There Might Be No Day After in Gaza

As the war continues, deterioration at the level of governance, security, and public order will likely be deepened by the absence of a political horizon, diplomatic process, or future prospects.

Initial reactions to Hamas’s October 7 bloody attack on Israelis and Israel’s declaration of war focused on the short term: how strongly would Israel react and what would its war aims be? It was precisely such short-term thinking—on the part of Israeli, Palestinian, American, and other leaders who sought to postpone rather than address issues—that contributed to the current crisis. Israel has finally spelled out war aims, but they are very ambitious: to oust Hamas from governance and to destroy its military capability. That new, yet limited, clarity has pushed public discussions and private, official meetings to begin arrangements for the day after.

But there is no sign of consensus, and even the most detailed authoritative statements lack clarity. U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken’s October 31 comments were the most specific offered yet, but they only suggested that the United States and other countries are looking at “a variety of possible permutations.” He mused that an “effective and revitalized Palestinian Authority” (PA) should ultimately govern Gaza but offered no clues on how to make the PA effective or overcome Israeli opposition. He only suggested vaguely that in the meantime, “there are other temporary arrangements that may involve a number of other countries in the region. It may involve international agencies that would help provide for both security and governance.” The nominees floated for this interim role include Arab states and the United Nations, supported by other governmental and nongovernmental international organizations.

THE RIGHT QUESTIONS

The lack of clarity has a cause: The question “How should Gaza be governed when the war is over?” will likely reveal itself to have no good answers and not even to be the right starting point. Instead, better questions ask: What does it mean to oust a party like Hamas from governance when it dominates all levels of Gaza’s government? What does it mean for Israel to attempt to end the military capability of Hamas, a social movement with a military wing that also oversees public security, administration, and other governmental functions—especially when it operates both above and below ground? What does victory mean? And whatever its goals, what will Israel actually achieve? How will anyone know that the war is over? These better questions show why it is a mistake for scenarios to assume a “day after” as if this were a conventional war that will clearly and cleanly give way to agreed or imposed postwar arrangements.

Many scenarios are based on what actors should do rather than what they are likely to do, which is also misleading. Such scenarios also risk seriously underestimating the difficulties of any diplomacy. Instead, policymakers should examine how unfolding events will affect what the actors are likely to do and the ways in which the violence may deepen divisions. Gazan governance may be so seriously undermined that political disintegration accompanied by social and economic deterioration are far more likely than any ideal (or even manageable) arrangements.

HAZY OUTCOMES

It seems safe to assume as well—and indeed it is rapidly becoming the case—that the Israeli military operation will kill many civilians and destroy part of Gaza, including housing, infrastructure, and critical aspects of civilian life. Israel will most likely impose significant military buffer zones within Gaza that will be inaccessible to Palestinians for a while, if not indefinitely. As fighting dies down, the ongoing Israeli military stance in Gaza will likely tighten the border and increase security forces’ capacity to conduct incursions into populated areas.

Israel will not likely reintroduce settlers into Gaza, but future military moves might include setting up military installations within Gaza. Israel will not be able to dominate Gaza to the same degree as the West Bank, but that level of control is not necessary anyway, as Israel’s principal aim in Gaza is to prevent the capacity of Gazan militias to attack Israel rather than to protect its settler enterprise.

Besides displacing Gazans within Gaza, the effect of the Israeli military operation might force a significant number of people to leave Gaza into the Sinai Peninsula, despite Egypt’s blockade. That possibility seems to be receding, both as a result of external pressure and very sharp Egyptian resistance. But population shifts within the Gaza Strip are already occurring, as Gazans flee fighting and are warned by Israel that their lives are at risk if they do not. And further displacement and depopulation to create the buffer zones will further squeeze many Gazans into tenuous enclaves within enclaves. Parts of the north of Gaza might be in practice annexed—at least in security terms—and turned into a closed Israeli military zone.

EVOLVING ACTORS

Rather than a “day after,” what seems more likely is a shift from intensive to low-level combat that has no clear resolution. There will be efforts to devise arrangements, to be sure. But the most notable diplomatic fallout from the fighting might be that diplomacy becomes even more difficult. The coordination necessary to make any arrangements for governance functions may be extremely difficult to achieve.

And changes within each actor are likely to complicate matters further.

Hamas is not likely to be destroyed, though it will undoubtedly suffer tremendous losses. It may be that the movement’s political wing—since it operates aboveground—is a softer target than the military wing, which is both hardened and already partially underground. There is a significant possibility that the military wing will actually increase its hold on the organization—and that it will identify any postwar governance that targets the movement as collaboration with Israeli efforts to eliminate it.

