Consider This from NPR - Will we finally see an end to the war in Gaza?

Episode Date: January 16, 2025

At the time we publish this episode, Israel's government has yet to accept the terms of the long-negotiated and hard fought ceasefire deal announced yesterday.The deal is still on, but the quarreling over the details demonstrates how difficult it is to keep the agreement on track.On Thursday morning Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu delayed a cabinet vote on the deal, accusing Hamas of "reneging" on parts of the agreement. A Hamas official said on social media that the group is committed to the agreement announced Wednesday. After more than 15 long months, tens of thousands dead, and close to 2 million people displaced, will we finally see an end to the war in Gaza? For sponsor-free episodes of Consider This, sign up for Consider This+ via Apple Podcasts or at plus.npr.orgEmail us at [e-mail] more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoicesNPR Privacy Policy

Last night was horrible. That's 21-year-old Shimah Ahmed, an engineering student living in Gaza, speaking with Morning Edition's Leila Fadl Thursday morning. The bombing couldn't stop throughout the night. The bombing, she is describing, happened hours after the ceasefire deal between Israel and Hamas was announced by negotiators in Qatar and President Joe Biden in Washington. The road to this deal has not been easy. I've worked in foreign policy for decades.

This is one of the toughest negotiations I've ever experienced. The ceasefire, designed to happen in phases, is supposed to begin on Sunday. But while celebrations happened in both Israel and Gaza, skepticism over whether the fighting will actually stop remains, particularly for those still in Gaza, like Ahmed. We have developed this mechanism to kind of protect ourselves, which is basically by stopping to develop any kind of hope. That skepticism and fear was fueled on Thursday morning after Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin

Netanyahu delayed a cabinet vote on the deal and accused Hamas of reneging on parts of the agreement, a Hamas official said on social media that the group is committed to the agreement announced Wednesday, neither provided any further details. Consider this. After more than 15 long months, tens of thousands of people dead, and close to two million people displaced, will we finally see an end to the war in Gaza? From NPR, I'm Mary Louise Kelly.

This message comes from NPR sponsor Paramount Pictures' new film, September 5. Based on the true story of reporters covering the Munich Olympics, when the unthinkable happens four outsiders will report from the inside. Now playing in select theaters everywhere January 17th. It's Consider This from NPR. At the time we published this episode, Israel's government has yet to accept the terms of the long-negotiated and hard-fought ceasefire deal announced yesterday. The deal is still on, but quarreling over the details demonstrates how difficult it is to keep the agreement on track. NPR's Greg Myrie is in Tel Aviv and spoke with my co-host, Ori Shapiro.

What's the stumbling block here? Yeah, Israel's cabinet needs to approve the deal and was expected to meet and do so today. But the office of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Hamas was reneging on part of the deal. Now, it didn't specify what part. Hamas said this wasn't true. It's still committed to the agreement. The net result was the Israeli cabinet didn't meet. A session is now planned for Friday. One far-right Israeli party is voting against it and threatening to resign. It calls the deal a surrender to Hamas. But

the agreement is expected to comfortably pass. Pete And in the meantime, fighting is continuing in Gaza, right? Pete That's right. Some pretty heavy Israeli airstrikes yesterday and today. More than 80 Palestinians have been killed and more than 200 injured in the past two days, according to Palestinian health officials. Now, Israel acknowledged hitting around 50 targets in Gaza. It says one of them was a Hamas militant who took part in the October 7th, 2023 attack in southern Israel that launched this war. And Ari, we've certainly seen this in the past where quite intense shooting takes place when a ceasefire is just about to take effect.

Ari So when is the earliest a ceasefire deal might go into effect? Well, Sunday looks like it would be the first day, and we should stress this is a process that even if it goes as planned, will play out over many weeks. It's not going to happen in a day. This first phase of the deal alone, last six weeks, Hamas is obligated to release 33 of the 98 hostages in Gaza. Israel will free about a thousand prisoners during this period, and aid is supposed to surge into Gaza. But the hostages won't all be freed until a second phase. Some Israeli troops will remain in Gaza for many weeks to come,

and then, even if everything is still moving along, we'll get to the really hard stuff. Who's going to rule Gaza after the Israeli troops leave? Who's going to pay for the rebuilding of the territory? So far, no clear answers to these very tough questions. You know, President-elect Trump called for a ceasefire deal before taking office, and it's now happening just days before his inauguration. Did his statements help drive this process? Well, Trump certainly believes so and he said so on social media.

