Hamas disarmament cannot wait for the IDF's withdrawal from Gaza - editorial

ByJPOST EDITORIALAUGUST 2, 2026 05:55The latest Gaza proposal is better than the empty language that has surrounded much of the postwar discussion. It addresses Hamas’s weapons, the tunnels, the command structure, the future administration of Gaza, and the link between demilitarization and Israeli withdrawal.That is important, but it is not enough. Israel cannot agree to a process in which withdrawal, reconstruction, or political recognition move forward on the assumption that Hamas will disarm later.The issue is not whether disarmament appears in the document - it does - the issue is whether Hamas is required to carry it out before Israel gives up the leverage needed to make it happen.Hamas has spent the period since October 7 using every negotiation to gain time, preserve control, and push the most difficult questions into the next phase. Deals have produced real achievements - above all the return of hostages - and that matters. But Hamas’s military power has remained largely untouched by diplomacy.The negotiations show the same risk, with Hamas already presenting its obligations as conditional on Israeli steps that would come first in practice. It has repeatedly rejected disarmament, qualified it, or offered formulations that leave its weapons under a different name or authority.(Illustrative) Palestinian members of al-Qassam Brigades, the armed wing of the Hamas movement. (credit: ABED RAHIM KHATIB/FLASH90)The latest proposal may be more serious, but it still depends on sequencing. If Hamas is allowed to remain armed while a new Palestinian committee enters Gaza, while international bodies begin work, and while Israeli forces pull back, the result may be a civilian structure operating under the same threat that has shaped Gaza for years.Israeli withdrawal can not happen based on Hamas promisesThe United States should be careful not to mistake a framework for implementation. Titles, ceremonies, international boards, and public declarations may help move negotiations forward, but they do not remove a single rocket, destroy a single tunnel, or prevent Hamas from rebuilding. Israel cannot base a withdrawal on what Hamas says it intends to do.The standard must be physical and verifiable. Weapons need to be collected and placed beyond use, while production sites and tunnels need to be located and destroyed. Smuggling routes, command networks, and financing systems need to be dismantled. Inspectors must be able to enter sites without warning, and violations must stop the next stage automatically.Food, medicine, water, shelter, and basic services should reach civilians regardless of Hamas’s conduct, and they should do so without strengthening Hamas’s control where possible.Large-scale reconstruction is different. It brings money, building materials, jobs, contracts, and influence. If it begins while Hamas remains armed, it risks rebuilding the system that allowed the organization to embed itself in every part of life in Gaza. Reconstruction should expand first in areas that have been independently verified as demilitarized and where a civilian authority can operate without armed intimidation.Palestinians deserve real chance to live in peaceThis is also not an argument against Palestinians. Hamas is not the Palestinian people, and it has done very little to improve their lives. It seized Gaza by force, suppressed opposition, restricted political choice, and built a society around war rather than public welfare. If its priority had been Palestinians, Gaza would have looked very different long before October 7.The anti-Hamas militias and clans that have emerged in parts of Gaza are evidence that the population is not politically uniform. They are not, however, a ready-made replacement.They are fragmented, locally based, and in some cases accused of criminality, looting, or abuse. Gaza cannot move from Hamas rule to rule by competing armed groups. Any future system must apply the same principle to all of them: one civilian authority and no independent militias.Palestinians deserve a real chance to live under a government that is not preparing for the next war; Israelis deserve to know that an IDF withdrawal will not be followed by rearmament, new tunnels, and another attack.Those goals are not in conflict, as both require Hamas to lose the military power it has used against Israel and against Palestinians.Diplomacy and humanitarian relief should continue, and a Palestinian civilian administration should be built. But none of that can become a mechanism for allowing Hamas to survive the war with its weapons, its coercive power, and its ability to start the next one.The test is not whether Hamas signs a disarmament clause. It is whether Hamas is, in fact, disarmed.Follow us on Google