Israel plays a cynical game. It makes phased agreements with the Palestinians that ensure it immediately gets what it wants. It then violates every subsequent phase and reignites its military assault.

Piece Plan – by Mr. Fish.
By Chris Hedges
ScheerPost
Israel, going back decades, has played a duplicitous game.
It signs a deal with the Palestinians that is to be implemented in phases. The first phase gives Israel what it wants — in this case the release of the Israeli hostages in Gaza — but Israel habitually fails to implement subsequent phases that would lead to a just and equitable peace.
It eventually provokes the Palestinians with indiscriminate armed assaults to retaliate, defines a Palestinian response as a provocation and abrogates the ceasefire deal to reignite the slaughter.
If this latest three-phase ceasefire deal is ratified — and there is no certainty that it will be by Israel — it will, I expect, be little more than a presidential inauguration bombing pause. Israel has no intention of halting its merry-go-round of death.
The Israeli Cabinet has delayed a vote on the ceasefire proposal while it continues to pound Gaza. At least 81 Palestinians have been killed in the last 24 hours.
The morning after a ceasefire agreement was announced, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu accused Hamas of reneging on part of the deal “in an effort to extort last minute concessions.”
He warned that his cabinet will not meet “until the mediators notify Israel that Hamas has accepted all elements of the agreement.”
Hamas dismissed Netanyahu’s claims and repeated their commitment to the ceasefire as agreed with the mediators.
The deal includes three phases.
The first phase, lasting 42 days, will see a cessation of hostilities. Hamas will release some Israeli hostages – 33 Israelis who were captured on Oct. 7, 2023, including all of the remaining five women, those aged above 50, and those with illnesses – in exchange for up to 1,000 Palestinians imprisoned by Israel.
The Israeli army will pull back from the populated areas of the Gaza Strip on the first day of the ceasefire. On the seventh day, displaced Palestinians will be permitted to return to northern Gaza. Israel will allow 600 aid trucks with food and medical supplies to enter Gaza daily.
The second phase, which begins on the 16th day of the ceasefire, will see the release of the remaining Israeli hostages. Israel will complete its withdrawal from Gaza during the second phase, maintaining a presence in some parts of the Philadelphi corridor, which stretches along the eight-mile border between Gaza and Egypt.
It will surrender its control of the Rafah border crossing into Egypt.
The third phase will see negotiations for a permanent end of the war.
But it is Netanyahu’s office that appears to have already reneged on the agreement. It released a statement rejecting Israeli troop withdrawal from the Philadelphi Corridor during the first 42-day phase of the ceasefire.
“In practical terms, Israel will remain in the Philadelphi Corridor until further notice,” while claiming the Palestinians are attempting to violate the agreement. Palestinians throughout the numerous ceasefire negotiations have demanded Israeli troops withdraw from Gaza.
Egypt has condemned the seizure of its border crossings by Israel.

Israeli military ground operations in the Gaza Strip on Nov. 1, 2023. (IDF Spokesperson’s Unit, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 3.0)
The deep fissures between Israel and Hamas, even if the Israelis finally accept the agreement, threaten to implode it.
Hamas is seeking a permanent ceasefire. But Israeli policy is unequivocal about its “right” to re-engage militarily.
There is no consensus about who will govern Gaza. Israel has made it clear the continuance of Hamas in power is unacceptable.
There is no mention of the status of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA), the U.N. agency that Israel has outlawed and that provides the bulk of the humanitarian aid given to the Palestinians, 95 percent of whom have been displaced.
There is no agreement on the reconstruction of Gaza, which lies in rubble. And, of course, there is no route in the agreement to an independent and sovereign Palestinian state.
Israeli mendacity and manipulation is pitifully predictable.
Camp David

Egyptian President Anwar Sadat (left), U.S. President Jimmy Carter and Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin after the Camp David Peace Accords signing ceremony at the White House on Sept. 17, 1978. (U.S. National Archives and Records Administration, Wikimedia Commons, Public domain)
The Camp David Accords, signed in 1978 by Egyptian President Anwar Sadat and Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin, without the participation of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO), normalized diplomatic relations between Israel and Egypt.
But the subsequent phases, which included a promise by Israel to resolve the Palestinian question along with Jordan and Egypt, permit Palestinian self-governance in the West Bank and Gaza within five years, and end the building of Israeli colonies in the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, were never honored.
Oslo
Or take the 1993 Oslo Accords. The agreement, signed in 1993, which saw the PLO recognize Israel’s right to exist and Israel recognize the PLO as the legitimate representatives of the Palestinian people; and Oslo II, signed in 1995, which detailed the process towards peace and a Palestinian state, was stillborn.
