Meanwhile, Netanyahu was blasted in op-ed columns by two former prime ministers, Ehud Barak and Ehud Olmert. Barak and other prominent Israelis said Netanyahu should be disinvited from speaking to Congress next month because he doesn’t represent most Israelis, and Olmert told me he agreed.
Olmert slammed Netanyahu at a session I moderated Wednesday of the Aspen Ideas Festival, accusing the prime minister of “arrogance” in failing to anticipate the Hamas attack on Oct. 7. He bluntly said: “There is nothing at this point that we can gain that is worth the cost of continuing the war.”
Netanyahu’s governing coalition was also rocked internally from two directions this week. Israel’s Supreme Court ruled that ultra-Orthodox Jews shouldn’t be exempt from military service, a position that some members of his government support and others oppose. And Gallant pressed forward with postwar transition plans for Gaza, informally described as “the day after,” that Netanyahu doesn’t support.
Resolving the squabble over U.S.-Israeli arms shipments was important, not least because Gallant overcame the political flap his prime minister had created. Netanyahu had claimed in a June 18 video that the United States was deliberately slowing deliveries of major weapons, in addition to the announced delay of 2,000-pound bombs that President Biden fears would harm Palestinian civilians. Gallant and U.S. officials this week reaffirmed delivery of major arms shipments, from ammunition to engines for tanks and F-35 fighter jets.
After these discussions, a senior administration official spoke with reporters and thanked Gallant “for his professional approach to all issues of the security partnership between Israel and the United States.” The official “confirmed the movement of munitions and military systems to Israel,” aside from the 2,000-pound bombs.
The least visible, but perhaps most important, subject Gallant discussed during his visit was a detailed plan for postwar transition in Gaza. This plan would go forward even if Hamas continues to reject the cease-fire and hostage-release proposal the administration has struggled for months to advance.
The Gaza transition Gallant discussed in Washington would be overseen by a steering committee headed by the United States and moderate Arab partners. An international force — potentially including troops from Egypt, Jordan, the United Arab Emirates and Morocco — would oversee security, with U.S. troops providing command and control and logistics from outside Gaza, probably in Egypt. Gradually, a Palestinian force would take responsibility for local security.
Gallant and U.S. officials agree this Palestinian security force should probably be trained under an existing security assistance program for the Palestinian Authority, headed by Lt. Gen. Michael Fenzel, who’s based in Jerusalem as security coordinator for Israel and the authority. Gallant is reflecting the judgment of the Israeli defense establishment here, even though Netanyahu publicly has rejected a role for the Palestinian Authority in postwar Gaza.
U.S. officials told me they support the thrust of Gallant’s plan, but that moderate Arab governments won’t back it unless the Palestinian Authority is directly involved, conferring what Arabs would see as legitimacy. They also caution that moderate Arabs want what the Saudis have called a “political horizon” toward an eventual Palestinian state, something Gallant says he and most Israelis won’t support.
The Gaza transition plan would be implemented in phases, starting in northern Gaza and spreading south as conditions improved. Gallant envisions expanding “bubbles” of security that would eventually encompass 24 Gaza administrative districts. Biden administration officials support the idea but are skeptical that these “ink spots” of security could be quickly expanded.
These plans assume that Hamas has been sufficiently degraded as a military force that it can’t mount large-scale attacks, which Israeli military leaders believe they have largely accomplished. But a U.S. official told me that a “Hamas-like” force is now providing some security for the distribution of humanitarian aid in northern Gaza. This force is described as the “De-Facto Authority,” or DFA, by humanitarian aid groups, the official said.
Gallant also discussed the Biden administration’s efforts to avert a war between Israel and Lebanon. Brett McGurk and Amos Hochstein, the National Security Council’s top Middle East officials, have hammered out a truce deal for Lebanon that officials say could be implemented as soon as there’s a cease-fire in Gaza. The Lebanon deal calls for withdrawal of Hezbollah’s Radwan force north to a line roughly parallel to the Litani River and Israeli agreement to border adjustments that Hezbollah has demanded for years.
“The pieces are all there” for ending the war in Gaza and averting one in Lebanon, the U.S. official told me. The two wild cards are the Israeli and Hamas leaders, Netanyahu and Yehiya Sinwar. The Hamas chief, hidden in his network of tunnels, might prefer to die underground than to compromise.
But Netanyahu sees the growing political pressure to move toward an endgame in Gaza. His gambit to blame Biden for major arms delays appeared to have failed this week, and his political rivals are gathering. Netanyahu has always been a nimble, shape-shifting politician. His options for political survival are narrowing.
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