Pro-Hamas students rally at the encampment for Gaza set up at George Washington University students. Washington, DC, April 25, 2035. Photo: Allison Bailey via Reuters Connect

Last week, Abdullah Ocalan asked his fighters in Turkey and Syria to lay down their weapons and declare a ceasefire. They agreed.

Who is Abdullah Ocalan? He is the leader of Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), listed as a terrorist group by Turkey, the US, and other countries. He has been imprisoned by Turkey under rather harsh conditions since 1999.

Whether the ceasefire will hold and lead to some degree of independence or at least easing of oppression by Turkey remains to be seen. If nothing else, this step by Ocalan shows that a leader can have an impact on his followers even from prison.

What is the connection to the Gaza situation? It has been clear to many players in the Middle East that Hamas cannot stay in power, and that it needs to be demilitarized. As we know, Israel has been calling for this since October 7. The US administration knows this, too. And Arab states are well aware that this is a necessity for ending the war in Gaza, though for the most part they are afraid to say so publicly.

Perhaps just like with the PKK, the process needs to be initiated from the top to the bottom.

It is unlikely that the current leadership in Gaza itself will take the first or any steps. Mohammed Sinwar, the brother of Yahya Sinwar, and his colleagues believe that their permanent residence in Gaza tunnels gives them at least a long term, if not permanent, lease on life and rule. Only one of the Palestinians who were recently released from Israeli prisons in exchange for Israeli hostages, publicly called for peace with Israel. He spent 40 years in an Israeli prison, he is quite elderly and not influential or known.

On the contrary, many released Palestinians were rushing immediately to their old jobs, i.e., terrorism. There is a zero chance that Marwan Barghouti, the most prominent resident in an Israeli prison who was responsible for organizing many deadly terrorist attacks, would do what Ocalan just did — call for disarmament and real ceasefire. The input needs to come either from Gaza’s population or from Gaza leaders living abroad and Arab leaders in the neighborhood.

The Gazans are too oppressed and dependent for everything on Hamas, so they keep quiet, though a recent poll shows a marked decrease in Hamas popularity.

Gazans put a lot of blame for the destruction of their homes and for looting of humanitarian aid on Hamas, though many of them also fervently hate Israel and Jews. The latter was particularly palpable during the transfer of hostages, alive and dead.

Qatar, the financier and enabler of Hamas, a state claiming to be “an honest mediator and broker of peace” should stop financing and supporting Hamas, and it should expel the Hamas politburo from its soil. Instead of making a real contribution by pressing Hamas to release all hostages unconditionally, it called last week for UNRWA to return to Gaza (or as they called it, to “Palestine.”)

Egypt will present a proposal for rebuilding Gaza at an emergency Arab summit in Cairo in the coming days. Whether it includes disarmament and/or expulsion of Hamas from Gaza, and at least temporary relocation of Gazans into Egypt, is doubtful. But any reconstruction of Gaza with Hamas remaining in any position of power is total waste and folly. Hamas does not care about Gaza’s population; its only goal is to destroy Israel. Egypt is hoping that Europe would underwrite this adventure, but the EU would be foolish to go for it while Hamas and its affiliates are in power.

I have no idea what prompted Ocalan to declare a ceasefire. He has been in prison since 1999 – 26 years, and he is in his 70s. Does he want to live out his final days in peace, does he think a good outcome is possible for his people, that enough people have died, or that the regional situation is changing with Israel defeating Hezbollah, Assad gone from Syria, and Iran weakened by Israel’s intervention?

We can only wish and hope that his new approach would inspire Hamas to do something leading to real peace. Unfortunately, we know one thing for sure from their recent rejection of a new peace deal: there will be no ceasefire until Hamas is gone.

In the 10h year of the rather slowly progressing Trojan War, things start heating up as described in the Iliad. Achilles, the greatest warrior of the Greek army, sits on the sidelines offended by Agamemnon, the leader of the Greeks. Patroclus, Achilles’ closest friend, goes into battle and is killed by Hector, the son of Priam, the king of Troy.

