US Vice-President JD Vance is one of three US envoys monitoring the Gaza ceasefire in Israel. Photo / Getty Images
United States Vice-President JD Vance and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu met today in Jerusalem as the Trump Administration redoubled efforts to preserve the Gaza ceasefire.
Concerns grew in Israel over whether the US would seek to limit its military actions in the enclave.
“We don’t want a vassal state, and that’s not what Israel is … we want an ally,” Vance said in brief remarks to reporters alongside the Prime Minister, adding he was optimistic that “the ceasefire is going to hold”.
Vance arrived in Israel yesterday, joining Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner, US President Donald Trump’s son-in-law, to help calm tensions after violence flared in Gaza over the weekend, with two Israeli soldiers and 45 Palestinians killed.
The three envoys were also there to open a US-run civil-military co-ordination centre to monitor the deal, ahead of an expected visit by Secretary Marco Rubio tomorrow.
The Administration’s public push to uphold the ceasefire, which went into effect on October 10, is “not about monitoring in the sense of, you know, you monitor a toddler”, Vance said today.
“It’s about monitoring in the sense that there’s a lot of work.”
Still, Netanyahu came under fire this week from critics who said US officials are dictating Israel’s post-war policy in Gaza.
“This makes him look very bad, like he is not protecting Israel,” said Jonathan Rynhold, a political scientist from Bar-Ilan University in central Israel.
“When it comes to Israel’s security, we do what we have to do,” Netanyahu told reporters.
He added that while the two countries could have “some disagreements here and there”, the US-Israel relationship was ultimately “a partnership”.
The Prime Minister lost much of his political support following Hamas’ deadly October 7, 2023, attack on Israel, which killed around 1200 people and saw some 250 others taken as hostages, and for his failure to develop a viable strategy for the post-war period.
Israel’s two-year-long military campaign in Gaza has killed at least 68,234 people, according to the Gaza Health Ministry, which does not distinguish between civilians and combatants but says the majority of the dead are women and children.
The initial agreement between Israel and Hamas is part of a multiphase deal to end the war, but there is no clear timeline or mechanism for getting through the various steps, including the creation of an international peacekeeping force or programme to disarm and demobilise Hamas.
The deal is backed by the US, Egypt, Qatar and Turkey, and enjoys support from other nations in the Middle East and Europe, but the open-ended nature of the agreement has made the ceasefire appear more tenuous, according to Gayil Talshir, a political scientist at Hebrew University in Jerusalem.
“Because the ceasefire agreement isn’t finalised - the international body doesn’t yet exist, the Palestinian government hasn’t been formed, and there are two million people in Gaza who need infrastructure and services … Everything is subject to pressure from all sides: Hamas, Israel, the mediators,” she said.
Michael Milshtein, the former head of the Palestinian department in Aman, Israel’s military intelligence agency, said that the diplomacy this week has revealed “the daylight that exists between Israel and the US” on how to implement the ceasefire.
Much of the Israeli security establishment views the visits as a means to establishing a “red light” on Israeli military action on Gaza, he added.
“What will the US do when, in another month, Hamas fires rockets into Israel or attempts to smuggle weapons? Will Israel have the most basic permission to attack back?”
According to Khaled Okasha, a diplomatic and security consultant who advised the Egyptian and Palestinian delegations during ceasefire talks in Sharm el-Sheikh this month, the agreement stipulated that “the US would be the judge and evaluate who is not doing their part of the deal”.
Any violations by Hamas would be addressed by the US directly or through Egypt or Qatar, he said.
Egypt also sent its intelligence chief and lead negotiator, Hassan Mahmoud Rashad, to Israel this week, where he met with Netanyahu, Witkoff, and Kushner.
“All these people went to Israel because they were annoyed that there’s no seriousness, that there’s a different interpretation by Israel of the deal,” Okasha said.
He added that Rashad’s unusual, face-to-face meeting with Netanyahu “tells you there’s a huge problem”.
It’s a sign that “things are not very promising in Israel, or at least it’s not going as the process should be”.
Sign up to Herald Premium Editor’s Picks, delivered straight to your inbox every Friday. Editor-in-Chief Murray Kirkness picks the week’s best features, interviews and investigations. Sign up for Herald Premium here.