Trust, as they say, is built up in drops and lost in buckets. When it comes to the shaky truce in Gaza, however, there appears to be little trust to lose. The violent animus between the Israeli military and Hamas is such that a reported breach of the ceasefire in Rafah on Sunday led to dozens of Israeli strikes across the enclave that killed at least 44 people, according to Wafa, the Palestinian news agency.
Israel says Hamas gunmen opened fire on its troops, killing two soldiers. The militants said they had no contact with their fighters in the area – a possible scenario given the armed group’s fragmentation and the sheer level of destruction wrought by Israel in the Palestinian territory, but also a potential abdication of responsibility. Wars rarely end cleanly and this incident highlights the dangerous lack of effective and independent ceasefire monitoring to make sure Gaza’s strained truce does not collapse completely.
In the absence of such a mechanism, recording or verifying breaches of the ceasefire become even more difficult. In Gaza, there are few protocols in place for de-escalating incidents where one side or another claims a violation has occurred. This lack of communication and arbitration leads to situations like Sunday’s, when the first reaction of the Israeli military was to carry out a widespread bombing campaign.
This is an unsustainable situation. Yes, constructive ambiguity can be helpful when trying to bed in a peace process but in a highly combustible conflict zone such as Gaza, clarity and an agreed set of rules can stop conflict from reigniting. The 20-point peace plan for Gaza has played an important role in moving the situation forward but its lack of firm detail on critical points – such as monitoring the ceasefire or establishing a hard timeline for Israeli troop withdrawals and Hamas disarmament – leaves the plan vulnerable to failure. Getting to phases two and three of the plan is essential to avoid a full Israeli military campaign on Gaza and new attacks from Hamas.
Given this looming danger, news that an international peacekeeping force for Gaza is taking shape is particularly welcome. Egypt is reportedly expected to lead a four-nation “stabilisation” detachment. Critically, this team of at least 4,000 soldiers – expected to be from Muslim-majority countries – would be deployed with a UN Security Council mandate.
As Egypt’s Foreign Minister Badr Abdelatty told The National in remarks published yesterday: “We need first to have a Security Council resolution as soon as possible to endorse this plan and also to give legitimacy for this ISF, the International Stabilisation Force, and to identify its own mandate and its own mission."
Such a mandate is vital. Having trained and independent troops on the ground will internationalise monitoring efforts and accountability, ultimately making it less likely that a full-scale return to war will take place. That said, peacekeeping is not perfect; in Lebanon, both Hezbollah and Israeli forces have shown themselves willing to use violence against UN-mandated peace missions. However, having international troops in sensitive parts of Lebanon has arguably played an important part in preventing full-scale conflict, or at least mitigating the worst of the violence when it does break out.
Gaza is a much less predictable environment than Lebanon and leaving the present situation as it is risks undoing the progress made so far. The enclave’s civilian population has enjoyed a short period of relative calm. For them to lose this respite over incidents that could be avoided or contained would be a tragedy to compound that suffering they have already endured. Ceasefires are difficult to engineer but all too easy to break. The next necessary step is to make Gaza’s truce as robust as possible.