The United States has played a dramatic role in the war’s initial stages, hardwiring the American and Israeli decision-making processes together in an unprecedented way. European states have followed their general pattern of tailing the United States while advocating a bit more publicly for civilian lives and longer-term diplomacy. The result may be that the United States gains real leverage with Israel—while many people in the region increasingly distrust the United States and place very strong pressures on their governments not to cooperate with U.S. diplomacy.

Multilateral institutions have been far more adept at service provision and humanitarian aid than governance. Some (such as the UN’s Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East, or UNRWA) do have extensive operations in some sectors (most notably education), but they are unlikely to wish to extend that programming especially if there is resistance among some of the population. The casualties already suffered by such agencies and the extraordinary vitriol directed by Israeli officials against the UN secretary general augur poorly for constructive arrangements if the fighting does ease.

Arab states never wished to be made responsible for Gaza; that preference is likely to be strengthened. Nor are they likely to band together to manage a problem they feel was caused by the recklessness of others. The few experiences of multilateral involvement by Arab states in “peacekeeping” or security arrangements do not provide positive models. In short, Arab states are unlikely to accept a role. And in the unlikely event they were persuaded to step in, such involvement would likely be ineffective in providing administration, much less security.

Israel’s future posture is unknown even to most Israelis. Over the short term, there is unity behind a military effort, but the underlying fissures in Israeli society seem more deferred than resolved. The religious nationalist camp has lost its centrality with the expansion of Israel’s governing coalition, but it retains key ministries for now, and its citizens’ violent activities against Palestinians in the West Bank have stepped up. Its vision for annexing the land but denying rights to non-Jewish inhabitants has already advanced very far. 

The country’s military and security leaders are both leading much of the country’s response, but they are also taking blame for missing the signs that Hamas would strike out; the tensions between the leadership and rightist politicians seem to be just below the surface. Leading Israeli political and security figures are divided about whether the Palestinian Authority in Ramallah is annoying, hostile, or a potential partner, but the idea that Palestinians are a national community that should be treated as such is accepted only in pockets of the Israeli political spectrum. The political configuration in Israel is volatile, and the stance and composition of the country’s leadership a year from now are difficult to foresee.

SO HOW WILL GAZA BE GOVERNED?

These evolving actors will struggle to devise a new governance system for Gaza.

Gaza has been governed in various ways by Hamas since 2006, and it is therefore only a minority of Gazans who remember anything different. Hamas is not particularly popular—it has some enthusiastic support, to be sure, but only from a minority. But asking Gazans whom they support is partly beside the point: no Palestinian has had a serious voice in choosing their leaders since 2006. A bizarre coincidence of interests among a variety of international and domestic actors has formed to prevent meaningful elections. Resignation is the currency of popular politics.

In the meantime, the administration and governance of the Gaza Strip gradually evolved into a party-state that is now in the crosshairs of Israeli military efforts. So what will be the fate of that structure—and the people it has governed?

Gazans will live in the surviving buildings and makeshift structures for a while. Any rebuilding will exclude significant portions of Gaza. Commerce, manufacturing, agriculture, and other businesses will be effectively destroyed, rendering Gazans completely dependent on humanitarian aid. Once a “besieged enclave,” Gaza will be reduced to a “supercamp” of internally displaced persons.

Israel has a choice here: its initial pledge to kill every member of Hamas has faded, but it remains unclear how Israeli forces will treat Hamas’s bureaucrats, teachers, judges, inspectors, and police. Will Israel simply raid and target Hamas’s military wing? Will it attempt to arrest, assassinate, or ignore government officials? Will it be systematic or ad hoc? Will governance structures in Gaza be decapitated, decimated, or partially incapacitated?

Disintegration of the central government in Gaza is not without precedent. After its 2006 election victory in Palestinian Authority elections, and even after the 2007 split in that body that left Hamas in control of Gaza, Hamas exercised tightening control of the security and political framework in Gaza. But it initially did not have total control of the services traditionally managed by the governments, and some key areas still lie outside of its oversight. Much of Gaza’s civil service remained on the Ramallah payroll—though when the West Bank ordered many employees in many sectors in Gaza to stay home, the result was that the Hamas government hired many of its own personnel. Over time, much of the apparatus of governance began to function again, with parts (such as education) coordinating with the West Bank but with Hamas placing almost all structures under those who either were loyal or accepted Hamas as inevitable.

But Hamas’s control has never been total. The Gaza government could not provide for all its people’s needs, and international bodies stepped in. Indeed, these organizations provided virtually the only institutions in Gaza not under the control of what was becoming a party-state. For example, a desalination plant was managed by the UN Children’s Fund, a power plant managed by the Palestinian Energy and Natural Resources Authority, some schools managed by UNRWA, and salaries of hospital staff paid by Ramallah. This setup was necessary to avoid essential services being cut off when the international community boycotted Hamas and to facilitate vital cooperation with Israel in running these services.

