Possible conclusions for the Gaza POWs

What could happen to the ~190 remaining POWs from October 7 in Gaza

Bring them home… in body bags is fine.

On October 7 2023, Gaza took the world by surprise by launching a never-seen-before incursion into their occupied territory of Palestine. This act of resistance, protected by UN Occupation Law, shook “Israel”, the occupier, to its foundations. Not only did they fail to intercept or even learn of the operation beforehand, they were taken completely by surprise by the sheer scale of the operation.

All told, the Al-Qassam Brigades (Hamas’ paramilitary wing) said they brought 250 POWs (prisoners of war) to Gaza.

Since that day, the only retaliation the occupier (“Israel”) was able to muster was to indiscriminately bomb Gaza into rubble, committing several war crimes in the process by targetting civilian populations and, under Occupation Law, not being allowed to carry acts into Gaza (“Israel”’s “right to defend itself” does not extend beyond very strict parameters which they broke several times). Mind you, these are just two of the many war crimes the IOF (Israel Occupation Forces) have committed on Gaza since October 7.

There is a very sickening aspect to “Israel”’s rhetoric surrounding their POWs: on the one hand, they have started the PR campaign “Bring them home”, aimed at the English and foreign audience. Posters are being put up in cities in which the POWs are assuredly not (New York City, Madrid, London among others). The government of “Israel” is producing videos about their “kidnapped” “civilians” (most of which are IDF soldiers and as such valid targets — this is also why I call them POWs and not hostages).

On the other hand, they have been bombing Gaza with increasingly destructive bombs, even using white phosphorous, almost non-stop since October 8, putting them in danger. “Israel” has actually killed about 60 POWs so far with their bombing.

This is 60 of their own (and foreign) citizens that Israel claims to be very worried about and wanting to “bring home” by any means possible, killed in cold blood by the occupier.

You are only a tool to a settler-colonial project, not a human being. And this is an aspect I’ll delve into eventually in its own article (coming out November 17: Even the dead still have blood to spill). But to put it in other words, you are only valuable to a settler-colonial project as a human being up until you have nothing left for it to take from you. Past that threshold, when it can no longer extract anything out of you, your life has lost all value and may be forfeit.

This is why, for example, Ethiopian Jews were given contraceptives by the Zionist entity without their knowledge or consent: in the 60s and 70s, to call itself the “Jewish homeland” and legitimize itself as a country, the occupier in Palestine gave Jews from all around the world incentives to emigrate. Now that Ethiopian — Black — Jews are not needed to create legitimacy in the eyes of the world, they are given contraceptives as a form of genocide.

Let’s remember that the occupier, “Israel”, has been using what they call the Hannibal doctrine since the 1980s. This doctrine allows soldiers to use any means necessary to prevent a POW from being taken, including intentionally killing the POW.

Although the government of “Israel” announced they scrapped the doctrine in 2016 as it was never meant to allow soldiers to kill their own to prevent their kidnapping, one has to wonder why it took them over 30 years to do this, why they never prosecuted soldiers who did shoot their own peers to prevent their capture, and why the occupier is today still bombing its own citizens held in Gaza.

Those who know deep down that they are in the wrong can only lie to justify themselves, and I’m not naive enough to believe “Israel” is acting in good faith there regarding their announcement that they would cancel the doctrine.

When you would kill your own

So why would “Israel” be killing its own citizens through their bombing campaign?

The answer is because an “Israeli” POW is very, very valuable.

In 2011, Hamas exchanged one IOF soldier for 1000 Palestinians held by the occupier.

It’s very likely that the 250 POWs taken on October 7, which included officers, were meant to be exchanged for all Palestinians currently held in occupation prisons — over 5000 of them.

As a reminder, Palestinians jailed by the regime are not facing any charges. Many are children. When tried, they face military courts — while “Israeli” citizens face civil courts. It is a tactic of terror by the occupation to break the spirit of Palestinians in an attempt to destroy them.

With such a large number of POWs however, the balance tipped heavily in the resistance’s favor and they could have walked away with much bigger concessions on top of releasing every jailed Palestinian. Hamas has been cautiously quiet about what they expect to get out of the POWs, as the illegal act of retaliation by the occupier (which they 100% saw coming, I should add) makes all negotiations impossible. First, the enemy has to understand there is no point in attacking Gaza. Only then will Hamas be able to negotiate for the release of all POWs.