It stipulated that any discussion of illegal Jewish “settlements” was to be delayed until “final’ status talks, by which time Israeli military withdrawals from the occupied West Bank were to have been completed.
Governing authority was to be transferred from Israel to the supposedly temporary Palestinian Authority. The West Bank was carved up into Areas A, B and C.
The Palestinian Authority has limited authority in Areas A and B. Israel controls all of Area C, over 60 percent of the West Bank.

Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin, U.S. President Bill Clinton and the PLO’s Yasser Arafat at Oslo Accords signing ceremony, Sept. 13, 1993. (Vince Musi, White House, Wikimedia Commons, Public domain)
The right of Palestinian refugees to return to the historic lands seized from them in 1948 when Israel was created — a right enshrined in international law — was given up by the PLO leader Yasser Arafat, instantly alienating many Palestinians, especially those in Gaza where 75 percent are refugees or the descendants of refugees.
Edward Said called the Oslo agreement “an instrument of Palestinian surrender, a Palestinian Versailles” and lambasted Arafat as “the Pétain of the Palestinians.”
The scheduled Israeli military withdrawals under Oslo never took place. There was no provision in the interim agreement to end Jewish colonization, only a prohibition of “unilateral steps.”
There were around 250,000 Jewish colonists in the West Bank at the time of the Oslo agreement. They have increased to at least 700,000. No final treaty was ever concluded.
The journalist Robert Fisk called Oslo …
“a sham, a lie, a trick to entangle Arafat and the PLO into abandonment of all that they had sought and struggled for over a quarter of a century, a method of creating false hope in order to emasculate the aspiration of statehood.”
Israeli prime minister Yitzhak Rabin, who signed the Oslo agreement, was assassinated on Nov. 4, 1995, following a rally in support of the agreement, by Yigal Amir, a far-right Jewish law student.
Itamar Ben-Gvir, now Israel’s national security minister, was one of many rightwing politicians who issued threats against Rabin. Rabin’s widow, Leah, blamed Netanyahu and his supporters — who distributed leaflets at political rallies depicting Rabin in a Nazi uniform — for her husband’s murder.

Rabin, on the day he was assassinated, giving a speech in favor of the Oslo Peace agreement in Tel Aviv. (Israel Press and Photo Agency, Dan Hadani collection, National Library of Israel, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY 4.0)
Israel has carried out a series of murderous assaults on Gaza ever since, cynically calling the bombardment “mowing the lawn.”
These attacks, which leave scores of dead and wounded and further degrade Gaza’s fragile infrastructure, have names such as Operation Rainbow (2004), Operation Days of Penitence (2004), Operation Summer Rains (2006), Operation Autumn Clouds (2006) and Operation Hot Winter (2008).
Israel violated the June 2008 ceasefire agreement with Hamas, brokered by Egypt, by launching a border raid that killed six Hamas members. The raid provoked, as Israel intended, a retaliatory strike by Hamas, which fired crude rockets and mortar shells into Israel.
The Hamas barrage provided the pretext for a massive Israeli attack. Israel, as it always does, justified its military strike on the right to defend itself.
Operation Cast Lead (2008-2009), which saw Israel carry out a ground and aerial assault over 22 days, with the Israeli air force dropping over 1,000 tons of explosives on Gaza, killed 1,385 — according to the Israeli human rights group B’Tselem — of whom at least 762 were civilians, including 300 children.
Four Israelis were killed over the same period by Hamas rockets and nine Israeli soldiers died in Gaza, four of whom were victims of “friendly fire.” The Israeli newspaper Haaretz would later report that “Operation Cast Lead” had been prepared over the previous six months.
Israeli historian Avi Shlaim, who served in the Israeli military, wrote that:
“the brutality of Israel’s soldiers is fully matched by the mendacity of its spokesman…their propaganda is a pack of lies…It was not Hamas but the IDF that broke the ceasefire. It did so by a raid into Gaza on 4 November that killed six Hamas men. Israel’s objective is not just the defense of its population, but the eventual overthrow of the Hamas government in Gaza by turning the people against their rulers.”

Child in Gaza City during the cease fire after the 2008–2009 conflict. (andlun1, Flickr, CC BY-NC 2.0)
These series of attacks on Gaza were followed by Israeli assaults in November 2012, known as Operation Pillar of Defense and in July and August 2014 in Operation Protective Edge, a seven week campaign that left 2,251 Palestinians dead, along with 73 Israelis, including 67 soldiers.
