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--:-- Sean Rameswaram: Welcome to Today Explained. I'm Sean Rameswaram.
--:-- Noel King: And I'm Noel King.
--:-- Sean Rameswaram: Today, we're talking about the Israel-Hamas war. President Joe Biden says the US won't supply further weapons if Israel is going to use them in Rafah. Our guest is Barak Ravid, a politics and foreign policy reporter at Axios.
--:-- Barak Ravid: Thanks for having me on the show.
--:-- Sean Rameswaram: So, let's start with the basics. Israeli defense forces took over the Rafah crossing on Tuesday. What are they doing now?
--:-- Barak Ravid: They captured the crossing, the Palestinian side of the crossing. It's a strategic site for Hamas for several reasons. The one who controls the crossing controls the A-trux. The one who controls the A-trux has a lot of power inside Gaza. That's number one. Number two, Hamas collects taxes in this crossing. It's a lot of money. And third, and maybe most important, by the way, is the symbolic thing here.
--:-- Noel King: Because one of the goals that Hamas has and the goal that Israel has, which is completely the opposite, is, you know, this fight over whether Hamas is still ruling Gaza or not.
--:-- Barak Ravid: And the Rafah crossing was a main site that Hamas could use to say, we're the boss, okay? We're the boss because we control the crossing. We're still standing on our two feet. We're still running the show.
--:-- Sean Rameswaram: And when they're not in the Rafah crossing, Israel can say, you see, we eliminated a big part of Hamas's governmental control over Gaza.
--:-- Barak Ravid: In reality, I'm not sure that this is like a major achievement in the war for Israel or a major defeat for Hamas or that it will have any influence on really where this thing is going.
--:-- Noel King: Is aid still getting into Gaza and getting to the Palestinians?
--:-- Barak Ravid: So the answer is yes, but, okay, meaning aid is still coming in, but it's coming in with several caveats, meaning the Rafah crossing is shut down.
--:-- Sean Rameswaram: And what happened a day after, after a lot of pressure from the Biden administration and from President Biden himself in a conversation with Benjamin Netanyahu, the Israeli prime minister?
--:-- Barak Ravid: Israel reopened the Kerem Shalom crossing, which is two miles from the Rafah crossing.
--:-- Noel King: And what's the situation with the hostage deal? Is there any progress there?
--:-- Barak Ravid: So the latest is that we don't have a ceasefire yet and we don't have a hostage deal yet. But I think it is clear to everybody who's dealing with this, both in the Biden administration, in the Israeli government, in the Qatari government, in the Egyptian government, and in Hamas, that the only way to get to a ceasefire in the foreseeable future, the only way is if there's a hostage deal.
--:-- Sean Rameswaram: And what's the main gap in the hostage deal negotiations?
--:-- Barak Ravid: The main gap is whether this hostage deal, if implemented in full, will end the war or not.
--:-- Noel King: Because Benjamin Netanyahu said he was prepared to pause the fighting, but not prepared to end the war and leave Hamas in power.
--:-- Barak Ravid: Hamas says, you want a hostage deal? No problem. After the last hostage is released, we want this to be the end of the war and want to know that it's the end of the war in a very early stage of the implementation.
--:-- Sean Rameswaram: And Israel says, listen, we're ready to go into this process, but we don't promise you that that's the end of the war.
--:-- Barak Ravid: We'll see, we'll get into the process, you release the hostages, and because the process is, if fully implemented, you're talking about something like three months of ceasefire. They say, you know, in three months, we'll decide whether we're resuming the war or not.
--:-- Noel King: So, let's talk about President Biden's breaking point on Rafah. What do you think led to that decision?
--:-- Barak Ravid: I think we are definitely close to a breaking point. So, for example, what I heard from White House officials is that, you know, this the capture of the Rafa crossing is definitely not crossing Biden's red line and it's not a breaking point.
--:-- Sean Rameswaram: And what about the mechanics of pausing arms shipments to Israel? Is that symbolic or is that going to directly affect Israel's ability to conduct this war?
--:-- Barak Ravid: It's still symbolic. Okay. Because Israel has a lot of its own munitions and artillery shells and things like that. It depends also on U.S.-made weapons. But again, in the immediate term, this is not going to change, okay? Israel doesn't need this shipment that was held up or other U.S.-made weapons in order to go into Rafah.
--:-- Noel King: How is Netanyahu responding to this ultimatum from President Biden?
--:-- Barak Ravid: So, you know, there's a funny thing because Bibi's people started telling reporters that on the last phone call that Biden had with Netanyahu on Monday, he told Biden after the president told him that if you go into Rafa, who will, you know, suspend military aid. So they said that Netanyahu told them if Israel has to, it will fight with its fingernails.
--:-- Sean Rameswaram: And what does that mean?
--:-- Barak Ravid: It means that Netanyahu wants to deliver the message that, you know what, Joe Biden, you don't want to give me weapons. No problem. I don't need you. We will fight to our last bullet. We will fight with our fingernails.
--:-- Noel King: What do you think led to President Biden's decision to draw this red line?
--:-- Barak Ravid: I think it's because, you know, those demonstrations have their influence. If Israel goes into Rafah, this means that this war is going to escalate and going to continue for many more months.
--:-- Sean Rameswaram: And what's the big question here?
--:-- Barak Ravid: Whether there is a hostage deal and whether you can get to a point where both parties can get into some sort of an agreement that one side says, we didn't commit to end the war, and the other side says, we got the commitment that the war is going to end.
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--:-- Sean Rameswaram: Thanks for listening to Today Explained. If you want to support the show, you can make a financial contribution to Vox at vox.com/givepodcasts.
--:-- Noel King: And if you want to take a survey, you can go to vox.com/podcastsurvey.
--:-- Sean Rameswaram: Thanks for listening.
--:-- Noel King: And thanks for being a part of the Vox community.
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