I would not dare make conjectures about what the resistance hopes to gain from this exchange as only time will tell, but nonetheless, to give an order of magnitude of how valuable 250 POWs are, these are some gains that seem possible:

• A complete withdrawal from the West Bank, much like the IOF was forced to withdraw from Gaza in 2006.

• The removal of the fence separating Gaza from the rest of the occupied Palestinian territory and withdrawal of IDF checkpoints, bases and troops around it.

• Ceding valuable terrain around Gaza.

• Transfer of weapons and defense systems from the IOF to Gaza.

• Other material concessions such as money, tools, machinery, and other supplies.

Concessions such as a ceasefire that require a treaty would likely be broken by “Israel” without consequences and as such would not necessarily be brought forward by Hamas and the resistance. Material gains which the resistance can then defend and hold on to from their end without “Israeli” interference or involvement seem more plausible.

An unsure fate

At this point, the POWs being held in Gaza have more to fear from their own government than from their captor. The few released POWs so far (for humanitarian reasons and without asking anything in return) have talked about the humane treatment they received from Hamas — no more, no less than what the Al-Qassam fighters get too. They get the same food, they get to see doctors, they get water, and they get the same accommodations (bed, rooms, etc) the fighters do. This is humane treatment and what is expected by the ever-blurrier laws of warfare.

Meanwhile, “Israel” has already caused the deaths of at least 60 POWs held in Gaza through their bombing campaign — a fact so grossly repulsive that it bears repeating.

It has come to the point where the families of the POWs have been harassed by “fellow” countrymen while protesting for their release.

POWs themselves have been recorded on video demanding Nethanyahu’s government stop bombing them and start negotiating.

There really aren’t many exits for the POWs. Even if “Israel” agreed to concessions in exchange for the POWs, it would simply be impossible to guarantee their safe release under the bombing campaign. And this is only a hypothetical; on the ground, “Israel” is simply refusing to accept their POWs back, already having written them off as a loss, like one would cut their losses on a financial investment.

This, again, because POWs are very valuable.

Their fate rests in Hamas’ hands and their power to keep them safe from the shelling, seismic bombs and white phosphorus. Feeding and giving them medical care.

A difficult task under the blockade that is dwindling Gaza’s supplies.

The conclusions seem to trend more and more towards complete annihilation of the POWs or a ceasefire that would then necessarily lead to negotiations — hence why Nethanyahu is so reluctant to agree to one, despite pressures from his biggest backer (to the tune of 3 billion dollars a year), Joe Biden. Negotiations would see all POWs released (although the occupier has refused POWs before, how could they accept only some and refuse the rest in this situation?) and major gains made by Gaza in the treaty.

On the international stage, we have seen other countries are also reluctant at the idea of playing intermediaries. This is because right now, the occupier is not in any position to listen to any demand for release. Egypt, for example, has tried to broker the release of two prisoners with health issues, which “Israel” outright refused to take.

There is one last option that could happen in a vacuum but never play out in real life: as the IOF is now invading Gaza on the ground, they could penetrate into the tunnels and free the POWs.

This is a “possible” scenario in the sense that all the pieces seem to be there for it. But it will never materially play out for two reasons:

1. “Israel” has clearly announced they don’t care about the POWs and considers them dead already.

2. The IOF is utterly incapable of penetrating into the tunnels beneath Gaza. Not only are they already losing an unbelievable amount of tanks in the open (up to 60 already in two weeks), tunnel warfare is hell on the attacker. The resistance knows their tunnels and have built them for defense.

Speaking of the tunnels, it’s very likely that the resistance has enough food and water stored in them to last for years — this was seen in the Kurd tunnels in Syria, Iraq and Turkey for example, and they have been fighting many fewer years than Palestinians have. Tunnels can be built very quickly (around a kilometre in two weeks) and then stockpiled to resist a siege for years.

That’s why it’s a waiting game for the resistance; the POWs are not going anywhere that Hamas is not. They have food, they have water, they have shelter. They only have to wait for the end of the bombing campaign and will then be able to negotiate an exchange.