Achilles, devastated by Patroclus’ death, calls for revenge and drags Hector’s body attached to Achilles’ chariot. Fellow Greeks are appalled by Achilles’ defiling Hector’s body. Achilles is inconsolable until Priam comes to beg Achilles to release the body of his son for a funeral. Priam also brings a hefty ransom. Achilles takes pity on the old grieving father, accepts the ransom, releases the body and sits down with Priam to mourn the death of Hector. Achilles agrees to two weeks of truce to allow for a funeral and grieving for Hector.

Hamas should study the Iliad to imbibe some compassion and empathy both for its “enemies” and its own people.

Dr. Jaroslava Halper has been a professor of pathology at The University of Georgia in Athens, GA for many years. She escaped from communist Prague because of antisemitism, and lack of freedom and free speech. The gradual increase of antisemitism and anti-Zionism in certain circles in her second homeland, and the devastating October 7 massacre by Hamas, led her to realize that more active engagement is necessary to combat antisemitism, including anti-Zionism. 

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Basel Adra, Rachel Szor, Hamdan Ballal and Yuval Abraham win the Oscar for Best Documentary Feature Film for “No Other Land” during the Oscars show at the 97th Academy Awards in Hollywood, Los Angeles, California, US, March 2, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Carlos Barria

In an evening of glitz, red carpet pageantry, and self-congratulatory speeches at the Dolby Theatre in Los Angeles, one Oscar win was as predictable as the show’s nearly four-hour runtime: Best Feature-Length Documentary.

The award went to the Israeli and Palestinian filmmakers behind No Other Land, a film chronicling Palestinian activist Basel Adra as he supposedly “risks arrest to document the destruction of his hometown” in Masafer Yatta, at the southern edge of the West Bank.

Hardly a shock.

Not only was it the frontrunner, but it ticked all the right boxes for an Academy that never misses a chance to celebrate a politically fashionable pick. And with Israel dominating the headlines since the October 7, 2023, Hamas attacks and the ensuing war against the terrorist group, it didn’t take a fortune teller to predict this win.

Cue the victory speeches.

Adra took the stage alongside Israeli filmmaker Yuval Abraham, who used his moment to chastise the United States for blocking “a political solution, without ethnic supremacy, with national rights for both of our people.”

The line earned a rousing cheer — because what better way to celebrate cinematic achievement than by tossing out oversimplified, self-righteous slogans?

Also predictable? The media’s muddled reporting on No Other Land’s subject matter. Many outlets seemed convinced that Masafer Yatta is some ancient Palestinian village network, systematically uprooted in recent decades to make way for Israeli settlers.

Which, of course, is exactly the narrative the filmmakers wanted to push.

This is correct background information about Masafer Yatta that was portrayed wrongly in the movie that won the Oscar: https://t.co/GyeesTSePb

— Gil Hoffman (@Gil_Hoffman) March 3, 2025

The Truth About Masafer Yatta

The reality, as usual, is far less dramatic than the Oscar-winning version.

Historically, Masafer Yatta was a grazing ground for Bedouins and locals from the nearby town of Yatta — land they used but never permanently settled. Those who stayed for extended periods lived in caves, not in established villages.

In the early 1980s, the IDF designated the area as Training Zone 918, a military training ground. The arrangement was simple: locals could continue grazing their flocks, and the IDF would provide advance notice when live-fire exercises were scheduled. This system worked with little controversy for nearly two decades.

Then, in 1997, things shifted. Local Palestinians petitioned the Israeli High Court to revoke the training zone designation. At the same time, illegal construction ramped up. Permanent structures began appearing, first in small clusters and then expanding into what is now generously described as the “12 villages” of Masafer Yatta.

Under the Oslo Accords, Israel maintains full control over this area — known as Area C — until a final status agreement is reached. But that didn’t stop the creeping expansion, which military sources say wasn’t about housing a growing population but about creating political “facts on the ground.” Many structures, they report, stand empty, existing solely to inflate the appearance of a permanent Palestinian presence.

By 2000, the Israeli High Court had halted evacuations but explicitly banned further constructio — rules that were promptly ignored. The IDF offered compromises, allowing access on weekends, Jewish holidays, and for two months each year, all of which were rejected. It even approved permanent settlement in parts of the zone’s northwest section, but the legal battle dragged on.

