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A ‘Ceasefire’ That Leaves Hamas in Power Is Disastrous for Palestinians and Israelis
A Palestinian Hamas terrorist shakes hands with a child as they stand guard as people gather on the day of the handover of Israeli hostages, as part of a ceasefire and a hostages-prisoners swap deal between Hamas and Israel, in Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip, Feb. 22, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Ramadan Abed
Calls for an “immediate end” to the October 7th war in Gaza may sound compassionate. But in practice, they are neither pro-peace nor pro-Palestinian.
They are, in effect, demands that Hamas survive to reconstitute itself as Gaza’s governing power. And if history has taught us anything, nothing could be more anti-Palestinian, anti-recovery, or pro-perpetual war than such an outcome.
Hamas Is Gaza’s Captor, Not Its Voice
Hamas is not Gaza. Hamas is not the Palestinian Arab people. It is an arm of the Muslim Brotherhood, and its goal is certainly not a Palestinian Arab state, but a global Islamic caliphate. A Palestinian state is only a means to that end.
For 18 years, Hamas has ruled Gaza not as a government, but as a theocratic war machine. Its charter calls for the extermination of Jews. Its leaders openly glorify martyrdom and war. Billions in aid were funneled away from hospitals and schools to build approximately 750 kilometers of fortified tunnels—military bunkers for fighters, not shelters for civilians. Ordinary Gazans never protected; used instead as human shields.
Under Hamas, generation after generation of Gazan children have been raised on a steady diet of hate, jihad, and martyrdom. To leave Hamas in power is not to liberate Gaza, but to guarantee that the cycle of indoctrination, violence, and terror continues — and that another October 7th is only a matter of time.
Ceasefire as Perpetual War
The world has seen this movie before. After every round of fighting — 2009, 2012, 2014, 2021 — the “international community” pressed Israel into premature ceasefires. Each time, Hamas rearmed, retrenched, and plotted the next round.
October 7, 2023, was not an aberration; it was the natural product of this cycle.
That is why today’s calls for a “ceasefire” are not pro-peace. They are demands for Hamas to survive long enough to start the war again.
Britain’s Perverse “Incentive”
Britain recently threatened to recognize a Palestinian state if there is not a ceasefire that leaves Hamas intact. On its face, this might sound like diplomacy. In reality, it is perverse. It sends Hamas a simple message: terrorism pays. Massacre civilians, hide behind hospitals and schools, and the West will reward you.
Such recognition will not advance the creation of the first Palestinian Arab state or make Palestinian lives better. It will, however, make that state less likely than ever by cementing Hamas and its brand of Islamist rejectionism as Gaza’s unavoidable power.
No viable Palestinian state can emerge from a Gaza ruled by Hamas and a culture held hostage to its murderous ideology.
Western Protestors’ Blind Spot
The irony is that the very Western activists chanting “ceasefire now” in London, New York, and Paris — those who imagine themselves champions of peace — are objectively, de facto pro-Hamas.
Whether they realize it or not, their banners translate into “Hamas must survive.” And if Hamas survives, endless war is inevitable –because Hamas’s central purpose is Israel’s destruction. Every chant for “ceasefire now” while Hamas remains intact is a chant for more Israeli deaths and more Palestinian Arab misery.
They are not pro-peace. They are pro-perpetual war.
Who Actually Loses When Hamas Survives
Those demanding an end to the war with Hamas intact claim to care about civilians. But preserving Hamas ensures:
- No real reconstruction, because Hamas steals cement for terror tunnels and fuel for rockets.
- No freedom, because Hamas rules by repression, executions, and censorship.
- No future, because Hamas indoctrinates Gaza’s children for violent jihad, not life.
Keeping Hamas in power is not pro-Palestinian. It is anti-Palestinian. It guarantees that Gaza’s children will inherit only tunnels, wars, and funerals.
A Century of Rejectionism
Since at least the rise of the Muslim Brotherhood in 1928, this conflict has not been about borders. It has always been about the rejection of Jewish sovereignty anywhere in the land of Israel. When Jews accepted partition in 1937 and again in 1947, Arab leaders said no. Their problem was not lines on a map but Jews exercising sovereignty anywhere whatsoever in their homeland. The atrocities of October 7 echoed the massacres of Jews that Palestinian Arab leaders incited in 1920, 1921, 1929, and 1936.
This unbroken chain of rejectionism has condemned Palestinian Arabs to statelessness and war for generations. And now Britain, and Western protestors, seek to reward it.
If one genuinely wants peace, ask: who should shape Gaza’s future? The terrorists who turned mosques into arsenals, schools into rocket factories, and aid workers into shields? Or people who, without Hamas’ boot on their necks, might finally build homes, schools, and businesses not tied to terror?
The answer should be obvious. Yet Western protestors chanting “ceasefire now” have chosen the terrorists over the civilians.
If the world wants Gaza to truly rebuild, if it wants Palestinian children to inherit schools instead of terror tunnels, and if it wants Israelis and Palestinian Arabs ever to live in peace, then Hamas must be defeated. Only then will peace even be possible.
