Is an Israel-Hezbollah war inevitable?

 Published in the Jerusalem Post, 27 December 2023

In his much-trumpeted speech on November 3, Lebanon’s Hezbollah leader, Hassan Nasrallah, predictably praised Hamas’s October 7 invasion of Israel, the subsequent massacre of 1200 civilians and the abduction of some 240 hostages.  However he was at pains to emphasize that it had been a purely Palestinian enterprise. He asserted, whatever the truth of the matter, that neither Iran nor Hezbollah had had any part in planning or carrying out the operation, and that in present circumstances neither found it expedient to support Hamas by opening full-scale hostilities against Israel.  He wanted the subsequent conflict to remain Palestinian. 

Even so, changing circumstances could trigger an escalation of the fighting to encompass Israel’s northern border.  The initiative could come from Iran.  An unequivocal defeat of Hamas, known to be funded and equipped by Iran, could be the trigger.  Israel could not be seen to glory in victory over Iran's proxy, so the baton could be passed to Hezbollah to continue the conflict. 

It might come from Nasrallah.  If Hamas was about to be destroyed, he might feel that Hezbollah could be the next target, and move to launch a full-scale pre-emptive attack on Israel.  Britain’s prestigious Royal Institute of International Affairs, otherwise known as Chatham House, in a recent wide-ranging survey of the prospects of an Israel-Hezbollah war, believes so.  It maintains that the closer Israel gets to defeating Hamas, the more likely it is that Nasrallah will widen the war.  It points out that he heads an army of more than 100,000 battle-hardened fighters equipped with thousands of missiles, rockets, and armed drones that can hit targets deep inside Israel with pinpoint accuracy. 

.           Incidentally, provided the Iranian ayatollahs are able to continue fighting Israel by way of their Hezbollah proxy, they are unlikely to grieve overmuch at the destruction of Hamas.  Although happy to use Hamas, to fund, equip and support it, Iran must always have regarded it as expendable.  Hamas is a Sunni organization.  The ultimate ambition of Iran’s Islamic Revolution is to impose the Shi’ite tradition of Islam across the whole world.  Unlike Shi’ite Hezbollah, Hamas could never form part of Iran’s Shia Crescent.  It would eventually have been cast aside.

Meanwhile, with Iran’s connivance, the Shi’ite Houthis have ramped up their attacks against shipping in the Red Sea, while the cross-border armed exchanges between Hezbollah and the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) have been increasing in number and ferocity.  There are incidents on a daily basis.

Throughout December 24, for example, air raid sirens were sounding south of the Lebanon border in Avivim, Margaliot, Yiron, Shlomi, and the border Bedouin village of Arab al-Aramshe.  The IDF attacked the source of rockets launched towards Avivim, and bombed Hezbollah infrastructure with a tank near Kibbutz Yiron.

There were also alerts in Sasa, Matat, and Dovev following a suspected enemy drone infiltration and rocket attack.  Several rockets were also fired from Lebanon at the Keren Naftali peak in the Galilee Panhandle.  The IDF said it shelled the source of the fire with artillery, and attacked the source of Hezbollah fire and a cell of Hezbollah operatives close to the border near Shtula in the Western Galilee.

And so it goes on, day after day, while the toll in fatalities and casualties mounts.  Seven Israeli soldiers and four civilians have been killed since October 7, as have 121 Hezbollah fighters and 10 Lebanese civilians.   

Chatham House has pointed out that the initiative for a full-scale escalation of the Israel-Hezbollah conflict is not restricted to Hezbollah or Iran.  It could also come from the Israeli side.  It asserted that there are those in the Israeli government, including certain ministers, who see an opportunity in the present situation to neutralize the threat to Israel’s northern front once and for all.  Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has not yet reached that conclusion, said Chatham House, implying that it is not beyond possibility.  If ministers threatened to resign over this issue, for example, he might change his mind in order to maintain the integrity of his government.

Chatham House is not alone.  In early November the media were reporting concern in Washington about Israel’s intentions on its northern border. The worries may have been accelerated by the mass evacuations of Israeli towns and villages within easy striking distance of the Lebanon border.  Almost certainly undertaken by Israel to pre-empt any possible Hezbollah invasion on the lines of Hamas’s murderous incursion of October 7, suspicious minds in Washington may have seen in it preparations by Israel for a second front.