After years of legal wrangling, the court ruled in favor of the IDF: the training zone designation stood, and illegal structures could be dismantled.

Yet despite breathless media reports of “displacement,” the reality remains: evacuations have been minimal, the illegal buildings are still there, and the so-called “villages” remain.

The Media’s Convenient Omissions

So naturally, by Monday morning, Israel woke up to a wave of skewed coverage about No Other Land’s win, all of it framing the Masafer Yatta dispute as somehow tied to Israeli settlers.

ABC News, for example, suggested the issue was part of Israel’s broader “settlement expansion,” stating:

Israel’s demolition efforts in the West Bank, on what Israel considers to be illegal structures, have largely been in an effort to clear the way for Israeli settlers to move into the region for reasons including religious beliefs and improved quality of life.

Meanwhile, CNN failed even to mention that the so-called “collection of villages” in the Hebron hills consists of indisputably illegal structures, while also tying the dispute to “the encroachment of Jewish settlers for decades.”

And the BBC? It didn’t even bother including the fact that Masafer Yatta is a military training ground, leaving readers with the entirely false impression that Israel cleared the area for settlers:

Israel has occupied the West Bank since 1967. Israeli settlements in the territory are considered illegal under international law, though Israel disputes this. They have expanded over the past 55 years, becoming a focal point of violence and conflicting claims over land.”

And that was the story across the board — from NPR to The Hollywood Reporter. The facts were lost, and Masafer Yatta became yet another simplistic media tale in which Israel is, conveniently, the villain.

The author is a contributor to HonestReporting, a Jerusalem-based media watchdog with a focus on antisemitism and anti-Israel bias — where a version of this article first appeared.

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Families and supporters of Israeli hostages kidnapped during the deadly Oct. 7, 2023 attack by Hamas gather to demand a deal that will bring back all the hostages held in Gaza, outside a meeting between hostage representatives and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, in Jerusalem, Jan. 14, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Ammar Awad

Foreign Minister Gideon Saar said on Tuesday that Israel was ready to proceed to the second phase of the Gaza ceasefire deal, as long as Hamas was ready to release more of the 59 hostages it is still holding.

Fighting in Gaza has been halted since Jan. 19 under a truce arranged with US support and Qatari and Egyptian mediators, and Hamas has exchanged 33 Israeli hostages and five Thais for some 2,000 Palestinian prisoners and detainees.

But the initial 42-day truce has expired and Hamas and Israel, which has blocked the entry of aid trucks into Gaza, remain far apart on broader issues including the postwar governance of Gaza and the future of Hamas itself.

“We are ready to continue to phase two,” Saar told reporters in Jerusalem as Arab leaders prepared to meet in Cairo to discuss a plan for ending the war permanently.

“But in order to extend the time or the framework, we need an agreement to release more hostages.”

Hamas says it wants to move ahead to the second phase negotiations that could open the way to a permanent end to the war with the full withdrawal of Israeli forces from the devastated Palestinian enclave and a return of the remaining 59 hostages taken in the Hamas-led attack on Israel on Oct. 7, 2023.

But Israel says its hostages must be handed over for the truce to be extended and backs a plan to extend the ceasefire during the Muslim fasting month of Ramadan, which began on Saturday, until after the Jewish Passover holiday in April.

US President Donald Trump’s special Mideast envoy Steve Witkoff is due to visit the region in the next few days to discuss extending the ceasefire or moving ahead of phase two, the State Department said on Monday.

Saar denied that Israel had breached the agreement by not moving ahead to stage two negotiations. He said there was “no automaticity” between the stages, and he said Hamas had itself violated the agreement to allow aid into Gaza by seizing most of the supplies itself.

“It is a means to continue the war against Israel. It’s today the major part of Hamas income in Gaza,” he said.

Aid groups have said that looting and wrongful seizure of aid trucks into Gaza has been a major problem but Hamas, the Islamist terrorist group that seized power in Gaza in 2007, denies seizing aid for its own members.

Saar declined to comment on an Israeli media report that Israel had set a 10-day deadline to reach an agreement or resume fighting but said: “If we want to do it, we will do it.”

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