The Israeli soldiers stand rifles in hand, arm over shoulder, speaking to the camera. Behind them is the shell of a Gazan building. <\/p>\n
\u201cWe are here adding light after the black sabbath that the people of Israel had,\u201d one of the men says in the video, circulating on Telegram.\u00a0\u201cWe are occupying, deporting, and settling. Occupying, deporting, and settling. Did you hear that Bibi? Occupying, deporting, and settling.\u201d <\/p>\n
As Israel\u2019s war against Hamas enters its fourth month, the Israeli government has\u00a0said little of substance, at least in any official way,\u00a0on its\u00a0plans for post-war Gaza. <\/p>\n
Hamas seized control of the territory \u2013 home to about 2.2 million Palestinians \u2013 from the Palestinian Authority in 2007, two years after Israel unilaterally withdrew all its troops and about 8,000 Jewish settlers. Who governs it after Israel\u2019s war against Hamas concludes is an open question. <\/p>\n
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has rejected the idea of establishing Jewish settlements, but has said only that neither Hamas nor the Ramallah-based Palestinian Authority should govern the territory, and that Israel will keep \u201cfull security control.\u201d <\/p>\n
Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, a member of\u00a0Netanyahu\u2019s right-wing\u00a0Likud party,\u00a0has released his own proposal, saying that there should be \u201cno Israeli presence in the Gaza Strip,\u201d but light on detail about what governance there would look like. <\/p>\n
Into that void has stepped a group \u2013\u00a0once fringe, but now in the governing coalition \u2013that hopes for full Israeli control, to resettle Gaza and even expel Palestinians. And its ideas are permeating mainstream debate. <\/p>\n
\u201cWe must promote a solution to encourage the emigration of the residents of Gaza,\u201d far-right\u00a0National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir said on January 1. <\/p>\n
Far-right\u00a0Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich, who also holds a position in the Defense Ministry, says that Israel \u201cwill rule there. And in order to rule there securely for a long time, we must have a civilian presence.\u201d <\/p>\n
The United States\u2019\u00a0top diplomat is concerned enough that he has publicly rebuked those plans. <\/p>\n
\u201cThese statements are irresponsible, they\u2019re inflammatory, and they only make it harder to secure a future of Palestinian-led Gaza with Hamas no longer in control, and with terrorist groups no longer able to threaten Israel\u2019s security,\u201d Secretary of State Antony Blinken said during a recent trip to Qatar. <\/p>\n
Polling in Israel on the question of re-establishing settlements varies widely, reflecting subtleties in how the question is asked, and the fact that public opinion in the wake of Hamas\u2019 October 7 attack is wildly in flux, says Dahlia Scheindlin, a polling expert, journalist, and contributor to\u00a0Israeli\u00a0newspaper Haaretz. <\/p>\n
There is also an established track record in Israel of politicians pushing seemingly extremist ideas into mainstream conversation, and even into law. Netanyahu last year supported an effort started by a right-wing minister from his own Likud party to push through a law\u00a0limiting the Supreme Court\u2019s ability to scrutinize legislation, despite months of protests that roiled the nation. That proposal never had majority support, but the Knesset nonetheless passed it into law. The Supreme Court struck down the proposal earlier this month, saying\u00a0it would deal a \u201csevere and unprecedented blow to the core characteristics of the State of Israel as a democratic state.\u201d <\/p>\n
\u201cIdeas that often seem very extreme at a certain phase in Israel\u2019s history can over time become increasingly normalized very incrementally \u2013 sometimes a little bit below the radar, not exactly hidden, but not exactly advertised,\u201d Scheindlin said of Israeli policymaking. <\/p>\n
Diana Buttu, a Palestinian\u00a0human rights lawyer who has served as an adviser to the Palestinian Authority, gives little credence to Netanyahu\u2019s professed opposition to re-establishing settlements in Gaza. <\/p>\n
Far from a new idea, the desire to re-settle Gaza comes from decades of frustration with then-Prime Minister Ariel Sharon\u2019s 2004 decision to dismantle 21 Israel settlements in Gaza \u2013\u00a0known as Gush Katif \u2013 and expel their 8,000 Jewish residents, a process\u00a0which was\u00a0completed in 2005. <\/p>\n
Settler activists like Yishai Fleisher, a\u00a0spokesman for Jewish settlers in Hebron, in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, sense an opportunity. <\/p>\n
As a protester, in 2005, Fleisher was among those ejected from Gaza by the Israeli government. With public opinion in flux, he hopes that his movement\u2019s moment has come. <\/p>\n
\u201cPeople are\u00a0waking up \u2013 they\u2019re trying to open their minds,\u201d he said of fellow Israelis, reevaluating their politics in the wake of October 7. <\/p>\n
If Palestinians in Gaza are \u201cpost-Jihad, pro-Israel, and want to live that good life in that beautiful soil, there should be an opportunity for that,\u201d he said. \u201cAnti-Israel, pro-jihad Arabs have got to leave. And they\u2019re going to have to find a different place to go. It might be Turkey, and it might be Jordan, and it might be South America,\u201d he said.\u00a0\u201cIf they can\u2019t muster in their heart to live in or next to the Jewish state, we can\u2019t have them.\u201d <\/p>\n
The Norwegian Refugee Council in December warned that \u201cany attempts by Israel to deport and permanently displace Palestinians within and from Gaza would constitute a serious breach of international law and an atrocity crime.\u201d <\/p>\n
Since October 7,\u00a0about 85% of Gaza\u2019s population, or some 1.9 million people, have been displaced from their homes, according to the United Nations \u2013 many of them\u00a0moved multiple times, fleeing airstrikes and\u00a0heeding Israeli warnings of military attacks, and largely squeezed into a small, southwestern corner of the territory. <\/p>\n