Under the headline: “Scoop”, the on-line news media Axios reported on November 12 that US Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin had phoned his Israeli counterpart, Yoav Gallant, the previous day to urge restraint in the escalating tensions along the Israel-Lebanon border. According to Axios there was growing anxiety in the White House that Israeli military action in Lebanon could lead to a regional war.

Moreover, according to Chatham House, the White House believes some senior officers in the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) believe that a war in the north is inevitable.  It is the possibility of a pre-emptive Israeli strike, leading to a forceful Hezbollah response, that concerns Washington, since the US would inevitably be drawn into such a conflict. The last thing US President Joe Biden wants during re-election season is a war between Israel and Hezbollah that could lead the US into a direct confrontation with Iran.

So the US is intent on avoiding all-out war between Israel and Hezbollah. In an attempt to deter Hezbollah from launching deadlier attacks against northern Israel, Biden has ordered the deployment of a substantial amount of additional military assets to the Middle East, including an aircraft carrier, warships, a nuclear-powered vessel, attack helicopters, fighter jets, and 5,000 sailors.

On December 15 US National Security adviser Jake Sullivan told reporters that the US believes the threat to Israel from Hezbollah “can be dealt with through diplomacy and does not require the launching of a new war.”  The best way to ensure that the tens of thousands of Israelis who have evacuated their homes in the north can return, he said, “is to come up with a negotiated outcome.” 

Is an Israel-Hezbollah war possible?  Certainly.  Is it inevitable?  Surely not.

Published in the Jerusalem Post, 27 December 2023, and in the Jerusalem Post online as "Israel-Hezbollah war is possible but not inevitable":
https://www.jpost.com/opinion/article-779648

Published in Eurasia Review, 29 December 2023:

https://www.eurasiareview.com/29122023-is-an-israel-hezbollah-war-inevitable-oped/#:~:text=Britain's%20prestigious%20Royal%20Institute%20of,Nasrallah%20will%20widen%20the%20war.

Published in the MPC Journal, 2 January 2024:

https://mpc-journal.org/is-an-israel-hezbollah-war-inevitable/

What’s in store for Hamas and its leaders?

Published in the Jerusalem Post, 18 December 2023

The leaders of Hamas responsible for the pogrom of October 7 will be hunted down and eliminated, even if it takes years

          On November 30 the Wall Street Journal (WSJ), in what appears to have been a world exclusive, published a detailed report of discussions said to have taken place between US and Israeli officials about possible plans for shortening the war in Gaza.

 The report indicates that these official level discussions are following up options suggested by Israel’s political and military leadership of ways to disempower Hamas.  One favoured approach turns to a precedent set in 1982.   At that time the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) under Yasser Arafat had entrenched inside within Lebanon, and then–prime minister Ariel Sharon had authorised Israeli forces to invade and advance into the country.  In an attempt to dislodge the PLO, Israel was besieging the capital Beirut.  The US brokered a deal with Israel under which US, French and Italian troops entered Beirut and oversaw the departure of Arafat and his organization for a new base in Tunisia.. 

There is, of course, no question of offering the Hamas leadership the chance to escape with their thousands of followers to some country prepared to accept them. Planners are aware that though neither Hamas nor the PLO has any qualms about the use of terrorist tactics, the PLO is essentially a secular, political organisation while Hamas is a jihadist group inspired by extremist Islamist philosophy.  Hamas, unlike the PLO, would not respond favourably to a deal involving expulsion from what they consider their land. 

The idea under consideration is to capture  and expel thousands of lower-level Hamas fighters from the Gaza Strip, thus cutting away Hamas's power base – namely the tens of thousands of Hamas fighters it controls.  If achieved, this would undoubtedly contribute to the collapse of Hamas and shorten the war.  It would also prevent the group from ever retaking power, thus enabling Gaza to become governable in the future.

The process may have started.  In a statement released on December 11, the IDF announced: "More than 500 Hamas and Islamic Jihad terrorists have been apprehended by the IDF and Shin Bet over the past month and transferred for further questioning.”  

