We are in the midst of the exchange between Hamas and Israel: hostages in return for prisoners.
I will never cease to be amazed by people’s extraordinary willingness to be distracted, their goldfish-like memory, and their inability to connect the dots of the information they possess.
I’m not saying they should do so to reach a categorical conclusion—such conclusions would often be wrong because many facts remain unknown—but at least to ask questions.
On October 7, 2023
Hamas captured an unspecified number of hostages, mostly Israelis, estimated to be between 250 and 300. It demanded the release of Palestinian political prisoners in exchange for the hostages.
Israel decided to take a hardline approach to uproot Hamas from Gaza and crush it.
We certainly do not have the correct number of casualties. Reports mention 46,000 Palestinians, mostly women and children, and 840 Israeli soldiers.
Now, more than fifteen months have passed since the abductions, yet the hostage-prisoner exchange is ongoing.
So far, approximately 400 hostages have been exchanged for over 1,000 prisoners.
Has Israel conceded? If so, what was the point of not doing so immediately? It could have launched retaliatory actions after the exchange, not before. Doing it now does not give the impression of victory; rather, it looks like a partial surrender.
Hamas films itself in a martial stance
while releasing the hostages and openly challenging Israel.
Now, is it really possible that no one is asking some very natural and elementary questions?
If scorched-earth tactics were used to destroy Hamas, and Hamas is now displaying strength and resilience—meaning it was not annihilated—has it therefore won? And how?
How did the hostages survive almost entirely through the Israeli bombings, given that Tel Aviv presumably did not know where they were held?
Although I am astonished
that no one is asking these questions, I would be wary of simplistic answers. Israel has certainly not lost, but this entire operation, involving many actors, unfolds on multiple levels with widely different objectives.
While October 7 was the trigger for these fifteen months of war, the conflict—or rather, the web of conflicts being played out—occurs in parallel and even independently of the casus belli.
As the political and energy map of the Middle East is rewritten along the lines of a process that began in 2018, Sunni factions are trying to regain ground from Shia advances, alliances and agreements are being overturned, and American and Chinese influences are also coming into play.
No one really cares about Palestine
least of all the Arab countries. Consider that from 1948 to 2023, nearly three-quarters of Palestinians killed in conflicts were killed by Arabs.
We certainly do not know how Hamas and the hostages were shielded from the effects of the bombings in Gaza. We probably make a mistake when we speak of Hamas as if it were a monolithic entity.
It is more than likely that, once again, a bloody leadership change took place, shifting influence over the Palestinian instability—or rather, stability—represented by Hamas.
This has happened continuously since the birth of Fatah; since 1991, most of the Arab-Israeli manipulations have focused precisely on Hamas.
And Hamas itself
is a battleground for factions that care far more about fighting each other—regardless of the devastating consequences for the Palestinian population—than about pursuing a cause or a goal.
It is therefore highly probable that over these fifteen months, one Hamas was eliminated while another was strengthened, and that today, someone is cashing in—someone who is convenient to be the one cashing in.