Israel was last week\u00a0accused of genocide\u00a0in Gaza by South Africa, whose lawyers argued at the International Court of Justice in The Hague that Israel\u2019s military campaign was intended to \u201cbring about the destruction\u201d of its Palestinian population, and that comments made by Israeli leaders signalled their \u201cgenocidal intent.\u201d Israel\u00a0strenuously denied the accusation\u00a0and said that the charge was \u201ca concerted and cynical effort to pervert the meaning of the term \u2018genocide\u2019 itself.\u201d <\/p>\n
At the Gush Katif museum in Jerusalem, former settlers are printing T-shirts in bright orange. That color was adopted in 2004 and 2005 by the movement protesting Israel\u2019s disengagement from Gaza. At the time, Israel Defense Forces (IDF) soldiers pulled settlers from settlement synagogues. Days later, Palestinian forces razed the buildings to the ground. <\/p>\n
\u201cHome, returning to Gush Katif,\u201d the slogan on\u00a0the T-shirts\u00a0reads. <\/p>\n
The movement to re-establish Gush Katif, has found a place, too, among some of the many (IDF) soldiers posting from Gaza on social media. <\/p>\n
A photograph from a ruined Gaza street shows two soldiers holding an Israeli flag, altered to include an orange stripe and the words, in Hebrew: \u201cComing home!\u201d <\/p>\n
Another photograph shows soldiers with an orange banner that reads: \u201cOnly settlement would be considered victory!\u201d <\/p>\n
When the megastar Israeli singer Hanan Ben Ari serenaded Israeli\u00a0troops in October ahead of their deployment, he sang: <\/p>\n
Returning to Gush Katif<\/em> <\/p>\n Playing beach volleyball<\/em> <\/p>\n Establishing Nova Beach on the Gaza coast<\/em> <\/p>\n The nation of Israel lives!<\/em> <\/p>\n Those advocating for renewed Israeli settlements often frame their arguments in humanitarian terms, arguing that Palestinians would have a better life elsewhere. <\/p>\n \u201cThis is a correct, just, moral and humane solution,\u201d said Ben Gvir,\u00a0who has previously been convicted for supporting terrorism and inciting anti-Arab racism. <\/p>\n Gila Gamliel, Israel\u2019s intelligence minister and a member of Likud, suggested in November that Israel \u201cpromote the voluntary resettlement of Palestinians in Gaza, for humanitarian reasons, outside of the Strip.\u201d <\/p>\n Between 68% and 81% of buildings in northern Gaza have been damaged by Israel\u2019s war in Gaza, according to analysis of satellite imagery up to January 5\u00a0by researchers at Oregon State University and the City University of New York. In all of Gaza, the figure is between 45% and 56%. <\/p>\n Mahmoud Abbas,\u00a0president of the Palestinian Authority,\u00a0which\u00a0exercises limited self-rule in the West Bank,\u00a0has made clear his government\u2019s \u201ccomplete rejection of the displacement of any Palestinian citizen.\u201d <\/p>\n \u201cCan the population now return to northern Gaza, which has largely been destroyed?\u201d <\/p>\n \u201cAs a result of this, there is an opening for those ministers, media people, and so forth on the Israeli right to say, \u2018Well the most humanitarian solution is to remove that population\u2019\u00a0\u2014 or to encourage, as they say \u2014 to move out of Gaza. If that happens, then this entire scenario that I\u2019m talking about will be seen as ethnic cleansing.\u201d <\/p>\n Buttu, who said she has little doubt about the determination of some in Israel to re-settle Gaza based on their settlement efforts in the West Bank, voiced a similar concern. <\/p>\n Israel has \u201ccreated the conditions whereby Gaza is no longer liveable,\u201d she said. \u201cNow they\u2019re just simply repacking it as some sort of humanitarian gift, or humanitarian solution, when really what it is, is aiding Israel and ethnically cleansing Gaza of Palestinians.\u201d <\/p>\n Netanyahu has rejected the idea of new settlements as \u201cunrealistic,\u201d saying in an English-language statement that \u201cIsrael has no intention of permanently occupying Gaza or displacing its civilian population.\u201d <\/p>\n In October, the Israeli government admitted that a leaked intelligence document proposing the relocation of millions of Palestinian Gazans to Egypt\u2019s Sinai Peninsula was genuine, but downplayed its significance as \u201ca preliminary paper, like dozens of such papers prepared by all political and security echelons.\u201d <\/p>\n Nonetheless, the fact\u00a0the\u00a0re-settlement movement is now being openly discussed in Israel\u2019s parliament, or Knesset, as it was during a committee hearing earlier this month, is a step-change in\u00a0the debate. And despite international opprobrium, its far-right proponents are not holding back. <\/p>\n \u201cWe first need to occupy, to annex, to destroy all the houses there, build neighborhoods there,\u201d Tzvi Sukkot, a member of Knesset from Smotrich\u2019s Religious Zionism said during the committee hearing. <\/p>\n The only image that will convince Israel\u2019s enemy of its defeat, said Limor Son Har Melech from Ben Gvir\u2019s Jewish Power Party, to applause, is \u201cthe settlement, and Jewish children walking in its streets.\u201d <\/p>\n\n The Israeli soldiers stand rifles in hand, arm over shoulder, speaking to the camera. Behind them is the shell of a Gazan building. \u201cWe are here adding light after the black sabbath that the people of Israel had,\u201d one of the men says in the video, circulating on Telegram.\u00a0\u201cWe are occupying, deporting, and settling. Occupying, <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":14183,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-14182","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-world"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14182","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14182"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14182\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/14183"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14182"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14182"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14182"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}} \u2018Ethnic cleansing\u2019<\/h2>\n