As for the Hamas leadership, the WSJ had yet another revelation up its sleeve.  On December 1 it asserted that, according to  Israeli officials, the intelligence services were preparing a covert operation akin to that following the Munich Olympics massacre in 1972. The report was later confirmed by Shin Bet chief Ronen Bar in a domestic broadcast on December 3.  Those leaders of the Hamas organization responsible for planning, organizing and perpetrating the invasion and pogrom of October 7, he said, would be hunted down and eliminated, even if it took years and no matter where they were living, or wherever they might choose to settle after their defeat.

The WSJ, citing unnamed senior Israeli and US officials, says another option, floated by the Israel Defense Forces, is to form a “Gaza Restoration Authority” backed by Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, tasked with rebuilding a Hamas-free Gaza.

A major obstacle to this plan, the report says, is a fundamental disagreement between Israel and the US about whether the Palestinian Authority (PA) would, or should, be part of such a solution.  US Secretary of State Antony Blinken, and a number of Washington spokespersons, have said repeatedly that the settled US vision of the post-war future is the unification of the governance of Gaza and the West Bank under the PA, leading to peace negotiations with a two-state solution as their goal. 

This unchanged US view was repeated by vice-president Kamala Harris, speaking at the Cop28 summit in Dubai on December 2. 

Post-war reconstruction efforts in Gaza, she said, must be undertaken “in the context of a clear political horizon for the Palestinian people towards a state of their own, led by a revitalized Palestinian Authority…”

Netanyahu, however, has made it clear that Israel would not agree to allow the PA, as presently constituted, to have any part in the future governance of Gaza.  On December 12, after a conversation with US President Joe Biden, he virtually rejected  the US aspiration of an eventual two-state solution.  He would not allow Gaza, he said, to be ruled by those who “teach, support or fund terrorism”, thereby ruling out both Hamas and the Fatah-run PA.

Biden sees the right-wing elements in Netanyahu’s government behind this.  In a speech on December 12, he is reported as saying that Netanyahu “has to change this government,” adding that Israel ultimately “can’t say no” to a Palestinian state.

A problem given little emphasis so far in the media is that, in addition to Hamas, other groups such as Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ), control thousands of gunmen who not only took part in the October 7 atrocities, but are also holding hostages.  On November 27 CNN, based on a highly-placed diplomatic source, reported that more than 40 hostages taken from Israel into Gaza on October 7 are not currently in the custody of Hamas, but were being held by PIJ or other unidentified groups or individuals.  If accurate, this report complicates not only any future truce agreement, but also the wider issue of what an Israeli victory in the Gaza Strip might mean.

On November 28 the armed wing of PIJ, the Al Quds Brigades, said that it had handed over “some civilian detainees” as part of an exchange with Israel.  And indeed, together with Hamas gunmen, fighters from PIJ were seen handing over 17-year-old Mia Leimberg.  This was the first time that PIJ, or any other party, had publicly acknowledged being involved in negotiations.

As regards future truce agreements, the terms have so far required Hamas to hand over hostages in exchange for Palestinian prisoners held by Israel. They depend on Hamas actually possessing the hostages to fulfill their part of the agreement.  If Hamas does not, and cannot persuade other groups to participate in any future deal, the only recourse left to Israel would be to locate the hostages itself by achieving a complete victory over opposing forces in the Strip.  Subsequently, Israel would have to treat all militant groups and their leaders exactly as how they plan to deal with Hamas and its leadership.

 Whichever way they look, the future for Hamas, its allies and their leaders seems bleak.  Perhaps on October 7 they bit off rather more than they could chew.

Published in Jerusalem Post, 18 December 2023:
https://www.jpost.com/opinion/article-778420

Published in Eurasia Review, 23 December 2023:
https://www.eurasiareview.com/23122023-whats-in-store-for-hamas-and-its-leaders-oped/

Published in the MPC Journal, 25 December 2023:

https://mpc-journal.org/whats-in-store-for-hamas-and-its-leaders/

The governance of post-war Gaza

 Published in the Jerusalem Report, issue dated 25 December 2023

            Stated briefly, Israel’s war aims as articulated by prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu, government ministers and Israel Defense Force (IDF) leaders are to destroy Hamas and ensure the safe return of the 240-odd civilians it is holding hostage.

