There’s No Point Negotiating With Hamas, Says … Egypt?

Looks like Benjamin Netanyahu’s not the only one involved in negotiations over the hostages that believes Hamas is “delusional.” Yesterday, Egypt’s foreign minister blasted the terrorist group from a podium at the Munich Security Conference for its delusions in refusing to deal in good faith. Sameh Shoukry also took aim at aid efforts that got directed to support Hamas, although Shoukry didn’t mention names:

Egypt’s Foreign Minister Sameh Shoukry sharply criticized Hamas on Saturday, saying that “the organization is outside the Palestinian consensus, which recognizes Israel and wants to reach negotiations with it, because [Hamas] is not ready to give up its support for violence.” 

Shoukry made these comments at a press conference held at the Munich Security Conference. He also said that “we must give an account of how Hamas gained power in the Gaza Strip, and why it received financial support to increase the division between it and the other peacekeeping Palestinian factions – whether these are the Palestinian Authority, the PLO or the Palestinian public itself.”

There’s some nuance to Shoukry’s somewhat ambiguous accusation in the second paragraph, at least as reported. Some Arab states have accused Netanyahu of subtly strengthening Hamas politically by marginalizing the Palestinian Authority (and others) so as to keep the conflict in Gaza as stark as possible. That’s a bit into tinfoil-hat territory; Netanyahu wasn’t PM when Gazans elected Hamas to power in 2006 or when Hamas seized total control of Gaza in 2007. Netanyahu had left office in 1999 before the post-Wye River intifada launched in the West Bank by Yasser Arafat, and didn’t return as PM until 2009. Hamas had entrenched itself as the sole power in Gaza by that time, both politically and literally, as Israel found out not long afterward.

And a lot of that entrenchment in both contexts became possible because of badly managed Western aid. Shoukry might — and probably does to some extent — intend to echo the tinfoil-hat message as a way to maintain credibility with other Sunni states as well as Egypt’s own population. But it applies more strongly to UNRWA and other NGOs that routinely funneled billions in aid to Gaza through Hamas and ended up corrupted and co-opted by the terrorist network. That is undoubtedly the “financial support” that Shoukry highlighted in this speech, especially considering the venue in which the speech took place.

Egypt’s government already has plenty of reasons to be hostile to Hamas, which is an offshoot of the Muslim Brotherhood. The parent group has tried to seize power for decades, and briefly succeeded during the so-called “Arab Spring.” The army deposed Mohamed Morsi after Morsi threatened to cut ties with Israel and open the border to Gaza and Hamas, among other reasons. But until this weekend, Egypt had hosted hostage negotiations and had engaged Hamas diplomatically to achieve some sort of solution.

Shoukry’s main declaration all but endorses Israel’s rejection of Hamas’ terms. The Israelis refuse to pull out of Gaza before destroying Hamas because Hamas won’t quit trying to annihilate Israel. Their leaders have openly declared that they will continue to conduct October 7 massacres no matter what the outcome of this conflict will be, which means there’s really no point in negotiating at all any longer.

Time is running out anyway, and Egypt knows it. Their army has begun to build an eight-mile-deep buffer zone on their side of the Gaza border for the refugee flood that will result from an assault on Rafah. That will come no later than Ramadan on March 10, according to a new Israeli ultimatum to Hamas, turning the tables on their hostaging strategy:

Gantz also threatens that Israel will invade Rafah if hostages are not freed in the next several weeks. …

He says an invasion of Rafah will occur in coordination with “our American and Egyptian partners to minimize civilian casualties,” but indicates the offensive can be avoided if the hostages are freed.

“The world must know, and Hamas leaders must know – if by Ramadan our hostages are not home, the fighting will be extended to the Rafah area,” Gantz says, setting a deadline around March 10.

The Israelis have learned a hard lesson about the futility of negotiating with barbaric terrorists. The Egyptians have learned it relatively cheaply in contrast, but they seem to have arrived at the same destination nonetheless. 

Addendum: The Israeli war cabinet unanimously rejected any plan for Palestinian statehood today as a “reward for terrorism”:

Israel’s cabinet on Sunday unanimously approved a declaration rejecting “international diktats” seeking to push Palestinian statehood, in the wake of reports that the US and several Arab partners were preparing a detailed plan for a comprehensive peace deal between Israel and the Palestinians that includes a “firm timeline” for a Palestinian state.

“Israel utterly rejects international diktats regarding a permanent settlement with the Palestinians,” the cabinet decision read. “A settlement, if it is to be reached, will come about solely through direct negotiations between the parties, without preconditions.

“Israel will continue to oppose unilateral recognition of a Palestinian state,” the motion added. “Such recognition in the wake of the October 7th massacre would be a massive and unprecedented reward to terrorism and would foil any future peace settlement.”

That message is clearly intended as an answer to certain fools who haven’t learned the lesson about negotiating with terrorists. Most of those fools are clustered in Washington DC, Brussels, and Turtle Bay.