It has now been over 11 months since Hamas's “Al-Aqsa Flood” operation and the Israeli war on the Gaza Strip, which has brutally killed tens of thousands of Palestinians. Gaza has been completely devastated, and as the spectre of full-blown famine lingers, some of its residents, particularly children, have already died of hunger.
To make matters worse, polio has reemerged, and the UN is racing against time to vaccinate as many children as possible under the very difficult and dire conditions on the ground. Gaza’s Palestinians are once again displaced just as they, their parents or grandparents were displaced in 1948.
Rounds of negotiations have been followed by even more rounds of bombardment and bloodshed. Some might argue that the "Al-Aqsa Flood" operation was essential for the liberation of Al-Aqsa, or, as al-Qassam Brigade spokesman Abu Obaida declared at the outset of the war, "to begin the liberation of every inch of Palestine, as well as to release prisoners and empty Israeli jails."
Fading demands
However, a few weeks into the “Al-Aqsa Flood” operation and the heinous war Israel launched—and continues to wage—against the Gaza Strip, it became evident that Hamas’s demands to release Palestinian prisoners from Israeli jails, liberate Palestine, and retaliate against Israel’s ongoing violations at Al-Aqsa Mosque were starting to fade. The scope of their demands has now narrowed to a return to the conditions before 7 October 2023. But who will convince Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to agree to that?