The realization is growing that by the time the IDF have succeeded, a plan for Gaza's future governance must have been developed, agreed by those involved, and be ready for Implementation.  On November 2 the Reuters news agency, citing authoritative sources, reported that the US and Israel were exploring options for the future of the Gaza Strip, including a possible multinational force to keep the peace until a more stable leadership is established.  Such a scenario builds on US Secretary of State Antony Blinken’s concept, laid out during his recent visit to Israel.  He said that he understood that Israel did not want to control Gaza, and he believed a revitalized Palestinian Authority (PA) should eventually be in charge of the territory.

On November 6 both the rumoured US-Israel negotiations and Blinken’s suggestion were apparently nullified.  In a TV interview Netanyahu said for the first time: “Israel will, for an indefinite period, have the overall security responsibility, because we have seen what happens when we do not have it.” 

His statement was as surprising for what he said as for what he omitted.  Maintaining that IDF forces would be stationed in Gaza for an indefinite period after the fighting had ceased seems to imply an intention for Israel to repossess the Strip.  What Netanyahu omits is any indication of how he sees Gaza being administered post-Hamas, and by whom.  Who would be responsible for redeveloping the ruined city, for housing the displaced people returning to their home areas, for administering the essential services?  Surely Netanyahu does not envisage a military occupation of Gaza on the lines of Area C in the West Bank.

Speaking in Japan on November 8, Blinken, while acknowledging that "some transition period" might be needed at the end of the conflict, virtually rejected Netanyahu’s vision of continued and indefinite IDF presence in Gaza post-war.  He strongly advocated a united and Palestinian-led government for a united Gaza–West Bank after the war ends, as a step toward Palestinian statehood.  “We’re very clear on no reoccupation,” he said, “just as we’re very clear on no displacement of the Palestinian population.”

            A few weeks into the war, the Washington Institute published a thoughtful analysis of what might follow an Israeli victory over Hamas.

As a starting point they acknowledged that it would be a mistake for Israel to destroy Hamas and then leave Gaza as an ungoverned space without a clear sense of what comes next. They insisted that the US and others must ensure that a plan is ready to be implemented once the IDF withdraws.  What the Institute did not consider was Netanyahu’s latest proposal – that the IDF might actually remain in place to guarantee that the Strip no longer posed any sort of security threat to Israel.

            The idea of a Gaza administered under some as yet undefined group or consortium, with the IDF as its security force, bristles with difficulties, and is almost certainly a non-starter.  Moreover Blinken’s idea that the PA would eventually take over the administration of Gaza simply could not work with the PA in its present condition. 

The PA is currently riddled with corruption and inefficiency.  President Mahmoud Abbas, who is scarcely capable of controlling the situation in Areas A and B of the West Bank, areas nominally under its control, is profoundly unpopular with the Palestinian public. In the most recent poll of Palestinian opinion, nearly 80% said he should step down.  So an essential prerequisite before Blinken’s ideas could be put into effect would be meaningful, substantive PA reform.  Without obvious and significant changes to its administrative structure and methods of operation, neither local Palestinians nor international donors would have confidence in the its ability to extend its authority to Gaza.

The Washington Institute hypothesized that a proposed Gaza Interim Administration (GIA) should have three main components:  a civilian administration; a law enforcement system; and an international coalition for reconstruction and development.

They believe that the civilian administration of post-Hamas Gaza should be led and run by Palestinians. The departments of a fully functioning local government – health, education, transportation, judiciary, social welfare – should, they maintain, be operated by a mix of technocrats and administrators from Gaza, the West Bank, and the Palestinian diaspora.

They envisage public safety and law enforcement being directed by a consortium of those Arab states which have reached peace or normalization agreements with Israel. Only those states, it opines, would have Israel’s confidence, which is essential for the effort to succeed.

They suggest that a new Arab-run agency responsible for repair, reconstruction, and development should be established.  Billions of dollars would be needed to reconstruct Gaza city and to fund projects such as creating a new Gaza port and building new industrial zones to provide employment options.

