Ben Cohen
👤 SpeakerAppearances Over Time
Podcast Appearances
And what the...
There was actually a conference over the weekend in Qatar, in Doha, which was hosted by the administration.
And they had, I think, something like 25 countries turned up.
And there was a big appeal from the U.S., you know, deploy your troops.
Let's get this international stabilization force staffed, and let's give President Trump an announcement to make before or around the Christmas holiday, before we get to the new year, that this ISF deployment is going to happen.
None of them were...
remotely keen on deploying troops, and those who said that they would be prepared to consider it only wanted to deploy their troops on the Israeli side of the yellow line, which, to my mind, kind of defeats the purpose.
Right.
And this is the problem.
You really have to secure a commitment from Hamas to disarm before you can deploy these troops.
If you look at other conflicts around the world where you've had terrorist groups disarming, Northern Ireland is one example with the IRA, the Irish Republican Army.
Also in Colombia, the FARC, the communist guerrillas, they also disarmed.
But they signed up
to that process, and they felt that it was to their political advantage to engage in disarmament.
And Hamas is nowhere near there.
Now, the only military force that would be capable of disarming Hamas would be the Israel Defense Forces, and it would achieve that through the final defeat of Hamas, which is something that was prevented by the ceasefire.
I certainly don't think US troops are going to do it, and I would never recommend that they did.
And I don't think any other country is going to be willing to step up.
The comparison here, I think, actually, it's a little bit like, I mean, you mentioned Ukraine, and that's a pertinent parallel.
But I think there's another parallel to be drawn with Lebanon.