Haviv Rettig Gur
This is the best articulation of the Hamas tragedy I’ve read in a long time. It’s a classic example of the sunk costs fallacy. If Israel is not actually removable, then the safety and happiness of generations of Palestinians were sacrificed to a vast and foolish miscalculation by ruthless and incompetent ideologues. Since that’s too painful to contemplate, every time they fail to destroy the Jews, they double down on the claim that it’s nevertheless possible. And thus are another generation’s safety and prosperity sacrificed yet again on the crumbling old altar of Israel’s destruction. If they knew the first thing about us, if they saw us as real people with a real story rather than ideological constructs and cartoon villains shrunk to the needs of a racist ideology, they could pivot, repair and rebuild. But that would require a whole new Palestinian elite, a new willingness to learn about us, and a new capacity to think unromantically about their strategic options. People often say Palestinians need a nonviolent unifier and mobilizer like Mandela or King. They actually need a wise and unsentimental strategist, a Herzl.
Hamza
What does it take to surrender? The human souls? We lost enough. The city? Totally destroyed. Those who survived? Barely trying to survive one more day. Yet Hamas refuses. Not out of strength, not out of strategy, but because surrender means facing their own failure. It means admitting that all of this—the loss, the destruction, the unimaginable suffering—was for nothing. And that is something they cannot bear. So they hold on. Not for the people, not for Gaza, but for themselves. Because to surrender would be to let go of the power they’ve built, the control they’ve maintained, and the narrative they’ve spun for decades. They are not the ones searching for food in the rubble. They are not the ones watching their children waste away. They sit in safety while others pay the price. How much more is there to lose before they decide it’s enough? Or is the truth that they never will—because the suffering of Gaza has never been their concern, only their weapon.