Aaron David Miller

And remember, out of the 250, one or two that were taken on October 7 by Hamas in this willful and indiscriminate attack against civilians, sexual predation, mutilation, and even the execution of hostages, 130 have been returned through negotiations.

These 48 and then roughly the balance have died in captivity.

It takes the hostage issue off the table.

And once that occurs, it undermines, undercuts the justification.

and even the credibility of Israel's comprehensive military actions in Gaza, what we've seen over the course of the last two years, particularly the large-scale offensives against Rafah, Khan Yunis, and most recently Gaza City.

And it also obviates the need for the massive deployment of Israeli divisions, tens of thousands of Israeli soldiers.

If, in fact, this is correct,

it will create a new environment which has never existed beyond several weeks or months.

And that is to say an environment which will allow not just the dribbling of humanitarian assistance into Gaza, but the flooding of the zone.

And once the zone is flooded...

prices on the black market decline, the advantages that accrue to criminal gangs, and even Hamas in terms of the diverting of humanitarian aid and the use of that aid for recruitment, all of these things begin to end.

And those three elements were the reasons

the international community, the United States, the region cared about Gaza.

In a way, David, it's a paradox, because it could be that in reducing the urgency, no hostages, no major military campaign resulting in the exponential deaths of thousands of Palestinians, and no humanitarian catastrophe, that people may actually begin to care less

about what happens in phases two, three, and beyond.

That's a core question.

There are basically three reasons why this agreement came to pass.

Number one, Hamas is much weaker.

particularly on the military side, and it's the military commanders, not the external leadership that are making the decisions.

Number two are key Arab states, two of Hamas's principal backers of the three, the third being Iran.