Ultimately Wondering: Will Hamas Lay Down Their Arms?
A close friend from Tel Aviv texted me from her vacation in New York. She said she doesn’t know how to read from afar how things are progressing with the deal and asked me to update her. I responded in stream of consciousness, assuming she really knows as much as I do, trying to convey my thoughts, and the atmosphere, elation at the idea of the hostages coming home Monday, maybe Sunday, the war ending. Not on everyone’s radar, also feeling relieved for Gazans, and echoing a friend, a Palestinian, Arab-Bedouin citizen of Israel who said to me on Thursday, “No winners, just let’s have the hostages at home and let Gazans have food even if still homeless, let the deal rid us of the evil Hamas.”
Most of what I wrote to my friend is translated below, capturing fleeting moments, and moments later, I would likely write about another nuance of the moment.
Waiting for the hostages.
Talk about which Palestinian terrorists will be released from Israeli prisons as part of the deal. Israel did not bend to demands to release terrorists with Israeli citizenship.
You can imagine: anticipation, anxiety. Talk about the three hospitals that will receive the hostages – they are ready. The former hostages who returned over the course of the past two years waiting and speaking – in my mind a group for whom this event has exceptional meaning, because they too are hostages’ families. Constant talk about the second stage: How will it be managed? What does it mean – Qataris in Gaza? How will we eradicate Hamas? What will happen to the family gangs in Gaza that collaborated with Israel – and how will we relate to them?
Feeling like a dripping spigot, releasing fluid thoughts. Eisenkot according to a poll on Thursday was down to four seats and Kahlon considering a political comeback. (Just my way of conveying how pathetic the political situation looks if we were to have elections tomorrow.)
Still struggling to answer the question of how a state can be Jewish and democratic. When I wrote that to my friend, I mistyped “question” in Hebrew at first, and with most of the same letters, wrote, “delusion.” I rambled on, just thoughts loitering in districts where they are inadequately knowledgeable, but if I had once thought that Israeli society reflected methods it used during the British Mandate in order to elude the British, and methods familiar from lands of Exile where the Jewish community faced hostile regimes, now I wonder if Israeli society mostly told and tells lies to itself, and if this can be fixed. Maybe I am not such a fatalist and stick to delusions. Maybe on the day after which could be today, and maybe Monday – in any case, the day after wasn’t planned, and can’t be separated from the day before, because that can’t be. Yet let no one mention to me going back to what we were, and not even to what we could have been, because after all, what could we have been?
On the implications of the Gush Katif evacuation (as opposed to the Gaza disengagement in 2005 – more than just another name for the same), I admit not forming an opinion in the past for lack of understanding of its significance. Now, I avoid television programs on the subject, allowing common sense to take what it can from promos. Common sense? How did I miss it then? How did we as a society fail to understand that the evacuation of Gush Katif, was a culmination of past schisms and present schisms growing deeper and wider, leading us astray? Rambling thoughts: did we think the state would not only be our safe place from cruel and destructive anti-Semites, but that it would enable their eradication?
Back to the television screen, listening, processing, remembering other bytes: it was agreed that Hamas will not hold ceremonies upon releasing the hostages. There is talk about how they will be protected in the process until they reach Israeli hands. Talk, again, about how long it will take until the for the bodies of the hostages who are no longer living to be returned. Schedules are not clear. Contradictory statements about the hostages being released from different locations or all being led to one place where they will be delivered to the Red Cross and from there to Israeli forces. Not interpreted by reporters as Hamas making trouble – just the logistical reality.
Witkoff and Kushner spoke at Hostages’ Square at the weekly Saturday night demonstration. People cheered to mention of Trump and booed at mention of Bibi. Witkoff and Kusher apparently have the job of ensuring stage two. Israelis can’t envision Hamas laying down their arms.
Harriet Gimpel, October 11, 2025