There is only one conclusion for Nethanyahu to save face and try to salvage the compromising position the resistance forced him into on October 7: keep bombing Gaza and hope it all magically works out. Hope it pacifies the bloodthirsty Zionists. Hope it kills all the POWs, and hope it magically gets rid of Hamas too. His back was forced against the wall after October 7, and he does not have any way out; this was the point of the operation. What can he do but keep bombing?

What about US involvement in the crisis?

“Israel” is nothing more than a glorified US military base. It has in fact been called the “unsinkable aircraft carrier” by the State Department since the 1950s (and so have other post-colonial holdings such as Cyprus under the British mandate and modern Japan).

In this context, it should be understood that “Israel” is the one that depends on the US and not the other way around. The fact that the US funds the Zionist military to the tune of 3 billion dollars per year is not because “Israel” has leverage on the US, it’s because it’s a military base in a very strategic region (a region full of natural gas and oil, which Gaza also happens to sit on). And the military base gets whatever it needs to secure more natural resources.

The problem isn’t that Biden can’t restrain his attack dog, “Israel”. The problem is this situation is actually very good for him. Eradicating Palestinians, which are not aligned or allied with the USA, will give his attack dog access to these resources and, perhaps just as important, will finally end the “Palestinian problem” the US administration has had to contend with for decades (the problem being the presence of a native population resisting their genocide and a settler-colonial project).

It’s not good for his reelection chances of course, but it’s good for business. It’s good for Lockheed Martin who provides all the missiles that have been launched at Gaza. It’s good for oil companies — Israel exports mostly diamonds and refined petroleum to the US.

All those reasons explain why Biden has been very silent on the treatment of the POWs or indeed a ceasefire (famously saying “No possibility” just a few days ago) and why the US cannot be counted on to mediate in this crisis. As far the US is concerned, it’s business as usual.

Breaking development

On November 7, exactly one month after the Flood of al-Aqsa operation started, Nethanyahu announced that he was categorically unwilling to negotiate with Gaza. His position is now that all Palestinians in Gaza will be forced out to Egypt or elsewhere (which falls under the UN definition of genocide) and that Gaza will essentially become like the West Bank: “security” will be managed by the IOF — meaning the IOF will be present in Gaza and be settled by “Israelis” with full support from the military — over the rubble of apartment buildings, hospitals, schools and bakeries. Truly ruling over a kingdom of dirt.

Considering how the invasion has been going so far, I feel justified to say that Nethanyahu is coping, if you’ll allow me the expression. More than 300 IOF soldiers have been killed so far in Gaza, and more than 60 vehicles destroyed, with a large majority of them being tanks (that is because “Israel” is sending tanks in alone, because their soldiers are too cowardly to actually enter Gaza without the safety of the armor).

In one month of bombing, “only” 10,000 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza, almost none of which were in the Resistance. There are 2 million people living in Gaza. Genocide by means of weapons is simply impossible, and has never been possible (even the Third Reich ultimately failed, despite the scale of the Holocaust). The only other option is to displace Palestinians out of Gaza and the West Bank and refuse them the right to return to their homeland. Palestinians however will never leave Gaza or the West Bank willingly as it is their homeland; they have nowhere else to go to.

It’s a pipe dream for Nethanyahu to think that he can achieve anything in Gaza except bomb it to the ground, destroy it so much so that Palestinians will willingly leave as there would be nothing there left for them. But they will rebuild. Nethanyahu thinks from his cozy position as a settler. Palestinians think from their downtrodden position, living under occupation for decades already. Being orphaned at age 4 by bomb strikes. Seeing their countrymen and women, most of them children, being taken by a relentless bombing campaign. They will rebuild.

Sun Tzu said that “when you surround an army, leave an outlet free. Do not press a desperate foe too hard”. When two armies clash and one is surrounded, they need to have the impression they can flee. Otherwise, they will fight to the death — either yours or theirs.

It is impossible to break the spirit of someone who has nothing left, a lesson Nethanyahu failed to learn. He has not given Gaza any way out, as Egypt is refusing to open the Rafah crossing (which is being shelled by the IOF either way) as that would mean Palestinians would never be allowed back in Gaza and Egypt would be complicit in genocide.

On the ground, it seems not many Palestinians are willing to leave Gaza, even under the inhumane conditions they are currently facing.

The Resistance was clear when they launched the operation: there will be either freedom, or martyrdom, but no in-between. They have made peace with this state of affairs. Is “Israel” ready to make peace with it too?