Israel’s real goal must be to deradicalize Gaza, not just to demilitarize it

In the first “Day After” proposal they recently offered for following up the war in the Gaza Strip, Israeli leaders recognized that the key to long-term stability lies not just with demilitarizing Gaza, but with deradicalizing it into the future.

The one-and-a-half-page plan would have Israel maintain security control in the region. Just as significantly, it calls for changing the culture of hate in religious, educational, and welfare institutions and shuttering the United Nations Relief Works Administration, which has close ties to Hamas.

To achieve this, local officials unaffiliated with terrorist groups or countries would oversee civil management. Palestinian leaders immediately rejected the plan, which is also very different from the proposals the U.S. is floating.

Regardless of which “Day After” plan is ultimately implemented, it must reflect the reality that rockets and ground maneuvers might physically defeat terrorists, but they cannot address deep-rooted hate in Palestinian society.

The last few months prove that war only intensifies such hate. Polls of Palestinians show increased support for Hamas, despite its 15-year reign of terror. They also show blame being placed on Israel, an entity they have been taught to hate, including in UN-funded schools, for generations.

One generation ago, from 1993 to 1995, years of bloodshed led Israeli and Palestinian leaders to engage through the Oslo Accords. These agreements had one goal: to achieve a two-states solution and end the hostilities between the two peoples.

Despite being meticulously detailed, the accords fell short. One of the main reasons was their failure to address the rampant Palestinian incitement that had jeopardized their success in the first place. From students’ textbooks, which routinely call for the elimination of Jews, to streets and squares sometimes named after jihadists who had murdered innocent Israelis, an ethos that glorified violence against Israelis was firmly in place.

This reality was reinforced by a Palestinian leadership that spoke in two different voices. English was used to peacefully negotiate a two-state solution, Arabic to incite Palestinians to violence and echo terror-supporting messages. Anti-Israeli sentiment was widely encouraged, legitimizing an armed struggle. This led to an Intifada and a wave of suicide attacks, permeating the reality of the post-Oslo years and squelching any hope for the accords’ success.

The Oslo narrative of peace competed with this alternative narrative of hate without even acknowledging it. Looking back, it never had a chance. In both cultures, Oslo has since become a derogatory word for stagnation that contains the worst of all worlds.

Palestinians, of course, never established a state. The land is still divided as it was during the interim period of the accords. Leadership remains committed to terrorism, both in Gaza under Hamas and in Judea and Samaria and under the Palestinian Authority, which still stands by its “pay to slay” policy of financially rewarding terrorists and their families. 

This radicalized ethos has relegated Palestinians to a life of constant incitement and poverty. It led thousands of Palestinians to pour through the border into rural communities and attack Israeli families in their homes on October 7. It explains why recent polls in Gaza and the West Bank show that only 10 percent of Palestinians believe those attacks constituted war crimes.

Israel must develop more than just military plans for after the war. It must work with international partners to marginalize the forces that foster, fund, and incite hate. If the “Day After” plans don’t thoroughly address the root of the hateful ideology, yet another generation of Israelis and Palestinians will be doomed to bloodshed and tragedy.

In concrete terms, that means increasing oversight of how aid dollars are used in the Strip, so there are mechanisms and incentives to mitigate further radicalization. It means overhauling Palestinian education systems and curricula so that they do not dehumanize Jews or call for Israel’s destruction. It means clamping down on institutions that are poisoned by ideology, including cultural events that portray the Middle East without Israel, sports events named after terrorist “martyrs,” or Friday sermons that glorify the murder of Jews. 

We cannot revert to this Oslo-like reality where Israel has security control, but Gaza is populated by an aggrieved civilian population that regards Israelis as subhuman. Instead, we must demilitarize and deradicalize.

Gadi Ezra is a commentator for “Relevant” and Israel’s former Director of the National Public Diplomacy Unit. Aviva Klompas is the former director of speechwriting at the Israeli Mission to the United Nations and co-founder of Boundless Israel.