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In repeated scenes broadcast by Israeli occupation soldiers as they systematically destroy dozens of Palestinian buildings and homes in the eastern and northern regions of the Gaza Strip, the true intentions of the Israeli occupation state to create a new reality for the demographic and urban map of the Gaza Strip appear.
It was aroused The Maghazi process The latter, which led to the death of 21 occupation soldiers, is a controversy over the nature of the war effort undertaken by the occupation forces in the eastern areas bordering the security fence, which indicates practical steps imposed by the Israeli occupation to create a buffer zone within the Strip.
In this report we attempt to answer the following questions regarding this buffer zone:
What is the security and military background of the buffer zone that Israel intends to create?
Will it achieve for Israel the “security” it seeks?
What is its impact on the Palestinians in the Gaza Strip?
How will the resistance see this move?
Is the move internationally accepted?
Israeli estimates dealt with the Israeli army’s plan to establish a buffer zone along the security fence with the Gaza Strip under the pretext of providing security and allowing the settlers of the enclave to return. The Israeli army destroyed 1,072 buildings out of 2,824 buildings that were one kilometer or less from the border, which constitutes 40% of the buildings in Border areas.
Since the start of the ground attack launched by the Israeli occupation on the Gaza Strip, a number of Israeli officials have reiterated the intention of the occupying army to establish a buffer zone inside the Strip, in an attempt to besiege the Palestinian resistance and limit the impact of its operations across the separation fence.
Energy and Infrastructure Minister Eli Cohen explicitly declared that Gaza’s territory would “shrink,” while the Defense Minister called for… Yoav Galant To create an indefinite buffer zone within the Strip in a way that would push the Palestinian resistance away from the “borders,” a position supported by the Prime Minister. Benjamin Netanyahu Significantly.
The statements of the Israeli occupation army decided the matter, as it was the first public confirmation that the strategy was “under implementation,” according to a report by the Washington Post.
Israeli occupation army spokesman Lieutenant Colonel Jonathan Conricus said earlier this month, “It is one of the additional efforts that are being implemented after October 7.”
Failed experiments
The idea of the “buffer zone” that the Israeli occupying state intends to create in the Gaza Strip belongs to a previous traditional strategy in Israeli security theory called “strategic depth.” This strategy aims to control foreign lands indefinitely in order to enhance security from external threats.
Israel sought to implement it during its aggression against the Gaza Strip in the summer of 2014, but failed to achieve it. It is an attempt to circumvent the idea of reoccupying the Gaza Strip, which receives great opposition.
Operation led Al-Aqsa flood The sudden attack on October 7 led to a perception among the Israeli occupation that the strategies to contain the Islamic Resistance Movement (agitation) And creating deterrence equations with it that are unable to guarantee Israel’s security. This forces the occupation to take new approaches to dealing with the sector.
The experiences of the Israeli occupation in Gaza and southern Lebanon indicate the failure of the “strategic depth” strategy to provide security.
Former Director of the Strategic Planning Department in the Israeli army, Shlomo Brom, says that Israel sought “to protect our borders around Gaza by providing Hamas with more suitable targets: soldiers and settlers in the Gaza Strip,” referring to the phase of the Israeli military presence in the Strip before 2005.
Former Prime Minister Ehud Barak says, “We were protecting our front line in southern Lebanon as if it were the walls of Jerusalem. We brought in heavier weapons and more troops without even noticing that we were not defending anything strategic.”
These quotes highlight the shortcomings of re-establishing the “strategic depth” in the Gaza Strip today, whether at the level of reoccupying it or creating a buffer zone within it.
The buffer zone may temporarily push the fighting away from the Gaza border, but Israel’s experiences inside Gaza and Lebanon make clear that each occupation has only served to provide the resistance with political legitimacy for its actions and easy targets for its attacks. Therefore, it is unlikely that the “buffer zone” will limit the effectiveness of resistance actions, especially the ongoing missile effort launched from deep within Gaza.
Repercussions for the Palestinians
On the Palestinian level, any reduction in the area of the Gaza Strip will represent aggression, as the reduction constitutes a tightening of the siege and pressure on the Palestinians in the Gaza Strip, will deprive Gazans of agricultural spaces, and will deepen the population crisis in light of Israel’s demolition of more than 70% of the buildings in the northern Gaza Strip and the possibility of this being repeated in the middle. And south of the sector.
The population of the Gaza Strip suffers from overcrowding, as it is one of the most densely populated areas in the world, which will cause great population pressure within the cities and camps of the Strip, which raises questions about the relationship between the establishment of a buffer zone that consumes about 20% of the area of Gaza and the forced and voluntary displacement projects adopted by ministers in the Gaza Strip. Netanyahu government.
Resistance options
The Palestinian resistance is likely to deal with any attempt to keep Israeli army forces in the Gaza Strip as legitimate targets, which will represent a challenge and exhaustion to the occupation forces that the Palestinian resistance will use to its advantage.
A number of experts and former security personnel in Israel have previously warned against such an option.
Israeli estimates also suggest that the problems caused by the buffer zone in the Gaza Strip may outweigh the benefit of its establishment, as it is reminiscent of the buffer zone in southern Lebanon and the state of fighting that Israel experienced for many years until it withdrew, a scenario that may be repeated with the Strip.
Temporary American rejection
The idea of a buffer zone has received Palestinian, Arab and international rejection. Despite the constant skepticism about the American position, the administration of President joe biden It repeatedly expressed its rejection of any reduction in the area of the Strip.
Egypt and Jordan also reject the idea explicitly and directly, and the Wall Street Journal said that the project is meeting with increasing frustration among American officials, who say that they expressed their opposition to plans to establish buffer zones in the Gaza Strip, and then watched Israel move forward with what it wants, considering that establishing the buffer zone It is a reduction of Gaza’s territory and a violation of international law.
The Wall Street Journal confirmed that the US administration is facing difficulties by pressuring Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to stop the buffer zone project, saying that it may accept the establishment of a “temporary buffer zone.”
The US administration also warned that Israel’s establishment of a buffer zone may make it difficult to persuade Arab countries to help in the reconstruction of the Gaza Strip after the end of the war, according to its words.
The state of confusion that is plaguing the Israeli occupation state regarding the goals of the aggression against Gaza and the possibility of achieving them has become apparent, and it appears that there is fluctuation and instability in the declared goals of the aggression between eliminating Hamas, security control of the Gaza Strip and displacing its Palestinian population to Egypt, and then moving on to talk about eliminating Hamas’s military capabilities and preventing its management of the Strip, while the idea of a buffer zone has recently emerged.