Finally, the Institute believes that while Arab administrators, officers, and officials, obviously including Palestinians, should take the lead in all these efforts, the US and other supporters of a peaceful, constructive future for Palestinians would have a vital role to play in conceiving the plans, and in supporting those entrusted to carry them forward.

Whether the ideas put forward by the Washington Institute come to fruition, or others, perhaps more radical, emerge, how Gaza is to be governed after the IDF have achieved their victory over Hamas clearly requires urgent and detailed consideration. Diplomatic efforts, led by the US, must be initiated as soon as possible aimed at establishing an effective mechanism for planning Gaza’s post-war future.

Published in the Jerusalem Report issue dated 25 December 2023, and on the Jerusalem Post website under the title: "Israel-Hamas War: Finding rulers for Gaza when the fighting ends" on 23 December 2023:
https://www.jpost.com/opinion/article-779070

UN chief Guterres: right problem, wrong solution

Published in Jerusalem Post, 11 December 2023

          On December 5 UN secretary-general, Antonio Guterres, wrote to the 15 members of the Security Council invoking Article 99 of the UN Charter. This article states that the secretary-general may bring to the attention of the Security Council any matter which, in his opinion, “may threaten the maintenance of international peace and security.”

          In his letter, Guterres called on the Security Council to vote in favor of a ceasefire in the Israel-Hamas conflict in order to avert a humanitarian catastrophe in Gaza.  He said that the weeks of fighting had “created appalling human suffering, physical destruction and collective trauma across Israel and the Occupied Palestinian Territory” (the UN persists in regarding the Gaza Strip as territory occupied by Israel, despite the fact that Israel  totally evacuated the enclave in 2005).  He warned that “an even worse situation could unfold, including epidemic diseases,” and concluded: “The international community has a responsibility to use all its influence to prevent further escalation and end this crisis.”

UN spokesman Stéphane Dujarric said this was the first time Guterres had felt compelled to invoke Article 99 since taking office in 2017, and he hoped the Security Council “will be moved to push and put in place a humanitarian ceasefire.” 

Soon after Guterres’s letter was published, a resolution drafted by the United Arab Emirates (UAE) was submitted to the Security Council.  It demanded an immediate ceasefire in the war between Israel and Hamas in the Gaza Strip. 

To pass, a Security Council resolution needs at least nine votes in favor and no vetoes by the five permanent members – US, Russia, China, France or Britain.  When put to the vote on December 8 the UAE resolution received 13 votes in favor, the UK abstained, and the US exercised its veto. 

While in the drafting phase the US had proposed substantial amendments to the text, including a condemnation of "the terrorist attacks by Hamas in Israel, including those on 7 October 2023."  The UAE did not add this to the text.

   Britain's UN Ambassador Barbara Woodward said her country abstained because there was no condemnation of Hamas.  "Israel needs to be able to address the threat posed by Hamas,” she told the council, “and it needs to do so in a manner that abides by international humanitarian law so that such an attack can never be carried out again."

Deputy US Ambassador to the UN, Robert Wood, told the council that the draft resolution was a rushed, unbalanced text "that was divorced from reality…We do not support this resolution's call for an unsustainable ceasefire that will only plant the seeds for the next war."

Guterres was right to draw attention to the dire and deteriorating living conditions within the Gaza Strip, but his proposed solution – the Security Council voting in favor of a ceasefire – is misconceived on practical grounds, if on no other. “Ceasefire” is universally defined as an agreement between two armed forces to stop fighting.  The Security Council cannot impose one.  The UN could certainly request Israel, a sovereign member, to lay down its arms unilaterally, but how can the Security Council, in Dujarric’s words, “put in place a humanitarian ceasefire”?  What influence does the Security Council have on Hamas that could induce it to stop firing rockets indiscriminately into Israel?  

 In reality what Guterres is seeking is for Israel to cease its efforts to eliminate Hamas, thus allowing the terrorist organization to retain its control of the Gaza Strip, continuing into an indefinite future its unremitting intention of destroying Israel.