No one here is saying that explicitly, but there seems to be some certainly circumstantial evidence. He did send his envoy, Steve Witkoff, to take part with diplomats from the Biden administration in the final days of these negotiations in the Gulf country of Qatar. And, you know, in taking credit, Trump is also assuming responsibility. It will be his ceasefire deal to manage come Monday. And there may be some irony here, Ari. It's kind of a reversal from the presidential transition four years ago. Trump made a deal in 2020 with the Taliban for US troops to leave Afghanistan.

President Biden inherited that agreement and when he withdrew the US troops it turned into a real fiasco. Trump will inherit the Gaza ceasefire agreement and there will be challenging days ahead. Remember seven US citizens are among the hostages held in Gaza. At least some of them are believed to be alive. So the US has been involved in trying to resolve this conflict and its role won't end just because there's a ceasefire deal. That's NPR's Greg Myrie and Tel Aviv. Thank you. Sure thing Ari. News of a ceasefire and hostage release deal between Israel and Hamas spread quickly through

U.S. college campuses, which have been bitterly divided over the conflict in Gaza since October 7th, 2023. NPR's Tovia-Smith checked in with several students. When Maya Goel, a sophomore at Wayne State University in Detroit, first heard about the deal, she headed straight for Hillel, the Jewish student organization, both nervous and excited. We just talked about all the hostages and how happy their families will be to have them back. But Goel also worries about the price Israel may pay to get back the 33 promised hostages.

It would free about a thousand Palestinian detainees and prisoners, including some convicted of killing Israelis. That's especially hard to accept, Goel says, knowing that the October 7th mastermind, Yaya Sinwar, was one of the prisoners released in a hostage swap years ago. It is a high price to pay. Like, who knows who these prisoners are going to release and who knows what they're going to do in the future. I feel like it's a no-win situation.

Several other students expressed similar dismay, but they're somewhat more optimistic about implications on campuses where tensions have been roiling. Boston University senior Akiva Zeff says he hopes the deal could shift focus away from some of the most incendiary accusations like genocide and war crimes. I can only hope that this simmers down because it's very charged and that removes a lot of nuance from what is an exceptionally nuanced situation. The sentiment was shared by MIT senior Alex Edwards, walking past the spot he recalls was packed last year

with encampments, protesters, and police. We were just like, whoa, what the hell is going on? This is insane. I'm just here to learn, Edwards says, and the protests are a distraction. I don't think demanding that MIT cut ties with Israel is going to change Israel's policies. But many of those leading campus protests say they have no intention of letting up. Mahmoud Muhayzin co-founded the Muslim coalition at the University of Michigan-Dearborn.

If anything, he says he's now fired up by a deal he sees as a big win. When it happened, I went with a couple of friends and we drove around honking with the Palestinian flag and went and got sweets for all my coworkers and enjoyed the moment. Muhayson says more than two dozen students are planning to run for positions within Michigan's state Democratic Party since he says national Democrats betrayed them. The fight is ramping up, he says, not winding down. It would be a shame for all the sacrifice and all the martyrdom that happened inside

of Gaza to go in vain. Barnard College junior Marie Adele Grasso agrees. She says a ceasefire has been top priority for pro-Palestinian activists like her. Once that's achieved, she says, they can focus on the rest of their agenda. For divestment and keep pushing for the U.S. government to stop funding Israel. And we will be working hard on explaining more complex settler colonial violence, and hopefully people will keep showing up. As a rallying cry that may not resonate quite like calls for a ceasefire did, but it may end up spurring more serious and productive conversations about complex and nuanced issues

that many students agree is sorely needed. That was NPR's Tovia Smith. This episode was produced by Mark Rivers and Gurjit Kaur. It was edited by Courtney Dornig. Our executive producer is Sammy Yenigan. It's Consider This from NPR. I'm Mary Louise Kelly. Want to hear this podcast without sponsor breaks?

Amazon Prime members can listen to Consider This sponsor free through Amazon Music. Or you can also support NPR's vital journalism and get Consider This Plus at plus.npr.org. That's plus.npr.org.