These assaults by the Israeli military were followed in 2018 by largely peaceful protests by Palestinians, known as The Great March of Return, along Gaza’s fenced-in barrier. Over 266 Palestinians were gunned down by Israeli soldiers and 30,000 more were injured.
In May 2021, Israel killed over 256 Palestinians in Gaza following attacks by Israeli police on Palestinian worshippers at the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound in Jerusalem. Further attacks on worshippers at Al-Aqsa mosque took place in April 2023.
And then the breaching of the security barriers on Oct. 7, 2023 that enclose Gaza, where Palestinians had languished under a blockade for over 16 years in an open air prison.
The attacks by Palestinian gunmen [Al-Aqsa Deluge] left some 1,200 Israeli dead — including hundreds killed by Israel itself — and gave Israel the excuse it had long sought to lay waste to Gaza, in its Swords of Iron War.
This horrific saga is not over. Israel’s goals remain unchanged – the erasure of Palestinians from their land. This proposed ceasefire is one more cynical chapter. There are many ways it can and, I suspect, will fall apart.
But let us pray, at least for the moment, that the mass slaughter will stop.
Chris Hedges is a Pulitzer Prize–winning journalist who was a foreign correspondent for 15 years for The New York Times, where he served as the Middle East bureau chief and Balkan bureau chief for the paper. He previously worked overseas for The Dallas Morning News, The Christian Science Monitor and NPR. He is the host of show “The Chris Hedges Report.”
NOTE TO READERS: There is now no way left for me to continue to write a weekly column for ScheerPost and produce my weekly television show without your help. The walls are closing in, with startling rapidity, on independent journalism, with the elites, including the Democratic Party elites, clamoring for more and more censorship. Please, if you can, sign up at chrishedges.substack.com so I can continue to post my Monday column on ScheerPost and produce my weekly television show, “The Chris Hedges Report.”
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Views expressed in this interview may or may not reflect those of Consortium News.
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I hope the link below will show a video showing Palestinians in their thousands apparently demonstrating on the removal in 3 cars of the 3 hostages released recently.
As many who have commented on this video it apparently shows well dressed, not in rags, and well fed Palestinians shouting (if not added to the video) and waving, a little, in protest. It shows many large buildings untouched by bombing!
Any comments?
hxxps://x.com/realMaalouf/status/1881043972107485336?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1881043972107485336%7Ctwgr%5Eb698f13508a0f4f6eda4e11e2fdcc7571f47442d%7Ctwcon%5Es1_c10&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.conservativewoman.co.uk%2Fseen-elsewhere-this-week-in-the-alt-media-13%2F
The genocide is on pause. There are a lot people to kill and lots of buildings to be destroyed (and damage is seen on buildings in this video). After what Israel has done is it surprising that Israelis are not the most popular people in Gaza right now, even if these hostages had nothing to do with the genocide? And how can anyone tell from these pictures how well-fed these people are?
A fundamental and possibly currently insoluble problem is that while the sheer depravity of the Israelis is demonstrated every day, and is there for all to see, the bought and paid for politicians we have are just that – bought and paid for to, inter alia, not stop genocide. How else can their actions be explained – cash, threats, or blackmail? In their quieter private moments they may, repeat may, actually recognise this depravity and their support for it, but are compromised and have sold themselves. No self-respect, no honesty – each trying to outdo the other in their fulsome support of the Zionists, and always ready with the antisemitism slur against people who are not actually anti Judaism but simply anti-bastard (as polite as it can be said).
Some of the actions taken by the Governments in the US and the UK in support of Israeli degeneracy are absolutely disgusting, and cannot possibly be made in good conscience – but so long as politicians are eagerly queuing up to be corrupted, how can it be stopped? Proposals have been floated, for example, to limit political donations to candidates and parties, but it is the craved personal “boxes of chocolates” in various forms that pervert.
It is doubtful that this current “ceasefire” deal will last very long. One side has no intention of stopping murder and genocide, regarding the “ceasefire” as no more than a coffee break until some hostages are released.
Once, again, prophesy, poetry, proverbs, politicians, omens & “Art Imitates Life,” i.e., *“You can add up the parts; but, you won’t have the sum. You can strike up the march. There is no drum. Every heart, every heart, to love will come; But, like a refugee;” AND, Mr. Fish’s “Piece Plan,” sums up the calamity.
