While America Voted, Israel Set the Stage for Annexing Northern Gaza

One day before the U.S. election, Israel told the United Nations that it would be cutting ties with UNRWA, its aid agency for Palestinian refugees. On Election Day itself, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu dismissed Defense Minister Yoav Gallant — who had challenged him on his approach to a ceasefire and the return of hostages. Later that night in Tel Aviv time, as Americans went to the polls, the Israeli military told national media that it is getting closer to the “complete evacuation” of northern Gaza, and residents would not be allowed to return.

The victory of Donald Trump wouldn’t become clear until the next morning in Israel, but Netanyahu acted as if his preferred candidate was already in the White House. The green light from the U.S. government to carry out his war is, apparently, glowing even brighter. That same night, Israeli Brig. Gen. Itzik Cohen said that humanitarian aid would no longer arrive in northern Gaza, since there are “no more civilians left.”

“That really is a frightening statement, because the intention is to leave nothing and no one living behind,” said Khaled Elgindy, a senior fellow at the Middle East Institute think tank. The U.N. warned last week that “the entire Palestinian population in North Gaza, especially children, is at imminent risk of dying from disease, famine, and the ongoing bombardments.”

Israel “understood they were going to have an entirely free hand to do what they wanted.”

The Harris campaign and Biden administration did not want to be seen as critical of Israel ahead of the election, according to Yousef Munayyer, head of the Palestine/Israel program at Arab Center Washington D.C. As a result, the Israeli government “understood they were going to have an entirely free hand to do what they wanted,” said Munayyer. “Netanyahu understood that he had an opportunity to do things in the last three months that he probably would have got a lot more pushback on if there wasn’t an election on the horizon.” That includes the pager attacks on Beirut and the assassination of Hezbollah leaders, he said.

Now some Israeli officials want to gain control of northern Gaza by starving or killing the remaining Palestinians living in the area, following a proposal known as the “General’s Plan.” In late October, the Washington Post reported that Secretary of State Antony Blinken questioned Netanyahu about this plan, according to a senior State Department official who requested anonymity. The State Department told Netanyahu that there was a perception that Israel was denying food to those who refused to leave the north — to which Netanyahu responded that this was “not our policy” and that this perception exists is “deeply damaging,” per the official. The Israeli prime minister also shot down a request by U.S. officials that he distance himself from these allegations publicly, the Post reported.

Israeli attacks on Gaza, the West Bank, and Lebanon have continued over the last week, killing dozens of civilians. The U.N. reported on X that Israeli security forces killed at least eight people in the West Bank on Tuesday and fatally shot an unarmed 14-year-old Palestinian boy two days earlier. On Wednesday, officials in the eastern city of Baalbek in Lebanon, stated that at least 30 people were killed and 35 were injured in Israeli attacks. An Israeli airstrike on Monday in northern Gaza killed 20 people — most of whom were women and children, according to Palestinian officials. Hussam Abu Safiya, the director of Gaza’s Kamal Adwan Hospital, wrote in a statement to The Intercept that the hospital, including the children’s department, was directly targeted. The hospital, in Beit Lahiya, has been functioning in a limited capacity after being raided by the Israeli military.

Gallant’s dismissal on Tuesday was also a controversial move and led to sweeping protests across Israel. While Gallant previously described Israel’s fight as being against “human animals,” he has pushed harder than Netanyahu for a ceasefire with Hamas — believing it could be more effective than continued military pressure in freeing Israeli hostages. Gallant also clashed with Netanyahu over his desire to scrap an exemption from military service for ultra-Orthodox Jews.

Elgindy notes that Netanyahu may have taken advantage of the timing of American elections to get rid of a popular critic within the government. “That would have ruffled feathers in Washington, especially in the Pentagon, where they have a very close relationship with (Gallant),” he said. Munayyer stresses that it likely had little to do with the American election — and more to do with domestic politics. “It’s something that’s been brewing for some time. … Netanyahu needed a degree of cohesion and the Defense Minister was unwilling to fully play along with everything.”

How Trump will handle Israel and Gaza during his second term remains unclear. Trump has repeatedly said that he wants peace in the Middle East and called on Israel to “finish the job.” He has also told Netanyahu that he wants Israel’s war on Gaza to end by the time he takes office, which could inspire an intensification of Israeli military attacks in the coming months.

The rhetoric is vague enough that he’s been able to win over some anti-war voters. (Trump won 42 percent of the vote in the majority Arab-American city of Dearborn, Michigan, with Jill Stein winning 18 percent and Kamala Harris 36 percent, according to unofficial city results.) On the campaign trail, he called specifically for an end to the suffering and destruction in Lebanon. “It’s a smart talking point. He chose the right words,” Elgindy said “It was a cost-free way for him to tap into that anger and resentment against Biden and Harris, and it worked to a large extent.”

But Trump’s gestures toward anti-war rhetoric needs to be balanced with the pro-Israel slant of his base, his close advisers, and his policy decisions while he was in power, Munayyer said. “We cannot put too much faith in what Trump says and does on the campaign trail to understand what he might do once in office,” Munayyer said.

In Trump’s first term, he recognized Jerusalem as the capital of Israel and relocated the U.S. Embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem. He made the U.S. the first country to recognize Israel’s sovereignty over the Golan Heights — even though international law considers it to be occupied territory. The Trump administration also cut off U.S. funding for UNRWA in 2018. “We know the personnel that (Trump) had around him and who he’s likely to bring back or include in some way in his Administration,” Munayyer said. “None of that bodes well for peacemaking.”

Last month, the U.S. warned Israel that it would consider stopping the flow of weapons if Israel did not take action to let more humanitarian aid into Gaza. The U.S. State Department gave Netanyahu a deadline of 30 days; it expires on November 12. But by then, it may be too late to have any real impact, given Trump’s inauguration in January. “Even if they were to take a harder line on the Israeli government, that’s not going to last very long,” Munayyer said. “Netanyahu has a sort of stay of execution and has more time now to do as he pleases.”

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