Israel and Hamas End Cease-Fire, Resume Fighting

Israel and Palestinian militant group Hamas resumed hostilities today (FT), ending a weeklong cease-fire that saw Hamas release about 100 Israeli women and children, as well as some foreign nationals, and Israel release some 240 Palestinian women and children. International mediators had hoped to extend the pause for an eighth day, but the Israeli Defense Forces claimed that Hamas “violated the operational pause” and said they would resume fighting. Bomb sirens sounded across Israel and air strikes hit buildings in both the northern and southern Gaza Strip. Israel also dropped leaflets (AP) above some parts of southern Gaza, urging people to leave their homes. Qatari mediators said they are working to resume the cease-fire.?

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office said today that Israel is committed to achieving its war goals of “releasing the hostages, eliminating Hamas and ensuring that Gaza never again constitutes a threat to the residents of Israel.” Yesterday, the New York Times reported on detailed plans for an attack similar to that carried out by Hamas on October 7 that were widely circulated among Israeli intelligence officials more than a year before the attack occurred, though they were dismissed. It was not clear whether Netanyahu or other top political leaders had seen the plans.?

Analysis

“Fighting between Israel and Hamas has resumed,” Politico’s Alex Ward posts. “[Questions] now: Did Hamas refresh in [the] break? Will Israel change tactics?”

?“[Netanyahu] presided over the single greatest security failure in Israel’s history, which undermined the entire logic of his long tenure as the country’s leader,” CFR expert Steven A. Cook writes for Foreign Policy. “But his likely political demise does not portend the resurrection of the Israeli peace camp.”

Read the full suite of Foreign Affairs and CFR.org resources on Israel and the current conflict.

Source CFR