Instead of throwing a lifeline to Hamas by way of a ceasefire, Guterres should be urging the Security Council to encourage an increased flow of humanitarian aid into the Strip.  At present the provision of aid is haphazard.  Agencies send what they can when they can,  A special UN agency could be established, charged with coordinating the efforts of the UN, governments, non-governmental agencies and charities to bring much enhanced relief to the civilian population, adequate to provide for its needs. 

Among the partners providing the humanitarian cargoes are the US, the EU, the World Health Organization (WHO), the World Food Program (WFP), the International Organization for Migration (IOM), the UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF) the UN Population Fund (UNFPA) and the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC).  The work of these agencies needs to be coordinated and enhanced by recruiting other partners willing to contribute to a major humanitarian effort, so that the flow of aid can be brought up to the level required.  Here is where Guterres should be devoting his efforts.

As for Israel, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) are taking the greatest care to avoid violating internationally accepted laws of war.  Information released to the public daily demonstrates the steps they are taking, over and above what is strictly required of them, to minimize the effect on the civilian population of their anti-Hamas campaign.  They are even distributing maps indicating exactly where they next intend to attack Hamas - while on December 7 Israeli military spokesman Elad Goren told reporters that the Kerem Shalom border crossing will open “in the next few days “as another inspection station to expedite the entry of more humanitarian assistance into Gaza.

There is another button Guterres could be pressing – urging the Security Council to demand that Hamas and its allied terrorist groups release all hostages immediately, on pain of being charged in the International Criminal Court as war criminals.  Taking hostages is accepted universally as a war crime under international law, and if found guilty its perpetrators can be arrested and tried in over 170 countries world-wide. Perhaps a word from the UN’s secretary-general underlining the legal consequences of holding hostages would help bring about their release.

Deputy US Ambassador Wood said recently, “we remain focused on the difficult and sensitive diplomacy geared to getting more hostages released, more aid flowing into Gaza, and better protection of civilians.”  These are the issues that should also be Guterres’s top priorities in the on-going Israel-Gaza conflict .

Meanwhile the faster the IDF can finish the job of disempowering Hamas and its allies, the faster Gazans can take the first steps towards recovery, and a future free from the baleful influence of the Islamist terror group which has deprived them of freedom and prosperity for seventeen years.

Published in the Jerusalem Post and in the Jerusalem Post online titled: "UN Secretary-General has the wrong solution", on 11 December 2023:

https://www.jpost.com/opinion/article-777458

Taking hostages is a war crime

 Published in the Jerusalem Post, 5 December 2023

The events of October 7 have proved too flagrant to be ignored by the body that is supposed to be the world’s watchdog on protecting and advancing human rights. 

The UN Human Rights Council (UNHRC) was established in 2006 with one over-riding purpose – to rectify the egregious faults of its predecessor body, the UN Commission on Human Rights (UNCHR). Over the 60 years of its existence the Commission had accrued a raft of objectionable practices, high among them an obvious anti-Israel bias.

UNHRC is UNHCR with just one letter transposed, and it soon became obvious that all the UN had done was to substitute Tweedledee for Tweedledum.  It did not take long before the same anti-Israel stance began to emerge from the new Council.  Since its founding it has passed more than 90 resolutions condemning Israel – more than against Iran, Syria, North Korea, China, Russia, Cuba and Venezuela combined. The Council would have the world believe that Israel is more guilty of human rights abuses than all the blatant abusers of human rights put together.

Its determined anti-Israel position was actually codified in a decision in 2006 to include as a permanent feature of its sessions a review of alleged human rights abuses by Israel.   Even Human Rights Watch, no friend of Israel, urged the Council to look as well at international human rights and humanitarian law violations committed by Palestinian armed groups. This proposal was not followed through.

Now the Council’s commission of inquiry has undertaken an investigation on “possible international crimes and violations of international human rights law in Israel and the Palestinian territories since October 7, 2023.”  The Commission’s findings will be delivered to the Human Rights Council in June 2024.

Given the long-standing anti-Israel bias of the chairperson, Navi Pillay, as well as several commission members, what sort of picture it will eventually present is a matter for speculation.  But it is perhaps a hopeful sign that on October 10 the commission included the following in a media release: “The taking of hostages is a violation of international law and constitutes an international crime.”