W/o a doubt, Chris Hedges’ “The Ceasefire Charade,” basically, is Hedges tracking the decades, never-ending, flight of “The Birds of Ill Omen;” AND, the landing, is 100% Hedges, *“With yourself, use your head. With others, use your heart.”
……..‘This horrific saga is not over. Israel’s goals remain unchanged – the erasure of Palestinians from their land. This proposed ceasefire is one more cynical chapter. There are many ways it can and, I suspect, will fall apart. But let us pray, at least for the moment, that the mass slaughter will stop.” Hear! Hear!!
Followed by, “Signs For All To See.” Just the other day, “our” 8 years young, “Lion-Son,” articulated an observation he discovered. He says to us, “January 1, 2020, began on a Wednesday, followed by Thursday, Friday. January 1, 2025, began on Wednesday, followed by Thursday, Friday. Double-You. Tee. Eff, (WTF), “What The….Fu..dge?” he asks; &, ROFLOL. He’s 8! “But, we, know what he’s say’n.” And, I’m thinking, hmmmm, that’s astute! OR coincidence, science, an omen; after all, *“we” asked for signs; &, the signs were sent;” &, the “wtf” moments, abound!!!
TY, Chris Hedges, Mr. Fish, CN, et al. “Keep It Lit!”
*Anthem,” Leonard Cohen
*An African proverb
I had one of those “signs”last week. On the strength of it (something I rarely do) I bought a lottery ticket. I didn’t get even one number. LOL.
……… “No Professor Doom’s gonna $tand in my way. Oooooh, I feel lucky today!” Mary Chapin Carpenter
Valerie, for the playlist, Mary Chapin Carpenter’s “I Feel Lucky,” @ https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=eLMkMfYJe4w&pp=ygUibWFyeSBjaGFwaW4gY2FycGVudGVyIGkgZmVlbCBsdWNreQ%3D%3D
…p.s., This tune, always, reminds me of, Joe Lauria, Clare Daly, Chris Hedges, in London, at The Royal Courts of Justice, i.e., “of all the people, on the planet, expected to be @ the Royal Courts of Justice, was the fearless, fierce, Irish MEP, CLARE DALY; and, She’s trying to make room for Joe Lauria!!! BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!!! (LeoSun).
…… “I was in the last batch admitted with no apparent seats left in a wood-paneled courtroom with just seven rows of 14 seats each. At the end of the row where I stood sat Clare Daly.” Joe Lauria
*CLARE DALY’S on Joe Lauria’s, right; Chris Hedges, is on his left,” 7 rows/14 seats; “taken;” &, Chris Hedges & Joe Lauria score a seat @ the table! Joe Lauria had to *“feel lucky” that day!!! @ “REPORTER’S NOTEBOOK: Covering Assange in Court.” March 4, 2024, JOE LAURIA @ hxxps://consortiumnews.com/2024/03/04/reporters-notebook-covering-assange-in-court/
It’s a shame Clare didn’t get back into the european parliament. She knows how to tell it like it is. Thanx for the links.
Leo ,
I am in respectof your son .
What that pride must feel like I can only imagine .
I lost my only son , it hurts .
I know what its like to see others die , some by choice but I could only console , it was their option as they felt it was the only choice ? ( not my son tho ) . I think the help they could have gotten , they believed the help would be in vain for health reasons and money .
in my heart I feel like I am unsure of my allowing that course was their intrepide , its a burden to bear .
I have great appreciation for Chris H. , helping those on the inside . I have admit I do not know him personnaly but am sure he would allow me to disagree with him but have not found a hard moment that he deserves that .
To end I can make a reference to a pun when riding in the car with others while passing a cemetary as to how many prisoners we should release or how many are dead in that yard .
the response was always ” All of Them ”
I am amongst giants here no matter how small .
thank you for my allowance to post .
Hi, joe Ell the 3rd,
Thank you. I begin, w/the end, “passing a cemetery,” reminds me of another time, i.e., we were going to visit Grandpa’s grave, “ugh, i don’t want to. No. Every time, we go, he’s never there.” The human response is to “Make It Make Sense.”
“Losing your son, joe Ell the 3rd,” I am so sorry. I know the hurt, it never dies! No doubt, life is NOT always wonderful & NOT all right. There’s so much wrong. More often than not, many people have days that are incomplete. No doubt, deception, destruction & death shatter lives & break hearts. It’s universal. No one is immune! The owl asks, “WHOse plan is this anyway?” The bird tweets, “The “powers that be” find the most convenient way to kill us, slowly.”
