Demilitarization plan becomes a gift to Hamas

This week, as the Knesset and television news studios repeatedly debated whether Arab lawmakers would be willing to call Hamas a terrorist organization, we and the rest of the world had another opportunity to see the depths of the organization's cruelty - this time toward its own people, the Arabs of Gaza. The IDF struck the commander of Hamas's Khan Yunis Brigade and other senior terrorists at Nasser Hospital in Khan Yunis. It then emerged that the hospital had not only served as a terrorist headquarters, something we have already grown accustomed to, but that one of its facilities was a torture chamber where Gazan Arabs opposed to Hamas were brutally tortured.

It is interesting and important to read the response of the Board of "Peace" to the incident: "The tragic loss of life following the Israeli strike on Nasser Hospital in Khan Yunis underscores precisely why President Trump's comprehensive peace plan must be implemented immediately and without further delay. Otherwise, we will continue to see tragedies in which Hamas alleges deliberate Israeli attacks on hospitals, Israel says Hamas exploits these facilities for terrorist activities, and innocent Gazans ultimately pay the price."

Not a word about the use of a hospital for torture, and, of course, an astonishing equivalence between Israel and Hamas. This disgraceful response does not surprise me, of course. I warned about it in advance, before Nickolay Mladenov was appointed director-general of the Board of Peace for Gaza. I wrote to the Prime Minister at the time, "In light of Mladenov's past activities in our region as the UN representative to the Middle East, this appointment appears highly inappropriate."

"His conduct during that period was marked by pro-Arab positions and activities, an obsessive focus on the ‘two-state vision’ as a goal, a negative attitude toward our basic security operations, and an unjustified equivalence between us and terrorists who acted against us. Appointing him to this position in Gaza could prove disastrous when it comes to translating the Trump plan into practice," I warned then, in Kislev 5786. It is saddening and frustrating to discover in Kislev 5787 just how right I was.

Mladenov writes, "The Trump plan must be implemented immediately and without further delay." Indeed, exactly as I predicted, he is obsessively pursuing progress, which, of course, he demands from the Israeli side alone, and immediately. True to this equivalence, the director-general is working to create a false impression through which he can demonstrate that the Hamas side is also doing its part - in other words, agreeing to disarm. And what happens when Hamas does not actually agree?

Well, the Board of "Peace" officials approached Hamas and asked what it would agree to. After lengthy negotiations conducted exclusively with Hamas, it emerged that the terrorist organization was willing to transfer weapons from one set of hands to another within the Gaza Strip - and, of course, into "Palestinian" hands only - and to store some of them within the Strip. The director-general immediately acted exactly as I had predicted a year earlier, preparing an official document defining disarmament and the demilitarization of Gaza according to the new criteria accepted by Hamas.

This is how Mladenov "translated" the Trump plan into a distorted version dictated by Hamas that tramples on Israel's security needs. The Board of "Peace" called this Hamas version of the plan a "road map," adding more and more elements to the "map," in accordance with Hamas's demands, that were never mentioned in the original Trump plan. One example is the application of Palestinian law to the Gaza Strip - yes, the very same law under which murdering Jews is not an offense but rather a commendable act that carries a reward.

Or, for example, the creators of the "map" - Hamas and the Board of Peace - selected Qatar and Turkey to oversee demilitarization, undoubtedly objective countries. Or the enormous sums that would flow from the Board of "Peace" to Hamas to cover its debts, as well as to all its salaried personnel who would be "forced to retire" because of their involvement in terrorism. A "map" that is entirely a gift to Hamas - and Mladenov now demands that Israel move forward according to it "immediately."

"And Esau went to the field to hunt game, to bring it." Rashi explains the conduct and plans of Esau, "What does ‘to bring it’ mean? If he finds no game, he will bring something stolen." In pursuing the task assigned to him, Esau was prepared to trample on the most basic values of the person who had sent him on that mission. This is how someone acts when, for him, the end justifies the means, and an obsession with achieving it at any cost gives him license to commit unacceptable acts.

This is exactly how the Board of "Peace" under Mladenov has acted. The first clause of the mandate it received from the UN Security Council required it to ensure that the Gaza Strip would be completely demilitarized, yet it is trampling on this overriding principle itself. Israel must put Mladenov in his place - both him and the Board of "Peace" he runs - and refuse to advance even a single meter in implementing the plan until he completely and unequivocally revokes his pro-Hamas interpretation.

This requires standing firm against the pressure that will undoubtedly come. I have no doubt that we can withstand that pressure, not only because our security is at stake, but also because this is an outright deception, plain for all to see. Plain, of course, to anyone who looks at things clearly and refuses to buy into the "emperor's new clothes" called a "road map." As is well known, neither I nor my colleagues support Trump's plan for Gaza.

We voted against it in the government, and we continue to oppose it. This is not only because Gaza is part of the Land of Israel, while the plan, shamefully, treats it as Arab land and ultimately aims to transfer it to the Palestinian Authority. It is also because, from a basic security perspective, this is not how a war that began with the October 7 massacre and all its horrors should end - a war in which hundreds of our soldiers gave their lives and never returned, and many others were seriously wounded or otherwise harmed.

The final outcome of such a war must be the transfer into our hands of the territory from which we were attacked. And, of course, we also opposed the plan because it is genuinely dangerous, inherently "full of more holes than cheese." Despite all our opposition to the plan, we must remain vigilant to ensure that it is not falsified to our detriment or interpreted in a way that erases the gains we did secure in it: broad international agreement that Gaza must be completely demilitarized and that Hamas must disarm.

Israel must put Mladenov in his place and stand firm against all the pressure he exerts. We will stand firm and, with G-d's help, we will prevail.