Micha Danzig is a current attorney, former IDF soldier & NYPD police officer. He currently writes for numerous publications on matters related to Israel, antisemitism & Jewish identity & is the immediate past President of StandWithUs in San Diego and a national board member of Herut.
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After False Dawns, Gazans Hope Trump Will Force End to Two-Year-Old War
Palestinians walk past a residential building destroyed in previous Israeli strikes, after Hamas agreed to release hostages and accept some other terms in a US plan to end the war, in Nuseirat, central Gaza Strip October 4, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Mahmoud Issa
Exhausted Palestinians in Gaza clung to hopes on Saturday that US President Donald Trump would keep up pressure on Israel to end a two-year-old war that has killed tens of thousands and displaced the entire population of more than two million.
Hamas’ declaration that it was ready to hand over hostages and accept some terms of Trump’s plan to end the conflict while calling for more talks on several key issues was greeted with relief in the enclave, where most homes are now in ruins.
“It’s happy news, it saves those who are still alive,” said 32-year-old Saoud Qarneyta, reacting to Hamas’ response and Trump’s intervention. “This is enough. Houses have been damaged, everything has been damaged, what is left? Nothing.”
GAZAN RESIDENT HOPES ‘WE WILL BE DONE WITH WARS’
Ismail Zayda, 40, a father of three, displaced from a suburb in northern Gaza City where Israel launched a full-scale ground operation last month, said: “We want President Trump to keep pushing for an end to the war, if this chance is lost, it means that Gaza City will be destroyed by Israel and we might not survive.
“Enough, two years of bombardment, death and starvation. Enough,” he told Reuters on a social media chat.
“God willing this will be the last war. We will hopefully be done with the wars,” said 59-year-old Ali Ahmad, speaking in one of the tented camps where most Palestinians now live.
“We urge all sides not to backtrack. Every day of delay costs lives in Gaza, it is not just time wasted, lives get wasted too,” said Tamer Al-Burai, a Gaza City businessman displaced with members of his family in central Gaza Strip.
After two previous ceasefires — one near the start of the war and another earlier this year — lasted only a few weeks, he said; “I am very optimistic this time, maybe Trump’s seeking to be remembered as a man of peace, will bring us real peace this time.”
RESIDENT WORRIES THAT NETANYAHU WILL ‘SABOTAGE’ DEAL
Some voiced hopes of returning to their homes, but the Israeli military issued a fresh warning to Gazans on Saturday to stay out of Gaza City, describing it as a “dangerous combat zone.”
Gazans have faced previous false dawns during the past two years, when Trump and others declared at several points during on-off negotiations between Hamas, Israel and Arab and US mediators that a deal was close, only for war to rage on.
“Will it happen? Can we trust Trump? Maybe we trust Trump, but will Netanyahu abide this time? He has always sabotaged everything and continued the war. I hope he ends it now,” said Aya, 31, who was displaced with her family to Deir Al-Balah in the central Gaza Strip.
She added: “Maybe there is a chance the war ends at October 7, two years after it began.”
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Mass Rally in Rome on Fourth Day of Italy’s Pro-Palestinian Protests
A Pro-Palestinian demonstrator waves a Palestinian flag during a national protest for Gaza in Rome, Italy, October 4, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Claudia Greco
Large crowds assembled in central Rome on Saturday for the fourth straight day of protests in Italy since Israel intercepted an international flotilla trying to deliver aid to Gaza, and detained its activists.
People holding banners and Palestinian flags, chanting “Free Palestine” and other slogans, filed past the Colosseum, taking part in a march that organizers hoped would attract at least 1 million people.
“I’m here with a lot of other friends because I think it is important for us all to mobilize individually,” Francesco Galtieri, a 65-year-old musician from Rome, said. “If we don’t all mobilize, then nothing will change.”
Since Israel started blocking the flotilla late on Wednesday, protests have sprung up across Europe and in other parts of the world, but in Italy they have been a daily occurrence, in multiple cities.
On Friday, unions called a general strike in support of the flotilla, with demonstrations across the country that attracted more than 2 million, according to organizers. The interior ministry estimated attendance at around 400,000.
Italy’s right-wing government has been critical of the protests, with Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni suggesting that people would skip work for Gaza just as an excuse for a longer weekend break.
On Saturday, Meloni blamed protesters for insulting graffiti that appeared on a statue of the late Pope John Paul II outside Rome’s main train station, where Pro-Palestinian groups have been holding a protest picket.
“They say they are taking to the streets for peace, but then they insult the memory of a man who was a true defender and builder of peace. A shameful act committed by people blinded by ideology,” she said in a statement.
Israel launched its Gaza offensive after Hamas terrorists staged a cross border attack on October 7, 2023, killing some 1,200 people and taking 251 people hostage.
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Hamas Says It Agrees to Release All Israeli Hostages Under Trump Gaza Plan
Smoke rises during an Israeli military operation in Gaza City, as seen from the central Gaza Strip, October 2, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Dawoud Abu Alkas
Hamas said on Friday it had agreed to release all Israeli hostages, alive or dead, under the terms of US President Donald Trump’s Gaza proposal, and signaled readiness to immediately enter mediated negotiations to discuss the details.