Hamas will soon enter the disarmament process, the IDF said on Friday.
The announcement was aspirational, in that Hamas has not yet done so, and no one can really know whether the Gazan terror group will follow through, but it showed a growing confidence from IDF sources that Hamas overall is leaning toward taking painful steps to keep Israel from reinvading Gaza.
Next, the IDF was very vague about what it believed this disarmament would consist of.
The US said around three months ago that by late April-early May, Hamas would need to start handing over its heavy weapons, such as its remaining rockets, drones, anti-tank missiles, and maps of its as-yet uncharted terror tunnels.
Until the IDF statement, there had been significant media speculation that Hamas might use Israel and the US being distracted by the Iran war to drag out the deadline for starting the first disarmament stage.
In fact, in public, Hamas has demanded that Israel allow more rebuilding of Gaza processes to take place before it would be asked to start to disarm.
Absent Israel allowing more rebuilding, Hamas earlier this week conditionally rejected US demands to start disarming.
The IDF statement appears to reflect deeper confidence that Hamas may negotiate some concessions from the US and Israeli side, but that it will ultimately begin the disarmament process, a radical step it has never taken before.
No date for when Hamas needs to proceed to stage two of disarmament
That said, even if that step occurs, there is no deadline for when Hamas might need to give up its Kalashnikov rifles (stage two of disarmament), which help it dominate Gaza, and it is unclear if Hamas would ever do so, since such a step might truly risk losing control of the Strip.
No one has even discussed with any real seriousness the possibility that Hamas might give up its small weapons, such as handguns (stage three of disarmament)
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