The Israeli military’s departure from southern Gaza over the weekend has left the territory without a major battlefield for the first time since a brief truce with Hamas in November, raising hopes that the two sides might reach another cease-fire.
Analysts say the redeployment means that the war is entering a new phase, one in which Israeli forces, mainly stationed along Gaza’s borders, will mostly mount brief raids into the territory before retreating to Israel, rather than lengthy ground maneuvers involving large numbers of troops.
By withdrawing without either capturing Hamas’s last major stronghold, Rafah, or empowering an alternative Palestinian leadership, Israel has left behind a power vacuum in which Hamas could regroup and re-emerge as a military force across much of the territory.
That likelihood has prompted expectations that Israel will continue to mount small-scale operations across Gaza to prevent Hamas’s resurgence, extending the war for months to come. That strategy could occupy a middle ground between reaching a lasting truce with Hamas and advancing in force into Rafah.
The Israeli military said on Sunday that its 98th Division had left Khan Younis in southern Gaza in order “to recuperate and prepare for future operations.” That leaves no Israeli troops actively maneuvering in southern Gaza, according to two officials briefed on the matter who were not authorized to speak publicly about it.
The drawdown of troops continues a process that began in January and leaves the equivalent of a single brigade in all of Gaza, or fewer than 5,000 troops — down from roughly 50,000 at the height of the war in December.
The remaining troops inside Gaza are mostly guarding a buffer zone that Israel has created by destroying Palestinian buildings along the border, or positioned along a narrow land corridor that splits northern Gaza, including Gaza City, from the rest of the territory.
Two journalists for The New York Times traveled down the corridor last week, observing how it functions as a supply road for troops, a barrier to displaced Gazans attempting to move back to north Gaza, and a potential launchpad for future Israeli military operations in northern and central Gaza.
The Israeli leadership painted the withdrawal as a sign of Israel’s progress on the battlefield, and something it had long predicted. Israeli officials have said that, having routed Hamas, their army would eventually move most of its troops back to the strip’s perimeter and conduct brief attacks on specific targets, instead of carrying out large-scale ground maneuvers across wide areas.
The 98th Division’s operations in southern Gaza were “extremely impressive,” the Israeli defense minister, Yoav Gallant, said in a statement. “Their activities enabled the dismantling of Hamas as a functioning military unit in this area,” he added.
To others, the drawdown constitutes an Israeli failure. Despite mounting a campaign that local authorities say has killed more than 33,000 and left Gaza in ruins and on the brink of famine, Israel is leaving most of the strip without having achieved the goals it set for itself after Hamas raided Israel on Oct. 7, setting off the war.
Hamas’s most senior leaders are still alive; several thousand Hamas fighters are still at large; and roughly half of the hostages taken on Oct. 7 are still in Gaza. Israel’s withdrawal has left most of Gaza without a functional administration, and the void could yet be filled once more by Hamas.
“In the six months of war, we failed to achieve even a single one of the objectives,” wrote Nahum Barnea, a prominent Israeli commentator, in a column on Monday for the centrist Yediot Ahronot. “We did not destroy Hamas,” he added.
To rout Hamas, Israel would need to follow through on its promise to advance on Rafah, the southern city where most of its remaining fighters and military leaders are thought to be hiding.
“That will happen,” Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said in a video statement released on Monday, adding that a date had been set for the offensive, which he did not reveal.
Mr. Gallant said on Sunday that the military was preparing for “follow-up missions” that included “the Rafah area. We will reach a point when Hamas no longer controls the Gaza Strip and does not function as a military framework that poses a threat to the citizens of the state of Israel.”
Mr. Netanyahu faces intense pressure to proceed with the Rafah operation from far-right members of his ruling coalition, who have threatened to collapse the government if he calls it off, prompting elections that the prime minister could lose.
But Mr. Netanyahu is under growing international pressure, including from President Biden, to call off the Rafah operation because it would risk widespread harm to the more than one million civilians who have fled to the city since the war began.
He also faces a growing domestic backlash from opponents who believe he should secure the swift release of the remaining hostages, even if it comes at the cost of keeping Hamas in power.
The withdrawal from southern Gaza appeared on Monday to have given fresh momentum to negotiations to achieve a cease-fire and an exchange of Israeli hostages for Palestinian prisoners held inside Israel. Negotiations have stalled for months, in large part because Israel does not want to agree to a truce that allows Hamas to remain in charge of any part of Gaza, while Hamas is wary of a deal that does not ensure its long-term survival.
But after Israel redeployed its troops, several Israeli politicians, including Mr. Gallant, said they believed a deal could be struck, as mediators met in Cairo to try to reach a compromise.
Hamas did not release any official statements on Monday about the possibility of a deal, but on Sunday it restated several positions that Israel is unlikely to agree to, including the Israeli army’s full withdrawal from the territory.
Abu Bakr Bashir, Gabby Sobelman, Myra Noveck and Johnatan Reiss contributed reporting.