…joe Ell the 3rd, I don’t know Chris Hedges, personally; but, i did get a “Save the Date,” surprise gift, once, “Chris Hedges,” in person, at an organized speaking event, just for him!!!He was anwesome. Imo, Hedges’ “got” heart & bones!!! is approachable, friendly & absolutely spot-on about what’s been going on, for eons!! No doubt, you would receive a friendly welcome. He’s a gentleman. For example, @ “The Real News,” Chris Hedges w/Vijay Prashad, “Struggle Makes Us Human.”
This conversation answers everything! It absolutely, seriously, addresses the convenient way, the “Powers That Be” use, abuse & abandon all people in the Universe @ “Struggle Makes Us Human,” @ hxxps://m.youtube.com/watch?v=9WfSPU_kBxs&pp=ygUbQ2hyaXMgaGVkZ2VzIHZpamF5IHByYXNoYWQg
And, Hedges, Prashad, are two of many, other writers, investigative journalists, good people, imo, who are f/brillant. Found here @ CN’s Home Page! They know the what, why & how stuff works.
..joe Ell the 3rd, fingers crossed, you have come away with CN’s “spirit,” i.e., “You may be the greatest swimmer on earth; but, it does NOT make you better than the smallest fish.” Ugandan proverb.
Onward & Upwards. TY.
in all its gruesomeness great article, thank you. what can we do but pray and hope and show our (grand)children that Nüremberg’s “Never Again” was cheap and meaningless. remember the children – hxxps://thedailybeagle.substack.com/p/it-impugns-the-conscience
One would think that by now the ‘civilized’ world knows about the Zionists and their lies.
I think there are reasons to feel a sense of optimism about the recent agreement:
– The release of all hostages further undermines any justification for future Israeli attacks on Palestine.
– While analyzing history can provide insight into the current situation, it falls short when it comes to long-term predictions. Sure, Western culture continues to exploit human ingenuity for deceit and manipulation, leveraging our basest bestial instincts to attain wealth and power, but that strategy has become outdated. The toll this war is taking on the Israeli economy is substantial and will only worsen as hypocrisy and extremist ideologies rooted in brutality and “archaism” dominates.
The West alone cannot rescue Israel; in fact, it’s barely holding itself together against looming economic crises and potential wider conflicts. Diverting essential funds to military endeavors at this critical juncture, at the wrongest time ever, with a huge opportunity cost. The West has hit an economic dead end, choosing isolation over openness; they barricaded themselves in their tiny “incestuous” reign, where the same ideas interbreed until they no longer produce anything meaningful—only monstrosities.
The Western economy has never been truly efficient; it thrived on the exploitation of others’ resources. Now that those avenues are closing off, they employ an old tactics, land grabs, provocations, and wars, devide and conquer—as if the world hasn’t evolved since WWII. Only a culture steeped in narcissism could fail to recognize this.
So let the West and Israel carry on with their self-destructive charade while Russia, Iran, and China sit back—perhaps even entertained—watching Atlantis sink into a sea of its own foolishness and ignorance.
Food for thought, jamie, many thanks. Last line is pure poetry.
“cynical”
This is an understatement.
Great artwork Mr.Fish.
Valerie!!!
I got to say, “it’s so good to “see” you, hear you!!! All the best to you. Cheers!!!
Hey LeoSun. Great to be back. After the CN takeover/hacking I wasn’t able to comment. Sorted it out now.
Awh, Valerie, “the CN takeover/hacking” no doubt, was/is a colossal “WTF?!?” The owl asks, “Who, ordered the dagger pierced thru the heart of CN?” The bird tweets, “the $hadow, knows;” &, the readership sings “Don’t fall apart me, tonight. I just don’t think that i could handle it.”
……. “Yesterday’s just a memory. Tomorrow is never what it’s supposed to be.”
“Our” lighthouse, Consortium News, “GOT” “beneath the surface waste. No more booby traps and bombs. No more decadence and charm. No more affection that’s misplaced…..You know, the streets are filled with vipers, who’ve lost all ray of hope. You know, it’s not even safe no more, in the palace of the Pope.” Bob Dylan, “Don’t Fall Apart On Me Tonight,” @ hxxps://m.youtube.com/watch?v=97vZ2qOQv_c&pp=ygUrZHlsYW4gZG9uJ3QgZmFsbCBhcGFydCBvbiBtZSB0b25pZ2h0IGx5cmljcw%3D%3D
TY, Valerie! Onward & Upwards! “L O N G Live, Consortium News!!!” Keep It Lit.
I’d prefer a viper to some of these decadent humans. Long live CN.