The Israeli-Hamas negotiations are fraught with complexity

For weeks the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) had been preparing for an assault on Rafah. Yet when the order finally came on Monday night, it caught Israel’s generals by surprise. This was despite the fact that two armoured divisions had been deployed on Gaza’s southern border, and hundreds of thousands of leaflets printed warning the local population to evacuate to a ‘humanitarian area’ on the coast. Twice the plan to drop the leaflets over Rafah had been postponed, following American pressure. On Monday morning, when the green light came, the plan was to give civilians at least a week to move. Ten hours later the tanks moved in.

There was another reason for the generals’ surprise. A few hours earlier, a delegation of senior Hamas leaders in Cairo told the Egyptian government they accepted the proposal for a six-week truce during which Israeli hostages would be released. The generals believed that any major offensive would be on hold if there was a chance of a deal being struck.

The war cabinet had made two decisions: to send troops into Rafah and to send a negotiating team to Cairo to examine Hamas’s response. It looks like a contradiction – why launch an attack if there’s a chance of hostages being returned?

There’s a strategic logic, however, behind Israel’s move. Hamas’s response includes major discrepancies with the original framework proposed by the Egyptians weeks ago, which Israel agreed to. Hamas has also been given discreet assurances that Israel will be pressured to continue the truce and accept a longer-term ceasefire. The chances of bridging these differences are slim: that’s why the Israeli delegation doesn’t include the chiefs of Shin Bet and Mossad who have a mandate to sign off on any deal.