The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) has a unique role in the system of international humanitarian law.  It works on battlefields, reports on the problems encountered, and makes practical proposals for improving international humanitarian law.  Its proposals have led to the revision and extension of international humanitarian law, notably in 1906, 1929, 1949 and 1977.  This special role of the ICRC is now formally recognized by the states party to the Geneva Conventions – that is, practically the whole world.

According to the ICRC, the prohibition on hostage-taking is now “firmly entrenched in customary international law and is considered a war crime.”

Among the elements of the offence in international armed conflict are:

1. The perpetrator seized, detained or otherwise held hostage one or more persons.

2. The perpetrator threatened to kill, injure or continue to detain such person or persons.

3. The perpetrator intended to compel a State…to act or refrain from acting as an explicit or implicit condition for the safety or the release of such person or persons.

On October 11 the Lieber Institute published a lengthy, detailed and explicit survey of the provisions in international law regarding the taking of hostages. The Lieber Institute is situated at West Point and is part of the US Military Academy.  Its purpose is to contribute to the global dialogue on the complex issues surround the law of war, and to maintain the primacy of law in today’s armed conflicts.  It seeks to bridge the divide between legal scholarship and battlefield experience.

   The Lieber document explains that the provisions of the law of armed conflict depend on how a conflict is classified. The ongoing conflict between Israel and Hamas is best characterized as non-international in character. Therefore the applicable treaty law is Common Article 3 of the four 1949 Geneva Conventions, and this unequivocally forbids hostage-taking. The International Court of Justice has determined that “The taking of hostages is prohibited.”

The Lieber document goes on to explain that as a war crime, the offence of hostage-taking is subject to universal jurisdiction.  That means that any State, even those with no connection to the hostage-taking, is free to  prosecute offenders. Many States have accordingly criminalised the offence in their penal codes.

On the matter of hostage-taking alone – the unspeakably brutal onslaught on innocent civilians is an issue in its own right – the Lieber paper adjudges that Hamas has “without the slightest doubt” violated the law of armed conflict.  It concludes: “Hostage-taking was a central feature of Hamas’s opening salvo in its conflict in Israel…those involved are subject to worldwide prosecution as war criminals under international criminal law.” 

The basis for this conclusion is the International Convention against the Taking of Hostages, a UN treaty under which states agree to prohibit and punish hostage taking. The creation of an anti-hostage-taking treaty was a project initiated by the Federal Republic of Germany in 1976.  The convention was adopted by the UN General Assembly in December 1979 and came into force in 1983.  As of October 2016, 176 states are party to the convention.

Too little public consideration has been given to the likelihood of the Hamas organisation eventually being found guilty by the UN and other international bodies of the war crime of hostage-taking, and consequently that its leaders would then be liable to be arrested, charged and imprisoned in virtually any part of the world.  

Ismail Haniyeh may believe himself safe in Qatar, but in Qatar he would have to stay.  If Yahya Sinwar, who masterminded the October 7 onslaught, is not captured by the IDF within the Gaza Strip, he would be on the run for the rest of his life. Mohammed Deif, architect of the Hamas tunnel complex, Marwan Issa, Khaled Meshaal, Mahmoud Zahar – they and a host more leaders of Hamas would have nowhere to hide but in the few states not prepared to fulfil their obligations under the International Convention against the Taking of Hostages, and prosecute them.  Even so, they would all, no doubt, have in mind the fate of the perpetrators of the Munich Olympics massacres, given the remarks by Shin Bet chief Ronen Bar in a domestic broadcast on December 3.  Israel will hunt down the Hamas leaders, he said, even if it takes years

All provided that Israel achieves its primary war aim, and destroys Hamas.

Published in the Jerusalem Post and the Jerusalem Post online, 5 December 2023: https://www.jpost.com/opinion/article-776542

Published in Eurasia Review, 8 December 2023:

https://www.eurasiareview.com/08122023-taking-hostages-is-a-war-crime-oped/

Published in the MPC Journal, 11 December 2023:

https://mpc-journal.org/taking-hostages-is-a-war-crime/