Will It Last? (Updated)

In his Washington Post column David Ignatius reports on the incipient ceasefire and hostage exchange between Israel and Hamas:

A hostage deal between Israel and Hamas will bring joy to the families of the 50 Israeli women and children initially being freed, and a desperately needed four-day pause in fighting for Palestinians civilians trapped in the Gaza war. And it could gradually expand to a broader de-escalation of the nightmare conflict.

The basic idea driving the hostage-release agreement, approved by Israel’s cabinet early Wednesday in Jerusalem, is “more for more,” a formula that’s well known in arms-control negotiations. If Hamas delivers more hostages, Israel would be willing to extend the pause, a senior Israeli official told me. There is no cap on how long Israel might halt its Gaza operations, he said, as Israel seeks eventual release of all captives, including those in the military.

In his New York Times column Bret Stephens is not nearly as optimistic:

But a cease-fire wouldn’t spare just civilians. It would spare, and embolden, the main fighting force of Hamas. It would also embolden terrorist allies like Hezbollah. That’s a virtual guarantee for future mass-casualty attacks against Israel, for ever-larger Israeli retaliation, and for deeper misery for the people of Gaza. No Israeli government of any political stripe is going to allow the territory to rebuild so long as Hamas remains in charge.

That gives a second meaning to “Cease-Fire Now”: Either a demand for Israel’s total capitulation, or a recipe for a perpetual cycle of violence between a terrorist group sworn to Israel’s destruction and a Jewish state that refuses to be destroyed. Whatever else one thinks of Israel, no country can be expected to sign its own death warrant by indulging those who, if given the chance, would annihilate it.

In his Washington Post column yesterday David Ignatius reported that the Israelis planned a large “tent city’ in south Gaza:

The next phase will focus on southern Gaza, where more than 1 million desperate civilians have fled, probably along with one of Hamas’s top political leaders, Yahya Sinwar, whom IDF officials believe is hiding in tunnels under his hometown of Khan Younis. As in the north, the IDF will attempt to separate the battlespace — dividing it into military targets around Khan Younis and civilian safe zones to the west. But this separation might be as difficult as it was in the north — with civilians again caught in the crossfire.

To care for Palestinians who have fled the battle zones, Israel plans to create a vast tent city for refugees at Al-Mawasi, on the coast just north of the Gazan border with Egypt. The location should allow humanitarian supplies to be delivered easily by land and sea. After the intense international criticism for the hospital battles in northern Gaza, Israeli commanders want to quickly create temporary medical facilities for thousands of wounded civilians threatened now with starvation and infectious disease.

That’s similar to what I thought was Israel’s best strategy: clearing a large part of north Gaza and building a tent city there, encouraging civilians to move north into it, carefully searching every entrant to ensure they were civilians. That would have been an admittedly risky strategy and one that the Israelis possibly do not have the ability to implement but I made what I thought was a better assumption—Gaza is now a write-off; it must be completely leveled not just to the ground but below the ground. That’s a consequence of Hamas’s handiwork there.

Here’s my question. Will the ceasefire last four days? Keep in mind that Hamas violated a ceasefire in its October 7 attack.

Update

The editors of the Wall Street Journal follow up on my question:

Expect Hamas to drag out the cease-fire in hopes of making it permanent. Dribbling out 10 hostages a day, Hamas could stall for a few weeks. Or what if it claims after day two that Israel has broken the deal and hostage releases will continue only after Israel holds off for another few days? What if it pulls that trick over and over?

The domestic and international picture will become more complicated for Israel. At home a nation united will be divided over how long to wait. Abroad, the pressure to continue the cease-fire indefinitely will grow, and Israel can expect harsher criticism when it resumes fighting. Israelis know all this, but they are willing to accept the costs to retrieve the captives.