REINVENTING THE WHEEL OR BREAKING IT?

Most of the ideas about “the day after” that assume Hamas will soon be gone seem inspired by the set of ad hoc governance systems developed to provide social services while Israel blockaded Gaza and most international actors boycotted its government. The proposals are based on expanding the ad hoc arrangements with less involvement (or none at all) by formerly Hamas-led structures. Those who insist that Hamas rule must end do not spell out what they mean, but even a less ambitious scenario would leave only lower-level structures intact.

The question is not whether Israel will “reoccupy” Gaza. The most onerous aspects of Israel’s occupation never ended: what ended with the Oslo Accords was Israel’s post-1967 strong role in overseeing administration and internal security outside of settlements; what changed in 2005 was the withdrawal of Israel’s settlements and the attendant military presence. While some on the Israeli right have spoken of restoring settlements and even expelling Palestinians, louder voices seem to suggest that Israel will seek to hand administration over to someone else.

So “day after” plans focus on oversight and control over the governmental machinery in Gaza—perhaps greatly expanding the pre-2023 setup for some service provision with more involvement of the UN agencies and internationally sponsored organizations and possibly some Palestinian Authority or Arab involvement. Blinken’s comments rolled all these possibilities into one.

There is no real precedent in Gazan history for such loose arrangements—since the Gaza Strip emerged as a distinct entity at the end of the 1948 war, Egypt, Israel, the Palestinian Authority, and the Hamas-led government all took turns in overseeing Gaza’s administration, service provision, and security.

So who would oversee the assortment of UN agencies, various international aid agencies, nongovernmental organizations, elements of the Palestinian Authority, and remains of the Gazan bureaucracy? The various candidates put forward each seem implausible.

• The PA is unlikely to restore its pre-2007 institutional and legal framework. First, Israel’s long-standing policy to disconnect Gaza from the West Bank and to treat Gaza as a nonentity in political and governing terms would have to be completely reversed, and that seems unlikely. Second, the PA lacks popular support to begin with; to be seen as the agent of Israeli invasion and U.S. complicity—which is how most Palestinians would see it—might be close to suicidal. 
• The PA is clear on this point; its prime minister has said that “To have the Palestinian Authority go to Gaza and run the affairs of Gaza without a political solution for the West Bank, as if this Palestinian Authority is going aboard an F-16 or an Israeli tank? I don’t accept it. Our president [Mahmoud Abbas] does not accept it. 
• None of us will accept it.” And the PA’s stubbornly passive behavior is consistent with this stance: PA officials have launched an initiative to engage in a humanitarian response in Gaza. They do not engage in strategic communication to promote a ceasefire. There is no political dialogue with Hamas nor other Palestinian factions. On top of that, the potential PA administration would be under Israel’s complete security control, similarly to the West Bank’s Area C. This complete control would likely bolster the image of the PA as an Israeli “contractor.” 
• A “revitalized” PA capable of undertaking administration and providing security in Gaza would seem to require both elections and a very muscular diplomatic process within an acceptable horizon. Neither is likely; those now calling for a “revitalized” PA are precisely the same actors who have resisted such steps for many years.
• The UN or any international coalition is unlikely to be effective at more than some service provision. Misleading comparisons to Kosovo or Iraq obscure the far more hostile context: UNRWA alone has already seen sixty-three of its workers killed; Israeli officials have heaped extraordinary vituperation on senior UN officials; and internal security has dissolved in Gaza. For the UN to establish a political or peacekeeping mission, a high degree of consensus would have to be possible in the UN Security Council, which is already deeply divided on many global issues.
• Regional management seems even less plausible. Why would countries in the region want to take responsibility for administering Gaza under military control of Israel? And why would Israel want regional actors to have military control of Gaza?

Thus, while some of these actors might be involved in some way in some activities—service provision most especially—none acting individually or jointly would have the interest, ability, or capability to impose itself on Gaza as an overarching authority. Many might be willing to supply water, aid workers, school supplies, and food. The United States might press Israel to allow a supply of electricity and fuel. Gazan access to international financial systems might be restored.

But for the foreseeable future, there will be no central government for Gaza. Not only will no force be able to supply security in terms of public security and basic law and order, but also, continuous Israeli raids or Hamas attacks on perceived collaborators may be ongoing.

In that context, law and order on the streets will likely be handled—if they are handled at all—by camp committees and self-appointed gangs. And this deterioration at the level of governance, security, and public order will likely be deepened by the absence of a political horizon, diplomatic process, or future prospects: Gazans would be offered a dispiriting present and a future of statelessness and denial of dignity, national rights, and individual rights.

This seems less like the day after a conflict than a long twilight of disintegration and despair.

Source: Carnegie Endowment