to rebuild and keep terrorist organizations from running their country? (They should have their own country instead of being effectively an open air prison)

The strengthening of the "us Vs them" mentality and terror politics

Israeli's are (not that they think it was worth it), Gazan's are not. This war severely weakened Iran, Iran's proxies (Lebanon/Hezbollah, and Syria) and also interestingly Russia.

Gazan's now have a ruined country with exactly nothing to show for it.

Depending on how you interpret it, this war was actually a good thing for Lebanon (they have a government for the first time in years), and Syria who finally overthrew their sadistic monster.

You're not missing anything, this is a ceasefire like the first one, Israel will demand the rest of the Hostages at the end of it, Hamas will refuse, and the fighting will resume after lots of finger-pointing about whose fault it is.

Everyone is tired of this shit. Bibi will be on meathooks if he unilaterally backs out. Hamas will have no friends at all if they renege.

Israel already violated multiple clear orders from the ICJ so I honestly don't see what mechanism would hold them accountable.

Iran invested all its resources into proxies waging wars for it. Them being smashed means Iran is ruined on all those war investments. With economy in shambles and expansionist war failed, it's hardly "least damaged".

Hamas agreed to this deal months ago. Give Trump credit for applying pressure to the party that actually rejected it.

The last ceasefire and hostage exchange was broken by Hamas when they didn’t want to return the hostage that was agreed on by the ceasefire agreement

> Did you hear a single call by any country for Hamas to surrender? I didn't.

US, UK, France, Germany, Italy in a joint message: https://it.usembassy.gov/joint-statement-on-israel/

Spain: https://www.politico.eu/article/pedro-sanchez-spain-humanita...

Italy, France, Germany ask for EU sanctions to force Hamas surrender: https://www.reuters.com/world/italy-france-germany-call-ad-h...

Secretary of State calls out other countries for not demanding Hamas to surrender: https://www.cnn.com/2023/12/20/politics/blinken-israel-hamas...

You should expand your media diet.